There's a big difference between yourself claiming your trades with certain users have been successful and these people actually acknowledging it in the eyes of others. Any scammer could falsely claim the same, but they couldn't force those they scammed to acknowledge them. So basically, regardless of their past, a "not rated" user passes as "not rated" along with all the scammers and multis (news flash: the scammer tagged accounts fall into disuse because their owners switch to new ones over and over).

Sure, the trusted tag exist, but it doesn't solve the problem, considering how restrictive and statistically insignificant it is. The huge "not rated" group is divided between the scammers' current accounts and those who trade honestly. I think users that went through a large amount of transactions without problems should be able to recognize each other even if they don't know each other personally.

This post was edited by Sylvanas on Apr 3 2009 12:25am

This is why we have mediators. They donate their free time to make the situation you are describing a little better. Use them!

what about if this higher status was based off this:



It is possible for # of posted reported to be recorded, so dont say it is not. > So you will say what about posts that are wrongly reported. > Well from my understanding of the system, when a post is reported it goes to a que for moderators to "look at", if it is indeed a wrongful post, mod should awknowledge it, hence giving negative points.

This should work to a decent extent, cause all the wanna be trusted report the crap outta all wrongful posts and spam

::Edit:: and # of fg tractions (not in LS) and the amount of fg that is IN/OUT a month could also be factors

This post was edited by hasteful on Apr 3 2009 12:32am

Mediator trades prevent the "I take your fg or item and run as fast as I can" kind of scamming, but sadly not the "I give you your item only for you to find it gone after joining 3 games", the most harmful kind. =/

Worse, since items poofing can't be proved, scammers can do it over and over intentionally without getting locked. If there was a way to verify feedback concerning what users sold, well... that'd be helpful. I'm aware that adding a widespread trader rank would be difficult, and that it probably won't be done without some kind of major crisis, but I'm just trying to explain the good it would bring. I won't be disappointed to see it won't happen, because I'm honestly don't expecting anything. Being cautious and following my intuition has served me well, but this stuff is really harmful to many others.

This post was edited by Sylvanas on Apr 3 2009 12:38am

@DoomOnYou

I didn't edit my original post, however the #3 post pointed out almost immidiately after your initial post the active clause that I forgot to include explicitly in the first post, so it's not that hard to figure out if you read and think a bit. I'll consider this argument null, as the active over long period of time without warns method would work for all but the most programming saavy determined to beat it types, unless you have a new argument to add?

@hedonism

I disagree. There is a stigma. Because there are "trusted", inherently there must be an opposite and that opposite unfortunately leaks onto everyone else. Scammers, Banneds, Lockeds, sure. But normal members too. Nearly four years I've been here, zero warns, average a little under a post a day, have a donor star, and still there is no trust from most regular members to me. That is not right. And I'm one of the exceptions, most have not been here that long, and don't have a donor star.

@ all trusted's, mediators, mods, etc

I can fully see you want to protect your oligopoly on offering services via thread creation, and I don't blame you. It's a nice way to make FG. I wouldn't even care, except at all times and especially this late in ladder it is a real pain in the butt to sell anything that's not perfect or an exceptional rare unless you happen to find someone ISO for exactly what you have. This is equally rare if you don't troll the sales forum constantly (we regular users maybe stop by once or twice a day). I couldn't even sell a HR at standard discount price (8) today, tried three times. I can't mention why this is, but everybody knows full well. Lots of people playing D2 in their sleep and making magic happen with lag, shall we say. That leaves services or ladder slasher as the last viable ways to make a little FG here and there for regular members who don't play in their sleep.

I joined a guild, which I wanted to do anyways, and play with a group of fun people. Many of them hooked me up with alot of gear I otherwise wouldn't have, with all the MF'ing in the world. Simply because the last viable options I have left as a casual player for making some fg have gone out the window with your oligopoly. And that stinks. So think it over before you critique so hard.

@cardoors32

I remember trading with you, years ago. You used to buy pgems from me 40 at a time. I was coming into ladder 2 or 3 I believe mid-way through.

Dad is the only Senior I remember because I once found a truly awesome small poison charm in a hell cow game, first legitimately amazing thing I had ever found, (best before that being a vex also in cows), 423 poison I believe. Somewhere around that mark. I don't PvP, but apparently that one was of the numbers on poison small charms that had been duped in the past and Dad made a post bidding on it and eventually retracted after someone made a mention this one was of those numbers. Probably because of concern of the dupe, but he did so respectfullly and as quietly as possible. Well of course that didn't go unnoticed, which immediately ruined the thread because when he posted trolls followed. A dozen trolls hopped on board, and he felt quite bad afterwards having to close the thread and apologized. Didn't really bother me, just a funny side story. That's the event from which I remember the guy. Funny the odd things a person remembers.

But I bet dimes to dollars you still wouldn't trust me in a trade for more than a fg or two! Which just goes to prove the point. The current system could use an upgrade.

@ my guildie godz =)

I was chatting in vent as we ran an Uber tonight, when I was putting this original post together. My guildie said something interesting.

"I tried like that for a couple years, real hard to get a tag. I'm an early 07. [maybe he said 06, I forget] Did everything right, didn't bother nobody, didn't scam nobody. Them fuckers wouldn't give me anything for two years, so finally I said fuck it. If they aren't gonna allow me to trade with a tag for being good, I might as well be bad. Cause apparently nobody's paying attention."

He's a bit brash sometimes, but he's also a good guy and he makes a good point. There is no incentive for anybody to be good, only incentive not to be bad, and not much of an incentive at that. Proxy/Swap IP, make a new account, and it's right back to game on for the scammer.

A reverse of the warn system over time actively posting without warns would help regular members get to a point where they could trade freely and run services without prejudice. I can see now it's a simple matter of the Fraternity boys in the trusted catagory not wanting their frat house infringed upon by an alternate system of getting a reputation simply by merit of measurable statistics time/activity/warns/#trades/etc. That's understandable, just be honest about it and don't snowball with these silly excuses why the system would immediately fail. The warn system works with relative success. This is a basic opposite, medicated over years.

That explains perfectly why I am such a prick.
Thanks for putting it so eloquently with nice imagery there.

It isn't an "oligpoly" and noones is trying to protect their tag, my assumption is they want to tag people for trust but they aren't going to tag just anybody.

Donor stars and join date to my knowledge has nothing to do with obtaining a trusted tag, because you see yourself more fit than other people on the forums also does not mean you should have one.

I'm aware Daniel will elaborate much more but your not getting or understanding the idea of the trusted tag, it isn't about earning fg off it. It is something you may or may not get after being a trusted user on the forums, you don't need it and you shouldn't change your behavior to get it or once you have it.

Just BE trusted and if you don't get it in 2-3 years it is no reason to change your behavior..just continue to be as you were regardless of the blue letters.

Those truly deserving of the tag would act out of kindness because it's the right thing to do, not only because they are seeking some sort of reward for their behavior.

It has absolutely nothing to do with us wanting to preserve our "frat house" and more with us wanting to keep the site a safe place to trade for everyone that uses this site. The fact of the matter is that any automated system of gaining "reputation points" or whatever you want to call them can be abused, whether that be over a short period of time or a long one.

I want to reiterate here something I typed up in ipod's thread: I often see topics like this that seem to make it a fight between the "average joe" and the "big bad mod team" who is not recognizing that joe is trustworthy. Please understand that we (the mod team) are here to try and make every user's experience on jsp as good as it can be. We are not here to try and lord ourselves over you or to be an elitist group. We are here to serve you.

Trusted tags are not handed out like candy because we care about the users on this site, and want to make sure that the trusted tag will not be abused to exploit those users. For this same reason a tag like you are suggesting will not be created because of the reason Hedonism said above:

I Have to agree with This dood.
You are tagged becuz OF THE trust, And trusted becuz of the tag
or something like that
point is

Give a TT to any old member and Pauls Forums are going to get hectic