Petition to Forum Moderators regarding "Deal Spotting"

ufox9al

ufox9al

Slacker at large
Moderator
Joined
Jun 28, 2007
Messages
368
Dear Forum Moderator(s),
I am relatively new to BladeForums, but in the short time I have been around I have witnessed moderator activity that I believe is widely unpopular with the forum members. I am referring to the practice of altering/deletion of the posts that are categorized by the moderator(s) as Spam or Deal spotting.

Spam (unwanted commercial advertising) is a serious problem on the Internet and it is an honorable task to strive for its elimination. However, the posts that have apeared in this forum can hardly be categorized as "unwanted". As a matter of fact, in the short time that the posts have been available to members, people have expressed their thanks for the information. Also, a large number of members on other knife-related forums have explicitly expressed their happiness that these types of posts are available there for the benefits of the members.

I would also like to point out that the policy of not allowing "advertizing in the discussion forums" is meaningless. Would a post discussing whether "a certain knife selling at a cetrain site for $X is a good deal or not?" be considered a "dicussion" or "advertising"?

It is my strong belief that the forums are only successful whe the members are happy using them. I would therefore encourage the members to voice their opinion on the subject by replying to this thread.
Sincerely,
Alexei

P.S. I was planning on upgrading my membership and supporting the forum, as I have done on other forums, but I am not sure if I can support what I believe is a random exercise in censorship.
 
It is far from random; its a level playing field.


You did read the rules before, or directly after, you signed up here, didn't you?
 
ufox9al said:
Dear Forum Moderator(s),
I am relatively new to BladeForums.
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Really, 14 posts and you are telling the members we are not happy. What a crock.

ufox9al said:
P.S. I was planning on upgrading my membership and supporting the forum, as I have done on other forums, but I am not sure if I can support what I believe is a random exercise in censorship.

Sincerely,
Alexei
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I am sorry, but I do not think you have been around long enough to make judgments on how the members feel about spam.
 
Discussion about policy belongs in Bladeforums Service & Support.
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ufox9al said:
Dear Forum Moderator(s),
I am relatively new to BladeForums, but in the short time I have been around I have witnessed moderator activity that I believe is widely unpopular with the forum members. I am referring to the practice of altering/deletion of the posts that are categorized by the moderator(s) as Spam or Deal spotting.

"widely unpopular" is absurd. I'll tell you what. Start an objective poll absent any loaded choices and let's see how it goes. Nevermind, I forgot momentarily that only paying, contributing, members can do so.

Spam (unwanted commercial advertising) is a serious problem on the Internet and it is an honorable task to strive for its elimination. However, the posts that have apeared in this forum can hardly be categorized as "unwanted". As a matter of fact, in the short time that the posts have been available to members, people have expressed their thanks for the information. Also, a large number of members on other knife-related forums have explicitly expressed their happiness that these types of posts are available there for the benefits of the members.


They are unwanted by both the site owners and the forum moderators who are tasked with dealing with such posts. Why should they have to take all the extra time to weed out the "true" spam from the honest posts from people who are just looking to inform others? They are not paid to do this job. Unless you want to come out of pocket to fund their heretofore nonexistant salaries, it is my opinion that your (as well as mine, to be honest) opinion on the subject is essentially meaningless. This site is funded out of the owner's pocket and from paying members contributions and moderated by volunteers who take the time to do a thankless job and whose only public acknowledgment most often comes in the form of a frivolous complaint, such as yours.

I would also like to point out that the policy of not allowing "advertizing in the discussion forums" is meaningless. Would a post discussing whether "a certain knife selling at a cetrain site for $X is a good deal or not?" be considered a "dicussion" or "advertising"?

Leave out the "certain site" part and the question is still relevant. Whats the problem? or do you just like to stir the pot?

It is my strong belief that the forums are only successful whe the members are happy using them. I would therefore encourage the members to voice their opinion on the subject by replying to this thread.

The above is my opinion and I'm perfectly happy with the site the way it is. When I am not happy, on any given subject, I have zero problems vocalizing that.
Sincerely,
Alexei

P.S. I was planning on upgrading my membership and supporting the forum, as I have done on other forums, but I am not sure if I can support what I believe is a random exercise in censorship.

Speaking for myself and no other member, moderator, or administrator- and fully aware that its quite possible that I get my first warning/infraction for saying so: I think you are full of crap and had no intention of supporting this site with your hard earned $10 to $50 dollars. And, even if you were and something so silly as this complaint would keep you from doing so, well... don't let the door hit you where the good Lord split you.
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Like I said, its a level playing field. Were they to pick and choose which deal spotting/spam posts to delete then THAT would be random according to any and every definition of the word that I have ever come across.
 
Any and all deal spotting is dealt with accordingly by the rules set forth by the Admin. of this site. We are not selective. We do not play favorites. Get your facts straight before you spout off at the keyboard.
 
ufox9al, allow me to explain.

A major reason we don't allow deal-spotting is that Bladeforums is popular and the members are happy with the way it's run, on the whole. We don't need a poll to determine this. We can see the growth in membership. We can see the activity on our forums.

Because of our size and success in reaching so many knife knuts, if we allowed unsolicited recommendations, we would be overwhelmed with them. Bladeforums would become a bulletin board for free advertising.

Spam is usually obvious: a first-time poster putting up an ad for products we don't even discuss here, in a forum not even vaguely appropriate to them.

But what about auction-spotting or deal-spotting? It's the same thing. Even if the item is more appropriate to Bladeforums, nobody asked, and anybody could search for it. So it's just a way for someone who wants to increase that business's traffic to get our attention -- and that is unsolicited advertising, the same thing in other contexts we call spam.

Do we always eliminate it? No. We have a limited moderator staff, and we can't check every post on every thread every day. So improper posts can occasionally slip through. But we do have back-up. Even when the moderators miss it, regular members report it. Which tells me that they are also aware of the corrosive effect deal-spotting would have.
 
Things are running pretty smoothly the way they are.

How would a moderator know if deal spotting was being done by someone that was trying to pass on good deals to other members, or by the person who has the item for sale? Treating them all the same is the only fair thing to do.
 
Keith Montgomery said:
Things are running pretty smoothly the way they are.

How would a moderator know if deal spotting was being done by someone that was trying to pass on good deals to other members, or by the person who has the item for sale? Treating them all the same is the only fair thing to do.
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Agreed.
I'm sure I've missed a few good deals here and there...but overall it's a small price to pay for a forum with no spam.
 
What I don't think this person understands is the repercussions that a single deal spotting post can have on the market. With 97,000+ members BF has the potential of altering the outcome of an auction or drying up the available stocks of production knives.
I like the professionalism of this forum and advocate the reporting of spam and deal spotting to the mods by it's members. This forum is part of my community, and my sense of "Neighborhood Watch" just kicks in when I see posts that are out of bounds.
 
Most serious knife collectors spend so much time on the net every day looking for and reading about knives that posts about good deals are likely redundant. In other words if you know,, everybody else probably does to. :D
 
Cougar,
You could be a little more diplomatic. I made a mistake and I apologize for unwittingly breaking a rule.
The way in which you handled it including my infraction is lame IMO. You could have given me a warning that read a little like this;
Billym,
You may not know it but you just "deal Spotted" and it is not allowed. Please do not post threads about knife deals in the future.
Thanks Cougar

Instead you treat me like some sort of underling by over posting in a short and condescending tone without addressing me personally or the courtesy of a signature . I think you could do a better job a being civil.

Then I get an "infraction" what is that crap? I break one rule one time. I think I have been a civil and contributing member since I joined. Why treat me so heavy handed.

I have nothing to sell so why would I support BFs financially? Every other forum I participate is free so why the money making scheme anyway?

All I can say is the way you treated me makes you come off as a jerk. At least that is how I feel about the whole situation.

Anyway I enjoy BFs and will do my best to not break any more rules. I hope this rant doesn't get me banned or something. That would say a lot about this "forum".

By the way your definition of SPAM is not accurate. To be Spam it must be unsolicited and sent from an outside server. All I did was make a post. Even though it was against the rules it is NOT Spam.
I quote Webster; Spam=unsolicited usually commercial e-mail sent to a large number of addresses. That is what spam is.

Bill
 
billym,

You got a warning, not an infraction. Had you taken the time to read the FAQ's of BFC before posting you would have noticed that deal and auction spotting are forbidden. When members post deals on a regular basis it gets to be a pain in the ass. We do not have the luxury of being civil especially when the rules are laid out for you.


The BFC FAQ's said:
No deal spotting
Yes, we know you found a great price on the Ninja Disembowel 4000 at SuperPriceMART. We don't care. We'd prefer you support the dealers who support BladeForums.com. As such, we don't allow deal spotting because otherwise the forums would be a quagmire of "deals" (real or imagined) posted everywhere, or unscrupulous people posting "deals" for non paying dealers. So don't do it.

Auction / Deal / Bargain Spotting
This is a variation of the "no spam" rules that we have. We know you found a great deal on a Ninja Death Tool 3000 - we don't care. If that dealer wants to advertise on BladeForums.com, encourage them to purchase a Dealer membership here instead of giving them free advertising. This infraction can be issued as a warning and is worth 10 points towards your total. It expires in 12 months.
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Sounds like someone needs the.........

waaaambulance-23284.jpg
 
billym said:
As Spark once told me, infraction is better than banning, would you not agree?
Then I get an "infraction" what is that crap? I break one rule one time. I think I have been a civil and contributing member since I joined. Why treat me so heavy handed?

By the way your definition of SPAM is not accurate. To be Spam it must be unsolicited and sent from an outside server. By whose definition? All I did was make a post. Even though it was against the rules it is NOT Spam.
I quote Webster; Spam=unsolicited usually commercial e-mail (or Posting of Auctions or Deals) sent to a large number of addresses (ie:Members). That is what spam is. And the Red in the Post is Belongs to James

Anyway I enjoy BFs and will do my best to not break any more rules. I hope this rant doesn't get me banned or something. That would say a lot about this "forum".

Bill
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Sorry, I don't understand what the beef is, Don't you pay to do most things you enjoy, amusement parks, movies, cable, vacations, or etc. It cost money to run BF, why not pay and help keep the site up. You don't even see Spark posting great deals at his place anytime. He obeys the rules, why should we not obey. It is just an infraction, not a banning, but one thing that will get you banned is to sassy a Mod. Ps: I have an infraction also for deal spotting, around post 2 or 3. But as a newbie they did not ban me, When I asked Spark about it months later, he responded " An infraction is better than banning" I agreed and took my medicine without openly taking issue with breaking a known rule. (One, I failed to read, and my bad)

James

Just my two cents
 
Ken,
Like I said it was a mistake and I have no intention of deal spotting again. This was my only time so using the excuse of and I quote "When members post deals on a regular basis it gets to be a pain in the ass." This was my only post like this. So why use this excuse when corresponding with me about this.

How many folks do you thing read ALL of the forum rules when they signed up? How many folks read all the rules all the time?
What I got was called an infraction not a warning. Do you guys need a dictionary? The two words are not synonyms. (Edit; Ok I see I got 0 points so it is a warning.)
You don't have the luxury of being civil; too sad. You took the job of moderating. That is like a cop saying I deal with too many criminals or a teacher saying they are sick of kids.
One again I will obey the rules but I think civility on the part of the mods should be expected here at BF. Maybe you need a changing of the guard if you guys are so tired. Oh and I do appreciate their work as mods on most other occasions.
Bill

James
This is not intended as sassing any mods. It is a free expression of ideas. Like I said if I got banned for one mistake and then taking exception with how it is dealt with then that would say a lot about this forum. A forum by definition is a free exchange of ideas. Again from Webster's dictionary.
Bill
 
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