Well, to  be honest. I was and am wearing signature since the day the merit was introduced back in January. I start this "new age" as a Full Member and now here i am with 341 merits, which mean i got 241 merits while i use signature. Maybe some people who read this will try and look into my merit history and will says that my merits are mostly from meta section. Guess what? People can post in meta but doesnt mean they will get merits, if the post is merited, then someone thinks that it is worthy enough to be merited. That is why i am proud of my merits where ever i got it from.

I guess, there is 2 different side of your case. While you got less with signature, some people just got the merit in a faster rate while using signature (i am not saying this is me).

The problem is not all the good posts were get merited so the merit distribution is not equal even the two good posts will get different amount of merits it based on how much people reading this and how much think that this is worthy to be merited.We are in scarcity for merit sources I think.
If you get caught for merit trading you will be negged so never try to use their service for rank up.

I won't dispute that you have been on a signature the whole time since the merit system was started, but weren't you in a different signature campaign in January/February, as compared with the one that you have now?

Nice to see you’ve gone through the whole referenced thread, and not just to the referenced OPs, therefore getting the whole context.
To answer your questions:

A)   No, I did not separate personal signature from a campaign signature. I gave it a go, but there were so many distinct signatures that classifying them seemed rather painstaking. I believe I stated this in the original thread where the study was performed somewhere. Actually, what I really wanted at the time to group signatures by campaign and see where that led me, but since signatures differ per rank, and content of the signatures too, I had to give it a pass and settle for the simpler version of signature present/absent.

B)   The analysis only took into consideration merited members, so the considered user base is that of those that had achieved at least 1 sMerit at the time, thus disregarding all other users. That was the focus I intended really. I was therefore not concerned with forum members that has not achieved a single merit at the time, whether being active or inactive.

P.D. Thanks for the proper table format. I have since formatted data better, normally enclosed in code sections with padded spaces to align things properly (prior treatment on excel for the padding).

Yes.... exactamente..   My memory triggered further, too.

The current top 3 most merited user (LoyceV) is on ChipMixer's campaign.
The top 6, hilariousetc is also in the same campaign.
The top 8, Lutpin is using a paid signature.
The top 12, The Pharmacist is also with ChipMixer.

and the list goes on... actually, a big part of the top 100 most merited users are in a signature campaign. So, I think it's safe to assume that this doesn't mean a lot.

You're already one step too far: it depends on the signature campaign. If someone wears a signature advertising some token for an ICO, and gets paid in tokens, I often don't read his post. If I don't read it, he won't receive any Merit for sure.
I know your signature campaign has a strict manager, mine too, but most of the ICO spammers don't care about anything. It's simply not worth reading all the crap that's posted.
FYI: I only started using a paid signature when I was a Full Member, and I'm currently only in my second campaign on this forum. If anything, these (strict) campaigns made me improve my posts, as I always feel like I'm going to be judged for what I post.

That post was merited by me, so let me respond to this. What set your posts apart is your first line:
This may or may not have been a joke, but I don't think it's true. I don't have to agree with a post to Merit it, but I must believe the information is correct to do so. Example: this post of yours. I partially disagree, but it's worth reading.
The reason I merited JayJuanGee's post is explained here.

I especially try to Merit Newbies who aren't spammers. This forum needs "normal" new users, and if I see one, I Merit him. It's just hard to find that normal new user amongst thousands of spammers.

I doubt it, but if you really believe this, you could consider it an investment to get rid of your signature until you're a Full or Sr. Member. That will increase the value of your siganture, and could earn back the lost revenue.

This isn't true. Only Merit sources aren't allowed to sell Merit.
Merit abuse isn't moderated, but you risk red trust from DT.

Well, i guess i did a mistake in choosing some word and made the sentences differ from what i mean.

Yes, signature campaign is used as many variable in the talks that happen in this forum, either it is good or bad. Well everybody has opinion on it but it is better if everybody can bring up evidence like you said JJG, i agree with you. Upon your experience, it is quite interesting if it is happened to me which came from a 3rd world country because with that amount, i can pay up my college fees till i graduated.

Well, as you may recognize, in late 2015, when I began with my participation in signature campaigns, BTC prices had been stagnant and going down for the two prior years, so accordingly during the beginning of my participation BTC prices were around $250 and they were going up during that time to peak in the $19k arena... so yeah, some of the campaigns were scrambling to figure out how to pay their participants when BTC were rising so rapidly (especially in 2017 and in late 2017).

These days, it would take a lot longer to earn 3 BTC through any kind of regular BTCTalk member (posting) participation in signature campaigns.

Nonetheless, I do understand also that signature campaigns can still constitute a fairly decent income for some members, depending on their local economies, and surely some of those financial incentives had ben screwing up the forum because of the incentive to spam or even farm accounts.. .so in the long run, if the forum is figuring out ways to filter out farmed accounts, then contributions will be better, and I also agree that a lot of members are likely giving merits based on quality of posts and the sharing of substantive ideas, rather than the turn off that comes from folks posting nonsense or directly seem to be attempting to scheme or scam other members.