MODS: The marketplace "rule" is counter productive

Carlanga · Nov 30, 2012

ChrisMan287 said:
Well **** me sideways.

Isn't that a bit much?

No, I feel is a little too little.

peeaanuut said:
I read through the posts linked and the rules and I feel that the OP is correct. The restrictions are a quite over the top solution to a minor problem. I think the guidelines should be reduced.

I disagree. Unless you are a frequent visitor to the marketplace you wouldn't understand the reasoning behind the post and time count.

The marketplace is a place that is a bonus place where tech fans that have dedicated some good time to this site can buy/sell/trade goods. This restrictions removes most of the bad seeds, some always remain, but overall I believe the marketplace behaves pretty good thanks to them. If you can't wait the 6 months then I might be wary of buying or selling anything w/ you. How do I know you are not a scammer looking to make some quick money and leave. Most scammers won't wait the required period and will go to other forums. Also, you can't control who sells and who buys in the marketplace, this is not eBay, it just a subforum that has entrance limits so what the TS wants cannot be accomplished w/ the way the marketplace is set up.

peeaanuut · Nov 30, 2012

i dont understand that logic of yours. I frequent the marketplace quite a bit and it gets quite stale in there. There are plenty of new members that could contribute but they are being locked out. I believe the restrictions are too tough. If they get any tougher, why have a marketplace at all?

maflynn · Dec 1, 2012

peeaanuut said:
I believe the restrictions are too tough. If they get any tougher, why have a marketplace at all?

6 months of service with 250 posts is not really asking a lot. We're talking about an average of 1.4 posts a day for the 6 months.

Within that time frame members will gain a level of familiarity and also help exclude scammers who do not wish to put this amount of time and effort and also spammers.

Pulled straight from the Marketplace rules, which I think effectively explains the reasoning behind this

There are other websites more specifically devoted to buying, selling, and trading computer equipment, and to tracking buyer/seller reputations. The reason we have our own Marketplace is that it provides more focus on Apple products and is convenient for members who have had opportunities to learn to know each other.

If you or the OP is really wanting to sell stuff, there are better more focused sites to facilitate the sale.

desmotesta · Dec 1, 2012

Thank you for everyone's input. I now have a better understanding of the reasoning behind the 250 Post/6 month restriction but i still respectfully disagree on its effectiveness.

I also did not mean to say that ALL sellers on ebay are bad, majority are good sellers with good feedback.

Another concern I have is that WE are cluttering our board with needless posts. Even if just 2 new people join the board everyday (60 a month) and they make 250 posts, thats 15,000 posts now added to the database. How many of those posts were really needed.

I have been a member of an automotive board for 11 years that serves the owners of a very selective brand and model, and making needless posts or asking questions that have previously been asked is not tolerated (which helps keep the forum clutter free).

Again, the "Mods" have a good reason for their "rules" but I have always beleived that no one has a copyright on good ideas (or newer ideas) and may be one day they would revisit or at least loosen the restrictions (a good start would be restricting new members from selling but not buying)

184550 · Dec 1, 2012

peeaanuut said:
i dont understand that logic of yours. I frequent the marketplace quite a bit and it gets quite stale in there. There are plenty of new members that could contribute but they are being locked out. I believe the restrictions are too tough. If they get any tougher, why have a marketplace at all?

There are multiple new posts everyday of last month (November).

I'm not sure what you mean by 'stale'.

ucfgrad93 · Dec 1, 2012

Comeagain? said:
If this was MacMarket, then I'd see your point. But this is a news site and community, that happens to have a place for regular users to buy/share/trade items from other regular users. They could remove the marketplace entirely.

Agreed. I have no problem with the requirements to use the Marketplace.

yg17 · Dec 1, 2012

You're seeing this from the perspective of a buyer, and as a buyer, you have valid points. But you need to see it from the eyes of a seller.

PayPal's fraud protection and dispute resolution is a joke. 9 times out of 10, they will side with the buyer on a dispute, even if the seller did everything right. It's way too easy for a buyer to report that they didn't receive their item or it didn't arrive in the stated condition and get their money back, even if it did arrive undamaged. I've been screwed by PayPal's fraud resolution before (not on MR and not a large amount of money thankfully). As a seller, it's nice knowing a buyer from the marketplace has been around for awhile and didn't just sign up a day ago with the intent of screwing someone over.

I recently sold an iPhone and an iPod on the marketplace and sold them for less than what I would've gotten on eBay, and was perfectly willing to do that because the fact that the buyers for those items have been members for 10 and 9 years respectively (both have been here longer than I have) and provided some reassurance that it would be a smooth transaction was worth it to me.

If the marketplace didn't provide that peace of mind, I'd go sell my stuff on eBay, because if the risk of me getting scammed is the same on either site, I might as well sell it on eBay where I can get more money if the sale does go well (which I realize is probably 95% or more of sales).

r2shyyou · Dec 1, 2012

desmotesta said:
Another concern I have is that WE are cluttering our board with needless posts. Even if just 2 new people join the board everyday (60 a month) and they make 250 posts, thats 15,000 posts now added to the database. How many of those posts were really needed.

If the restriction was either 250 posts or 6 months, you might have a point. But since it's both and since maflynn noted that that calculates to 1.4 posts/day per person, it shouldn't be too hard to make those posts worthwhile.

I'd guess that there are many posts that aren't "needed" but that are still helpful (and there are certainly many that are neither, but those are deleted by the mods when reported and when appropriate). For example, if someone starts a thread to seek help about a problem they have and I respond saying that I, too, have this problem but don't have a solution, I wouldn't consider my post "needed" but would consider it helpful in the sense that it assures the thread starter that, for example, it's not just them that's experiencing this or that the problem they're experiencing isn't necessarily "their fault," so to speak.

My point is that, considering the combination of requirements for access to the marketplace, it shouldn't be that hard to average a couple of helpful or relevant (or at least non-useless) posts each day for the applicable time period. Like others have pointed out, fulfilling these requirements will get you acquainted with others throughout the forums and will allow others to get acquainted with you.

flopticalcube · Dec 1, 2012

I like it the way it is. Safe place to sell and buy Apple and related items, IMO.

r2shyyou · Dec 1, 2012

desmotesta said:
I have been a member of an automotive board for 11 years that serves the owners of a very selective brand and model, and making needless posts or asking questions that have previously been asked is not tolerated (which helps keep the forum clutter free).

Regarding the above, it sounds like this board you've been a member of is quite specialized. As such, is it fair to assume that it doesn't have, say, over 700,000 members or, say, over 1.4 million threads that could potentially be responded to?

MacRumors Forums Statistics said:
Threads: 1,416,207, Posts: 15,889,461, Members: 769,623

With as many members as MR has, not all will search before asking a question and I can think of instances where that's not necessarily a bad thing. If a member asks a question that was asked 2 years ago but that hasn't been asked since, it isn't bad, in my opinion, for the community to be "reminded" of its answer. In instances where the same question is asked multiple times in a short span, those threads are merged so that the info is consolidated and the "clutter" is cleaned up and organized as best as possible.

My point here, like earlier, is that I don't think the requirements are extreme and that it isn't hard to satisfy them and do so in a valuable way.

Slow Programmer · Dec 10, 2012

I generally don't post unless i have something worthwhile to add. At this rate I will never see the fabled Marketplace. I think it is just a myth actually

On the bright side I added another post to my total count by posting here

wordoflife · Dec 10, 2012

As someone mentioned before, MacRumors Marketplace is really just a bonus feature for its members, not the main point of the website.

Sure the requirements can be annoying, but it's a compromise to have a better experience. Don't want them to end up look like Craigslist now, do we ?

ChrisMan287 · Dec 10, 2012

I was looking for a bigger internal HD and luckily I saw a post from a member on here that had one. We exchanged quite a few PMs and I ended up buying it. Sent the payment through PayPal and got the drive a week later.

You really just have to know what you're doing when buying online whether it be on here or elsewhere. It's a good thing I didn't have to wait six months and 250 posts to send a PM

GoCubsGo · Dec 11, 2012

ChrisMan287 said:
I was looking for a bigger internal HD and luckily I saw a post from a member on here that had one. We exchanged quite a few PMs and I ended up buying it. Sent the payment through PayPal and got the drive a week later.

You really just have to know what you're doing when buying online whether it be on here or elsewhere. It's a good thing I didn't have to wait six months and 250 posts to send a PM

In all fairness, mostly to you, well established members have duped buyers out of cash before. Again though, if you catch a FS post outside the MP and you want to jump on it then I believe it is totally your prerogative. I could be wrong but MR offers no protection one way or the other inside or outside the MP if something goes wrong. Maybe an Admin can confirm or deny.

annk · Dec 11, 2012

jessica. said:
...I could be wrong but MR offers no protection one way or the other inside or outside the MP if something goes wrong. Maybe an Admin can confirm or deny.

You're right, we can't offer any protection. We can encourage the parties to come to some sort of agreement, but any buying or selling here is at the members' own risk.

ChrisMan287 · Dec 11, 2012

jessica. said:
In all fairness, mostly to you, well established members have duped buyers out of cash before.

Of course. It happens on every forum I'm sure lol You just have to know the signs and not send anything but a PayPal payment. No PayPal, no care.

jessica. said:
Again though, if you catch a FS post outside the MP and you want to jump on it then I believe it is totally your prerogative. I could be wrong but MR offers no protection one way or the other inside or outside the MP if something goes wrong.

MR definitely offers no protection and they shouldn't. The sale has nothing to do with them. It's completely between the buyer/seller, whether it happens inside or outside the MP.

Mr. Retrofire · Dec 12, 2012

desmotesta said:
MODS: The marketplace "rule" is counter productive

Not at all!

cfs112 · Dec 18, 2012

yg17 said:
You're seeing this from the perspective of a buyer, and as a buyer, you have valid points. But you need to see it from the eyes of a seller.

PayPal's fraud protection and dispute resolution is a joke. 9 times out of 10, they will side with the buyer on a dispute, even if the seller did everything right. It's way too easy for a buyer to report that they didn't receive their item or it didn't arrive in the stated condition and get their money back, even if it did arrive undamaged. I've been screwed by PayPal's fraud resolution before (not on MR and not a large amount of money thankfully). As a seller, it's nice knowing a buyer from the marketplace has been around for awhile and didn't just sign up a day ago with the intent of screwing someone over.

I recently sold an iPhone and an iPod on the marketplace and sold them for less than what I would've gotten on eBay, and was perfectly willing to do that because the fact that the buyers for those items have been members for 10 and 9 years respectively (both have been here longer than I have) and provided some reassurance that it would be a smooth transaction was worth it to me.

If the marketplace didn't provide that peace of mind, I'd go sell my stuff on eBay, because if the risk of me getting scammed is the same on either site, I might as well sell it on eBay where I can get more money if the sale does go well (which I realize is probably 95% or more of sales).

Totally agree. I have a friend that was scammed from eBay using paypal and he was the seller. For peace of mind and trust I don't mind paying more if buying and receiving less when selling. This policy mitigates the risk so I support it.

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