The New Marketplace Rules are Too Restrictive

[goamules]

And for the Moderator that says "controlling bumping was sooooo harrrrrddddd.....it took all my tiiiiimmmeee...." Um, what is a moderator supposed to do? Sit on high dispensing their wisdom in occasional witty, patronizing posts? Or to quietly moderate behind the scenes? I moderate the Collodion.com forum, and you'd barely know it. And I don't post long lectures about how hard my job is to "school" members.

And it may be just me, but it seems there is MORE work for the moderators now, than before. A quick check of the For Sale a min ago:



Tell you what, and I say again: my idea is to let democracy rein. Give moderation abilities to the forum senior members, all of them. At least for the For Sale section. Let US decide what is excessive bumping. Rather than you volunteering for moderation, then threatening to shut down the For Sale section any time anyone complains. Who gave you that decision authority? Or give ME the moderation of the For Sale forum, and I'll do it, if you put it back how it was.

[Paul Cunningham]

I find them too restrictive also. I understand that this is not a democracy, but isn't the intent to serve the community, even at the cost of a bit of effort?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[stawastawa]

But if I do a search for, say, Fujinon 90mm lens, all relevant threads containing those words will be displayed, including those that were in the classifieds.
They're not hidden if one just uses the search function.

The search extent is somewhat of an issue.

...
If we run out of database room (which we get for free), we may delete some or all of the for-sale archive. We are therefore trying to keep substantive discussions in the main forums. There is no coffee shop in the FS forums--the coffee machine is in the main forums. The water cooler is in the Lounge.
...

Archiving/deleting the F/S forums is a good reason to not want important information put there. But have the new rules resulted in more information on the forum? I think that if valuable information is shared in FS threads, for it to be valuable someone has to recognize it, and it should be encouraged that people then share that in non archived areas. But at the moment of sales, getting information and discussion on an item can be important, and encourages those with coffee or beer to interact.
Also, Great analogy.

...
1. The intent was to not allow Dealers to sell items. But several members NEVER posted anywhere except the For Sale section. And not just one item, once a month. Dozens and dozens of items every month, from a flash cable, to a digital or 35mm camera, to a yard sale found enlarger lens. Sorry, but these are "dealers." And they are the reason an individual, occasional seller had to "bump", because when someone posts 12 items at once, you are pushed to lower pages. Did the new change that doesn't allow a new comment to come to the top, fix this problem? Nope, didn't change a thing for dealers who post 100s of items a year.
...
3. Shill bumpers. Some people would knowingly or unknowingly bump their friends items with comments such as "this is a great buy!". We asked for that to stop, and it was greatly reduced. The new system that only allows the seller to post anything on his for Sale thread was kind of like fixing a scratch in your car with a 10 lb. sledgehammer.
...

The no more than 3 FS posts per day rule has helped prevent dealers, the rest of the changes I'm not so sure have.
I found the "great buy" posts to be helpful, as they were often from members who I had seen posting elsewhere in the forum who I felt trusting of their opinion.

Someone posted that part of the goal was to change how posts show up in the 'new posts' section. Is it possible to have a 'new posts' page that shows posts for each of the forum sections? One for the "community forums" one for the "LF forums" (and one could then make one for a separate "marketplace" forums)?

[Leigh]

We are therefore trying to keep substantive discussions in the main forums.

But Rick...

Why would a comment regarding a particular FS or WTB item be more appropriate in a general forum?

A person reading the post in the Classifieds would have no way of knowing that such a thread existed.

-----

The suggestion that this saves storage space is specious.

In fact, the new procedure wastes more storage space. Example:

I recently PMd a seller suggesting that certain information be added to his thread.
He did so.
So now you have two posts that have to be saved (my PM and his in-thread post) rather than one.

-----

The idea that deleting a Classifieds thread containing comments loses "general information" is also specious.
If the comments are about the specific item listed, losing them only deletes that specialized information.

- Leigh

[sanking]

How complicated does a FS/WTB section have to be? I participate in a number of forums that have FS sections. For example, here is the For Sale section of the Luminous Landscape forum.


For Sale
A place to list items for sale. No commercial ads allowed. No 'silent' auctions; asking price should be stated. Please move all questions and negotiations offline. Restricted to photography related products.

That is it. And you can see that a lot of merchandise is advertised on that forum.


Compare that simplicity to the rules on the LF forum.

For Sale or Trade -- USE OF THIS AREA IS STRICTLY AT YOUR OWN RISK. This is a private area open only to those who have been members for 30 days or more. Classified ads are limited to the photographic equipment (all formats), photography books, and prints of registered users. The item for sale must be owned by and in the possession of the seller or its location and ownership status fully disclosed in the sales listing. Items that the member may wish to simply give away should be listed here, with the preface “Free” in the thread title. The sales price must be clearly stated in the original post. Auctions are not permitted, nor are announcements, pointers or links to items for sale at other web sites or points of sale. They are prohibited and will be deleted without notice. Please prefix all post titles to indicate intent: "FS" , or "FT" (for trade), etc. Please read the Guidelines specific to this section prior to posting, or risk deletion..

Wanted To Buy -- USE OF THIS AREA IS STRICTLY AT YOUR OWN RISK. This is a private area open only to those who have been members for 30 days or more. WTB ads are limited to photographic equipment (all formats), photography books, and prints desired to be purchased by registered users. Please read the Guidelines specific to this section prior to posting, or risk deletion.
For Sale Member-Made LF Gear and Accessoreis -- USE OF THIS AREA IS STRICTLY AT YOUR OWN RISK. This is a private area open only to those who have been members for 30 days or more. For-sale ads here are limited to new LF gear, accessories and LF darkroom gear actually made by the member placing them up for sale. Threads (in this sub-forum) will be displayed in the date/time order of the initial post, newest first. Please read the guidelines for this section prior to posting, or risk your post being deleted.
Buyer Seller Advisories -- Any reports about the outcomes of transactions with providers of products and services to large-format photographers must be made in the "Buyer/Seller Advisories" sub-forum. The purpose of this sub-forum is to provide a service to large-format photographers who need to know whom to trust in a small market. All posts in other forums complaining about specific transactions will be moved to this forum, and repeated mispostings by a person may result in moderator action. Threads in the Buyer/Seller Advisories forum must be: -Factual -Unemotional -Related only to what actually happened. Comments about the character or honesty of the person described will be deleted without notice, and repeated negative personal comments will result in moderator actions. Remember, personal attacks and abuse to other site users is not allowed on this forum. Demands for action are also not appropriate anywhere on the Large Format Photography Forum, and will be removed. The LFPF does not provide any mechanism for seeking resolution of an unsatisfactory transaction--resolution must be pursued outside the forum. This sub-forum is for simple reports of outcomes of transactions here and elsewhere. If the transaction occurred elsewhere, then it must involve transactions of products or services relevant to the large-format community.

Seriously, guys, in an effort to solve a real or perceived problem I would suggest that you have created something of a monster. Moderators, please consider that your approach in creating a rule for every moment may be the wrong approach.

Sandy

[David Lobato]

How complicated does a FS/WTB section have to be?

Sandy

Since these new policies came in I have stayed away from the For Sale section. In fact, I still haven't browsed there. I can't explain why, but it seemed just too complicated. Seemed like having to learn another software application, ugh. Prior to that I was somewhat active in buying and selling. Not sure if I will jump in again or not.

[rdenney]

The LL rules are simply stated, and not that different from ours. They also disallow the very things people are complaining that we disallow here. Maybe they arrived by a different path. Maybe they pay their moderators. I honestly don't know.

I do know that too many people find whatever line we draw and dance right up to it, crying crocodile tears if the step a toe over the line and we take some action (or if we don't take action). So the line has become more precisely drawn over the years in the hopes people will be able to more reliably avoid it. Maybe Michael (RIP) or his mods just banned those people without trying to be so precise.

We could select a FS czar with absolute power, but I don't think that's what people want.

I know for sure that no matter what rules we've tried for the sales forum, and we've tried many different formulations, there has been a dedicated opposition to them. That gets tiring, but worse it just chases the rules in circles, if we let it.

I've just gotten off 9 hours of flying, trying to respond to this while catching my breath running between flights. I'm just grumpy.

Rick "who has read complaints about the sales forum for the entire time it has existed" Denney

[rdenney]

Since these new policies came in I have stayed away from the For Sale section. In fact, I still haven't browsed there. I can't explain why, but it seemed just too complicated. Seemed like having to learn another software application, ugh. Prior to that I was somewhat active in buying and selling. Not sure if I will jump in again or not.

Why?

One doesn't have to study the rules to buy things. I just last night browsed the first four or five pages, and it took about a two minutes. But only rarely do I find anything to buy--I already have everything I need. I have never used the sales forum here for dedicated buying, and I have only used it for filling in the corners of a kit.

If someone wants to buy a camera according to a general spec (monorail vs field, for example), a quick scan identifies what's available. But if I'm looking for something specific like a Sinar board with a 42mm hole, I go to dedicated sales sites. If I happen to see one here and think I might have a use for it, I buy it, but I have to be pretty lucky for specific stuff to appear just when I decide I need it. That was true when I first joined this forum, and it's still true.

This isn't a store and the breadth of what is available has never been enough to use it for dedicated shopping as opposed to speculative shopping.

If someone is building a kit and they don't know what they want, they should ask those questions in the main forum. Maybe even do a bit of searching and reading for similar questions and use cases. I've seen many sales threads in the past derailed because someone hijacked the conversation to ask if that's what they needed, and if not, what do they need, etc.

Sellers want to sell things, not provide counseling. If I'm selling something, I don't think I want a bunch of questions and comments from people not really interested in buying.

We used to receive quite a lot of complaints about that--the discussion distracted from and sometimes undermined the sale. Lots of people used to comment on the asking price, people who weren't themselves potential customers. We used to receive many complaints about that, too. And then there the bumping wars, where a dedicated few climbed all over each other to elbow everyone else out of the way. Only the bumpers liked that. Sellers never liked the "PM sent" posts, where buyers who had not actually done (yet) any buying tried to keep others from doing so. Many complaints--those PMs that were sent often contained low-ball offers or requests to do things the seller had already said he wouldn't do in the sales listing. And, yes, there were those who listed two dozen items in a batch, flooding the forum with items not from their own usage but bought just for resale. How are we supposed to detect that? The extremes are obvious but that leaves a lot of middle ground.

It's not just that the mods dislike complaints, it's that many of these complaints revealed problems for the targets of the service: regular members who want to occasionally sell things or buy things with people they know through the forum. They are the people we are trying to serve.

So, I can browse a hundred posts in a minute or two, and if I see something, I can click on the seller's username and send a PM or email. That's how I've always bought things on the sales forum, and what I see now is that browsing every few days won't require me to scan through a bunch of posts I've already seen. It seems to me that it's easier.

What I'm hearing is that people want to trade stuff at the water cooler, and that casual buyers won't browse stuff unless the sales forum seems like the coffee-break room. Maybe that's true. But we had moved away from being able to do that long ago, judging from the long history of dedicated complaining.

Rick "wondering about demand and supply" Denney

[cowanw]

Nevertheless somehow this thread gets bumped to the top with each post in my daily viewing and has the chit chat.
FS: Water Heater Recirculator 7000 Calumet / Arkay

[jnantz]

maybe if the for sale forum was broken down into parts of a "kit" it would make it easier for people who have trouble finding stuff because they can't search for it ...
for example have a subsection, "accessories" where compendiums, dark cloths, shutter releases, tripods do dads, and light meters are, then a "modern" lens section, then a "vintage lens" section
then a camera body section ( one for each size 4x5, 5x7, and ULF ) then "complete camera and lens" ..

i never go to the buy sell section not because it is complicated but because there is usually nothing i want, and things i have to sell no one wants
but i find it to be kind of funny that no matter how the buy/sell forum is - no rules, sort of rules, more active rules no one is happy. while it is a great service
this website offers, it always seems to be a large pain in the neck for the moderators who have to deal with complaints behind the scenes, and now every 5 or 8 days
threads about how the for sale sale section stinks now because it is just a for sale listing wtih out chat about the item. one would think if someone wants to know about an item
they don't know about they could google it, and then PM the owner a question about it, and if it is imporant to the sale of the item maybe the owner could update the for sale page
with something like " does not contain 15 waterhouse stops it originally came with, or felt lined box and instruction manual from 1910" or "rear element has a gouge in it 2" deep, here is a photograph
of the gouge, i have filled it with black water color ( can be removed with water ) and expsed this film wide open to show its effect in the print"
or maybe an interested buyer could start a thread in the main forum about noba studio cameras, and ask if anyone knows where they were made, what formats they came in
and the features and benefits of the system ... instead of a 5 page long conversation in the for sale section ... the website is about large format photography, not just a for sale section ...
probably info on the noba camera ( and links to other threads and info ) might be helpful to others that find ore are interesetd in that type of camera ... i don't think for sale items come up
in the search when one searches the main forum, unless they use google to search for things... ( i might be wrong )