Forum "Merit" or "reputation" - Effectiveness vs Barrier to join?

[zomgmike]

Something I'm starting to see on more forums is the concept of "merit." If you haven't seen it, conceptually it is privileges based on how many "likes" (or similar) you get rather than post count.  Ideally it is top stop spammers and promote quality posts.

So it has the obvious good side of community-policed spam prevention. Junk posts and obvious spammers never get likes or merits and can't post their links.  But the downside, it would seem, is that you kind of have to bust through a social barrier to be a full member.  Has anyone seen dropoff in new members really taking hold after implementing it?

[Kindred]

why not stop spammers from ever registering in the first place?   That is a much better use of resources.

and this...  no. I would never even consider implementing such a system as it promotes cliques indeed does serve as a very visible barrier to new users.

I would also argue that this has nothing at all to do with merit, which can not be measured by a simple number like post-count or even like-count

[landyvlad]

Personally I think it's gimmicky and childish.  Most forums I am on don't use it, and on those that have it, it isn't used properly.

I definitely would not have it on a forum of mine.