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Doctor Q

Administrator
Original poster
Staff member
Sep 19, 2002
39,777
7,498
Los Angeles
We regularly receive suggestions for changes in the Marketplace forum, for which we thank you. One such suggestion has been implemented as of today.

As you will see in the For Sale/Trade Policy (Marketplace Rules), we have a new rule for sellers:
  1. To start a Marketplace thread, you must be a forum members of status "Regular" or above, which means that you have 100 or more posts as displayed in your User Profile. This gives other members a chance to become familiar with the seller and helps make the Marketplace a place for personal sales among forum members. (To see your User Profile, click Quick Links -> My Profile at the top of this page.)
We realize that this rule involves a tradeoff. Some Mac users have joined MacRumors hoping to make a sale in the Marketplace their first stop, and the rule inhibits that. The flipside is that we have had trouble with Marketplace threads by first-time posters unfamiliar to other members, and some businesses have violated the rules against commercial sales by joining only to post there.

A Newbie becomes a Member at 30 posts and a Regular at 100 posts. We hope that new members won't spam the forums simply to reach Marketplace eligibility. Such posts are routinely reported and deleted. Instead, we hope they will take the change to join discussions and meet other members.

We're looking for the right balance to make the Marketplace work for private sales between MacRumors forum members and avoid opportunists and those without credibility. We'd like to see the Marketplace run without a high level of moderation, which should benefit not only the moderators but members using the Marketplace too.

Thanks for your cooperation and support. Suggestions and feedback on the rules and Marketplace forum are welcome as always.
 

devilot

Moderator emeritus
May 1, 2005
15,584
1
A big thanks to the mods and everyone who was involved w/ getting this rule into action!

Hopefully this will help to alleviate unwarranted issues. Thanks again for all your hard work!
 

GoCubsGo

macrumors Nehalem
Feb 19, 2005
35,741
153
They have this over at DSL Reports and it works famously! I hate to love it!! Thanks all!
 

jsw

Moderator emeritus
Mar 16, 2004
22,910
44
Andover, MA
Phat_Pat said:
awesome... less chance of being scammed :cool:
Until, that is, when wdlove decides to cash in on his carefully crafted "nice-guy" image by accepting payment to sell shady items for newbies....
 

minimax

macrumors 6502
Feb 9, 2005
351
0
This certainly is great news as I got scammed by a 'first time' poster on macrumors as well. Luckily I managed to get some of my money back through the creditcard corporation but I'm grateful action has been taken to reduce the risk to a minimum!
 

MacDawg

Moderator emeritus
Mar 20, 2004
19,823
4,503
"Between the Hedges"
I think it is a great idea as well, and should cut down on spamming/scamming.

Kudos

Woof, Woof – Dawg
pawprint.gif
 

mad jew

Moderator emeritus
Apr 3, 2004
32,191
9
Adelaide, Australia
Let's just hope it doesn't lead to marketplace threads coming up in other forum areas. Who wants to place bets that the Buying Tips forum will be the first innocent newbie victim? :p
 

homerjward

macrumors 68030
May 11, 2004
2,745
0
fig tree
mad jew said:
Let's just hope it doesn't lead to marketplace threads coming up in other forum areas. Who wants to place bets that the Buying Tips forum will be the first innocent newbie victim? :p
hay guyz, i cAnT p0st in teh mrktplc. wutz up w/ that? n-e-wayz, wanna buy a g5 powerbokz? only $999. shipz frum nigeria. :p:D
 

gwuMACaddict

macrumors 68040
Apr 21, 2003
3,124
0
washington dc
excellent idea... though i don't know if it will actually cut down on spamming... just take a look at that darn 'mix-it-for-me' thread we have going :p
 

MacMajor

macrumors newbie
Aug 14, 2005
5
0
<sarcasm>Great!</sarcasm> What about those who WTB ?

Well, that sure explains it. I just sent an email off asking this very question. I'm new here, yeah, and I was able to start a thread the other day; today I cannot. :(
I understand the reasoning behind it, BUT what about those who 'WTB'? That was the topic of my first post and the reason why I need to post another. I'm not looking sell, but to buy. So sad. :(

Tracy
 

MacDawg

Moderator emeritus
Mar 20, 2004
19,823
4,503
"Between the Hedges"
MacMajor said:
Well, that sure explains it. I just sent an email off asking this very question. I'm new here, yeah, and I was able to start a thread the other day; today I cannot. :(
I understand the reasoning behind it, BUT what about those who 'WTB'? That was the topic of my first post and the reason why I need to post another. I'm not looking sell, but to buy. So sad. :(

Tracy

I guess there is a trade off here, but it is an attempt to better manage the forum. All in all, you can still post, respond and monitor threads, just not create one there for a while. Yeah, it's tough that you have to pay the price for the abuse of others, but hopefully you will stick it out and contribute to the community.

Welcome

Woof, Woof – Dawg
pawprint.gif
 

mad jew

Moderator emeritus
Apr 3, 2004
32,191
9
Adelaide, Australia
How about letting newbies who have paid their contribution fee post in these threads. This should weed out the serious from the not-so-serious. Or is work-around this already in play?...
 

devilot

Moderator emeritus
May 1, 2005
15,584
1
Well, those under the 100post mark could still PM and email members saying they WTB.
 

Applespider

macrumors G4
devilot76 said:
Well, those under the 100post mark could still PM and email members saying they WTB.

They can still post to say that they want to buy in an existing thread. I think the concern MacMajor is raising is that they can't start a thread saying that they'd like to buy an original Airport card etc and obviously couldn't just randomly mail people to ask if they happened to have one.
 

Mac_Freak

macrumors 6502a
Apr 22, 2005
713
0
This rule sounds right. Credibility is good. Lets just hope there won't too much spamming going on as somebody else has posted.
 

robbieduncan

Moderator emeritus
Jul 24, 2002
25,611
893
Harrogate
I think that the 100 post think is a good idea for sellers but is obviously not really necessary for WTB posts. Perhaps the Marketplace can be split in two, one side buy, one side sell.

Then all you need is some sort of auto-matching of buyers and sellers...
 

michaelrjohnson

macrumors 68020
Aug 9, 2000
2,180
5
53132
robbieduncan said:
I think that the 100 post think is a good idea for sellers but is obviously not really necessary for WTB posts. Perhaps the Marketplace can be split in two, one side buy, one side sell.

Then all you need is some sort of auto-matching of buyers and sellers...
I had a reccomendation for something along these lines a few months ago. It didn't go over very well, due to a whole slew of logisitcal issues. I had hoped to see some form of change come as a result of the thread, it wasn't the right time.

Perhaps now, the "environment" may be more attuned to the revamp of the Marketplace experience.
 

Mudbug

Administrator emeritus
Jun 28, 2002
3,849
1
North Central Colorado
mad jew said:
How about letting newbies who have paid their contribution fee post in these threads. This should weed out the serious from the not-so-serious. Or is work-around this already in play?...

unless I'm mistaken, contributing to the site should override the 100 post minimum - but I'd need someone who's got under 100 posts, paid up, and wanting to post a thread to let me know if that's right.
 
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