Just curious if this site charged a small fee to sellers who only use thirdgen.org for primarily selling stuff why wouldn't that be a good thing. If they were charged it would allow the site to afford upgrades etc.Now I'm not saying people who are here for posting and answering questions but those who say primarily just use the site for business activity. Even if it was 1-5% of there sale price the donation would be reasonable considering what other type sales sites charge. Why give this to them for free?

 

Why not? It's a free community.

 

yea we are doing real good and have a real nice site just like it is, extra $$$$ would help, but its nice to be able to sell stuff at no cost

 

We do have paid sponsors and have for some time. If there are members that are simply using the site primarily for "business activity", and using the site as simply free advertising, you might want to send me a message with some details.

 

Yea but like this .... It would allow for enhancements and get rid of unwanted sponsor advertising. Like for instance one day I see a link for one of those bogus electric super chargers ..... I also think it would eliminate rip-offs that I have seen, if a member had to pay for a small fee before listing that in itself would semi deter bad sellers. ...... I just think buy charging that would allow a better community and better enhancements is all. and 1-5% isn't nothing.

 

I'm assuming you are talking about charging a fee for members to list things in our Classifieds, although you didn't exactly state such. I'm not sure how well that will work when plenty of other community-based websites allow you to post such items for free. In your suggested case, members will likely take their ad to another website. That would probably not help our community.

 

This site was created for the free exchange of information and for it's users to contribute to the community to make it better - at no charge - for everyone.

It is now a "FOR PROFIT" site that make $$ by advertizing on top of our - free - contributions to this community. The owners profit (directly and indirectly) from the free work of members and volenteers.

Sponsors pay for thier advertizing. The members see this advertizing and buy from the sponsors. Members are happy - Sponsors do buisiness - the site Owners get paid.

To charge a fee to create a web classified add would be an insult to those members that have made TGO what is is.





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It's not about getting rich! It's about having a better community through affording better everything. You're acting like it's some outragerous fee to list a ad ..... It's not like people are charged to be on the site. Just a sellers fee to make for a better forumn in that aspect to add better features for sellers but not in the auction type sense. Just software for better listings etc. Or to even just make it possible for moderators internet service to be paid for since they are donating there time and many of them go out of there way it seems to assist member with there problems.

 

Ok just asking in theory mr badnews (couldnt help but do it) say thirdgen did ask a 5% fee from sellers how would it collect this? You could use paypal and im not sure how that all works but I think paypal would ask thirdgen for a fee for that or at least a cut of the money and that really could make any kind of profits for the board minimal. Not only that but what about members who dont have a bank account? Sure they could get a paypal account with a credit card but It would leave them in a comprimised situation if they were short on money. I know I personaly hate selling with paypal because I dont have a bank account and prefer not to use my credit card as much as possible so that means that if I take a paypal payment I have to have the cash to back up shipping for whatever it is im selling and that is a pain if im low on funds (most likely being low on funds is the reson I am selling the item!)

To me having to pay a fee to sell would be a major inconveinence because I would need to sell on my paypal account to keep funds to pay the sellers fee and that would mean that the majority of my buying and selling would be done with paypal leaving me short on real paper $$$

Imo If you want to pay a fee to sell go to ebay! Yes we have to see advertising but hey I dont really mind it acctually sumtimes makes things conveinent like say I wana check out someting on Hawks boom its right there
as are some of its competitors.

This is just my opinions and they are opinions so please dont anyone get mad and if im wrong about anything let me know. I love thirdgen.org and always want better for the site but I do not feel that this will better thirdgen and its people

And on a completly seperate note I liken the idea of a sellers fee to tax and im not wesley snipes or anything but man its kinda nice to have a place not trying to tax you enjoy it and consider it a benifit of being a member

 

 

AMEN John Although we run into crooks now and then, we like our community the way it is

 

I agree with you to a point, I see sellers bumping their wares a few times a day and they don't contribute to the boards . Now this makes me upset but this is still a FREE site so we have to deal with it. That is why new members cannot sell without a certain amount of positive posts (it still doesn't work the way I planned it, but it works) There will always be good and bad but we need to be able to weed them out and hopefully people will start using the I trader so we can make TGO a more honest place for free trade

 

i agree this might deter would be theives. But so would be say like a $2.50 entry fee to the site. This though would deter members to joining and potentially people (such as yourself) out there ready to help others. I think that a fee is a good idea...just not in the case of this website. We as a community try to make a buck on what we sell, but also as sellers know that when we sell something, there are 100 other people with the same item...all the way from trying to make the most from thier item to "i just want to get rid of this thing." So as members, we sell to eachother at just about a rock bottom price, and in most situations try to help eachother out. To monitor these actions to the point of collecting fees would be probably more of an investment than the goal of 1-5%. I agree with you that the additional fees would be in good to put in place. But as a seller i like the fact that i don't have to deal with ebay charges WHILE i have to deal with paypal charges. Not to mention it's more personal selling things on this website, i have met a many of my fellow members of TGO from doing business on this site. I've travelled just in this past few winter months to conneticut, new jersey, pennsylvania, and within new york to meet many of the people i have done business with. I personally don't find myself in a high rate of selling such as a business, and not to name drop but the people who do do a lot of selling (of which some of the more common sellers have already posted here), while i see a high rate of selling items from them, i also see them doing thier part to better our community in helping people out and checking what they have doing thier best to get you parts that you need for reasonable prices. So in summation, while a great theory, it's hard to put in place due to the fact that it would deter people from joining/participating...prices would no longer be at rock bottom because they would take the fees on like some do for accepting pay pal and tack them to thier price of the iten, and it would probably cost money to accept these fees of which more than likely in the long run might work with a slight profit, but in the short run will actually be either a slight loss or about equal. Just my

 

If they took there posts elsewhere would it be such a huge loss? Since some don't do anything but sell on here whats the difference? Are they really hurting 3rdgen by selling elsewhere? If your sole intention here is just to sell and not partake in any constructive sense then basically all they are here for is to avoid paying for there commercial activity. I don't base this on all sellers since many seem to be elsewhere helping members and such. just a few should be paying is all.

 

Less membership, less active membership, less items made available inside our community, less traffic. Less traffic and membership figures impacts advertisers. Yes, it could matter.

I have to admit I may have missed some details until I re-reviewed this post to see the claim is that some may be simply using TGO for advertising and listing parts. If that is the case, then I should probably be informed - which has not been the case.

If someone is using TGO to simply advertise or do business, and they are not authorized, then it needs to be brought to my attention. That really isn't up for debate or a decision to be made here.

 

It took me about 2 minutes to ID 3 members that post 95% ( or higher ) of the time into only the classified forums. How many others would I find If I actually put a little effort into searching ?? All you need to do is look and you will find them.

It would be a disservice to this site and it's membership to punish or in some way limit these members from using the classifieds - just because they use only the classifieds. I never read anything in the board guidelines that state a member can only post in the classifieds if they post "helpful" information in the other forums. Who determines what it "helpful" ?? The 15 day / 15 post rule seems to be working fine.

These members are providing other members here with parts that they can't get anywhere else. Usually at a price that's far better than they would get anywhere else. Not to mention that many parts are hard to locate and finding 20+ Y/O parts of any quality is getting harder every year. ( I can recall when dash pads were selling here for $50 regularly ) When I need parts for my projects TGO is the first place I look; every time.

If Posting ONLY in the classifieds is really a problem - then the people monitoring the site should come up with a policy and place it in BOLD type in the announcment / sticky secion so that everyone can see it and understand that there is a new policy; before this new policy is implemented. After reading the board guidelines I have found no such policy in existence. If It's out there and I missed it, please; point it out !

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engi...uidelines.html

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engi...assifieds.html


It's a free site, like countless other auto related web sites. If TGO is hurting for or needs $$ for upgrades than start making people pay to be members..... A paid membership would than grant access to the classified boards. Don't charge a percentage for every classified add. In either case the results will negatively impact TGO.

 

If someone comes on here and creates a thread about this subject (people strictly using the Classifieds to do business and not contribute elsewhere), then they probably have some good leads as far as names as to who is doing this. If someone makes such a claim, I want to see their information in order to review. Please do not insult me by suggesting I'm not putting in the effort by taking 2 minutes to do a simple search. It is rather unfair and unrealistic to expect me to be able to be everywhere and know everything without some help from members here. I put in a lot of time and effort into this website as it is. This site relies on members doing their part, too!

If such policy were to be implemented, it would be my intention to do just that. I think that is not only rather obvious but also common sense. I do believe TGO's staff and management is fairly competent. TGO has been around for about a decade now.

That said, I'm editing my post because I've reviewed some things and I've come to a few conclusions.

First, if someone is using TGO to simply advertise or do business, and they are not authorized, then it needs to be brought to my attention. This really is not up for debate. It's probably not fair to the existing sponsors to require they pay to advertise and do business on our website while others may be doing it for "free".

As far as the Classifieds are concerned, at this time, I do not believe there will be really any such changes made at this time. I think both sides raised some good and interesting points that have been taken in. However, because such changes aren't planned at this time, discussing them is sort of irrelevant and not really necessary. Sort of a "what if" issue. It would be more appropriate to discuss such issues when, or if, that point is reached.

I'm locking this thread because I don't feel this thread has any good directions to go. People are going to have their difference of opinion.

Understand that it is our job to do what we feel is best for the community and website.