link to non-supporting vendor removed by staff

[HJA]

Hi.

New here. Made like 4 posts, most recent being this: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/pocket-sharpener-looking-for-suggestions.1789667/post-20508628

basically wanted to recommend a whetstone to someone. Few minutes later the link was removed by an admin because "non-supporting vendor". Err..? What? The self-proclaimed 'leading edge of knife discussion' doesn't even allow links to products unless what, they've paid their bribe money or something?

Presumably there's some list of unpersons somewhere that are not allowed to be linked to? Was I meant to vaguely hint at their name, perhaps through some sort of riddle? Overzealous censorship kinda kills my motivation to post anything.

 

[MolokaiRider]

It’s self explanatory as non-supporting vendors are not allowed advertising on this private forum.

It is not censorship.

 

[hhmoore]

The simplest solution is to review the rules you agreed to follow when you registered to use the site, rather than just assume you can do/post whatever you want & get upset when you find out otherwise.
To make it easy, the part that specifically applies to this situation is:

BladeForums.com stays open thanks to the users who have paid subscriptions, including the dealers who pay to advertise here. If a site doesn't advertise here, you are not allowed to link to items they have for sale.

The extension of that - written, or not - is that you are not allowed to link to the sites...meaning one can't get around that rule by linking to the home page, rather than the specific item.