I'm usually against restricting things more than they have to be, but things are getting a little crazy with the sale forums:

- it seems like half the posts there are by "members" that have 0 technical posts or very few, and I've even seen a few complain that they are getting treated as second class citizens. The fact is that they're here because other forums don't allow you to post in the for sale section till you have some minimum number of posts, and often have other restrictions. There are a few that I'm pretty sure are junkyards or other kinds of vendors that have <50 posts, but have had hundreds of for sale posts. I suspect that other's are scammers of sorts, I've seen multiple posts in multiple locations for the same stuff or ones that really seem not to have the item that they're selling (there is one on there now with no posts, and only pictures of the instructions that you could download and print, but none of the item, may be legit, but I'm not going to take the chance)
- you can waste a lot of time searching through posts that don't have enough info to actually sell, or people could assume that they are selling something that really isn't what you expect. I don't know how many "hood for an '87" type adds I've seen without specifying camaro or firebird or what, or large items that you probably couldn't ship without a location. Suggestions: some other sites require a location as part of the title (some forums actually have a state pulldown you have to select to submit), some forums automatically delete any ads without enough info, no questions asked (it's too big a hassle for the mods to ask every single one, list some instructions and if you can't read them... oh well)...

there's other things, but in general I'm thinking that there just need to be clearer rules there and more strict enforcement... It seems like we're slowly getting more leaches here, and I'm hoping that they don't ruin a forum that a lot of us have been members of for a _long_ time because of the sense of community that this place has

 

The site already restricts members to have 15 days of membership before they can post. I'm sorry, but we cannot really require too much more restrictions in order to access the Classifieds. Requiring a minimum post count does not come without its own issues as people learn what the minimum post is to participate, and then make posts to just bump up their post count. We've always been about post quality, not post quantity. You require a minimum post count and then you setup for people making quantity posts.

There's already a drop-down menu, part of a thread prefix title, that I previously added so that the member can select the State. It's been there for some time and has been used fairly regularly but is not required. The threads you see a state abbreviation inside brackets (e.g., [CA]) as part of the thread title are those who used the drop-down thread prefix to select their state.

Do you report the posts that aren't following the rules?

 

I have reported a few people that were clearly violating rules or just being unnecessary abusive and I don't think I've ever seen a response from it. For a while I was convinced that a couple of the forums were not actually actively moderated and even volunteered to do it and never got a response there either.

Along the lines of the first part, I just went looking to see if I had a reply to this after the last 3 for sale posts that I read all had post counts in the single digits, one had 54 posts trying to sell something with a post count of 1, one had 39 (interestingly all the same items over the last year) and the 3rd I don't remember...

I don't really see a problem with requiring something like a post count above some number to post a classified post, if people start posting trash to raise there count it will be obvious and just ban them immediately and delete there posts. Most other forums do that and most of these guys aren't going to waste their time trying to get a real post count before selling.

I've been around and active for a LONG time here and at least I feel like I've helped a lot of people with there cars, projects... have met a ton of people from this board in person... I guess I'm just seeing a distinct change with fewer people posting useful info, more people playing games, threads full of completely non-fbody, not even car related pictures... Maybe I'm just getting old and cranky.

 

Heh, I just noticed that I've been here longer than you have... actually, that doesn't look right... I could have sworn that I've been a member longer then that... heck, I remember arguing with Bruce about crossfire setups back when almost no one used the internet (I bought my crossfire car I think in '91..., I'm currently on my 4th f-body..., and I actually currently own 3), but I don't think that this site existed at the time, or when Andris's car was his college engineering project, when a bunch of us moved on to 4th gens and then came back to 3rd gens...

 

Yup, you got an account older than mine. There's actually many accounts that are older than mine, however, that was not a sole deciding factor when Dirk brought aboard the staff - such as he did with me. The real world is full of examples of people that are younger and/or newer than some of the people they oversee, guide or are responsible for.

The system logs all Report Posts. I checked the Reported Posts to look into finding what posts you had reported that you indicate did not get attention so that I could see what type of issue may exist. The last reported post the system shows by you was on 05-17-2009 at 06:02 PM CT and was for a post in the Fabrication section. The post that you reported was Moderated due to rule violations. I could not locate anything earlier than that. In fact, there has been few Report Posts in the Classifieds over a recent period of time. Doesn't mean that issues don't exist, however, it does mean that there may not be some helping by Reporting posts that may need attention. We do rely on members to help in the form of using the Report Post feature.

Additionally, it does not necessarily mean that moderation is inactive if they don't act on a Reported Post. It's Moderation that takes any required action based on the Reported Post and what it may or may not violate. Some cases action is not required while other cases actions may be noticable in public or only in private (e.g., warnings via PM, etc.).

My initial suggestion, at this time, if you wish to help, would be to use the Report post feature if you think there are some posts that need attention to confine within the rules.

Thank-you.

 

Didn't really mean anything by the "longer" comment, don't know that it matters at all, and wasn't all the forum info reset sometime around then?

Honestly, I haven't bothered reporting for a while... because of what I mentioned and a few other issues (and by responses I ment to PM's to the moderators of the forum in question).

I guess I need to go through and take a look at what the current rules are, but I don't believe that the posts that I'm talking about are actually violating any rules, and that was the reason I posted here, since it seems like most of the classified posts that I've run across lately fit one of the categories that I listed. It's getting to the point where I'm starting to wonder if even looking there is a waste of time since the sale items are being offered by people that have no history or vested interest here and doesn't have the protection of a site like ebay (there is no good way of getting a real name, any repercussions to them not following through...)

 

Just to make the point, these are the alerts that I got in my inbox from the classified forum, all the ones that I've seen so far today fit in with what I'm saying (most of these have tons of posts and very low post counts, I don't know about you but I find it a bit discouraging):
https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engine-drivetrain-suspension-parts/612421-slp-line-lock-brand.html#post4921924

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engi...-computer.html

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engi...ml#post4921584

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/exte...passenger.html

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engi...ml#post4923634

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

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engi...ng-slicks.html

 

Not wanting to deal with members who have low post count, or those not participating in the technical sections, is your decision and is respected.

Adding a post quantity before being able to access the Classifieds will add an incentive to post quantity over quality. ThirdGen.org promotes quality over quantity, and as such, does not provide incentive to post quantity. As it is, there is no difference (permission wise) between an account with 10 posts and one with 10,000 posts. They have the same level of access.

You introduce a post quantity to access the Classifieds, and not only do you have to determine how many posts qualify (set posts upfront, or set posts over the life of the account), but you also have to define what is considered acceptable posts. You also have to enforce it. When a member with 10 posts replies with a "that's cool" response to a thread while a Senior member does the same, if you delete or moderate the post from the 10 post member because you *think* it's an attempt to gain access to the Classifieds, you then have new issues. Forcing members to post in the Technical section could easily turn into bad and/or poor information distributed and "pollute" the technical sections with bad data.

Even with eBay and Paypal, there are still some risks involved and some ways to still get scammed. There is no guarantee.

Ultimately, it's up to the other party to decide if they want to deal with the other party or not and to use best judgment. If you do not feel comfortable doing a transaction with these parties because they don't post in the Technical sections, or have a low post count, that's your decision and is respected.

 

Although I agree with you in theory, and wouldn't have a problem if it was an occasional thing, the reason that I bring this up is that it's becoming very common, to the point that it is one of the things that some of us old timers feel is changing the flavor of the board.

Oh well, if you don't see the problem I guess I'll leave it alone (and probably unsub the classified forums).

 

I know that I said that I'll leave this alone, but this is ridiculous, what does someone like this add to this board:
https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engi...ock-brand.html

230posts and no post count and some sort of lie in most of them. In this thread he posts that its "new" line lock, only posts pics of the instructions and that you refuse to post pics but I found them in a previous post:
https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/engi...63-delete.html

Does this look new:

 

83, are you the first to report those threads (as far as you know)? I don't moderate those boards, but I will say that at least three members could have reported that thread (the one that has the picture of an obviously very used line lock) to ensure it was closed and, possibly, looked in to. Obviously it was missed, and that happens everywhere, but it appears that once you reported it the situation appears to have been handled.

I'm not saying anything for or against your above posts, I am advocating that TGO members can help one another, too, by reporting these things rather than simply making a funny post and leaving it as is. I will say, and I mean to take absolutely NOTHING away from your points that I spend A LOT of time on offshore racing sites, and these sites have various versions of your suggestions as rules on VERY HIGH DOLLAR sales and people are still burnt all the time. Again, taking nothing from you at all, but it's just the nature of the beast IMO, you simply have no guaranteed way to get rid of the vermin who are happy to steal from others.

Best wishes to everyone as always.

EDIT: BTW, I speak as a member of TGO, not staff or for TGO.

 

As I previously requested, please use the Report Post feature. As 92 Formula stated, there is no records of that post being reported.

However, it was reported to me yesterday, via PM, that this person was a previously banned member that was known to have caused problems with transactions. Based on that, the member was banned on receipt of that information. Thank-you to the member who did help by reporting this member to me.

Unfortunately, to be realistic, this type of stuff is going to happen on just about any community based site. Even sites that collect personal and financial information (such as eBay and PayPal) still have problems with transactions.

Besides members using best judgment (to supplement the tools such as our iTrader and Classifieds feedback forum) when determining to do business with another member, I think it would be much more helpful if someone were interested and active in helping spot concerns with specific members and bringing it to Staff's attention via Report Post feature and/or PMs.

Thank-you.