"Vendors with issues in the BOI"

Is the primary goal of this proposal to offer better protection to buyers, or to minimize revenue for the indicted "bad guys"?

Don't they go hand and hand? For my part it is more protection of the buyers. The scammers will still make money, unfortunately, just not on this site.

Per request, I am moving this from the BOI thread to this thread.

Why not include in the TOS that if ads will not be allowed by individuals/businesses that have multiple customer complaints on the BOI?

You CAN choose who you allow to advertise.

TRR will not allow anyone to advertise a void. So why not implement a policy restricting ads to only people who meet a certain criteria?

This way a scammer can have his ad pulled if he puts one up since he had already been warned in the TOS that this could happen.

Steve,

Wouldn't it be possible for a couple of determined people to put up some groundless complaints on the BOI and thereby deprive an innocent vendor of his privilege to advertise? Not every BOI complaint turns out to be warranted.

Well, let me throw this idea out here so you can all beat it into a bloody pulp.... And, btw, no I haven't thought through all of the ramifications of the details, so upon some deeper thought, it may be a bigger mouthful to chew on than I am willing to bite off. Tax season is HERE, breeding season is coming up. Time will be an issue.....

Anyway, here it goes.....

How about making this a more "closed loop" kind of system? Anyone permitted to post classified ads would have to be a paid member AND willing to participate in the Good Guy Certification Program? Anyone who gets voted OUT of that program loses their membership here as well as their capability of participating in posting classified ads.

That will do a couple of things. First off, it transforms the GGC into more of a BOI light with simple thumbsup or thumbsdown voting. It also keeps the decision of who is a good guy or a bad guy in YOUR hands and not in MINE. There will be a direct link on every advertisers website (as per the requirements of participating here in this program, which anyone can easily use to reference their status.

I may have to ask someone to take over this program, as it most certainly will take much more time than I will have to allocate to the management of it. As it is now, I am certain there are several members in the GGC certification program who have either let their memberships lapse, or failed to meet the requirements of having the GGC banner on their website. I just can't follow up on all of that. Heck, I have a few applicants already in the queue until I can get around to making up more of those GGC banners!

So poke some holes in the idea...............

As for search links, any programmer will tell you the weaknesses in that proposal. Intelligent fuzzy searches CAN be implemented but that are prone to a lot of errors. And you would still need to have your own brain power utilized to make the search effective. No program is really going to know everything YOU do about who you are searching for. So YOU will still be the one who needs to fill in the blanks.

First hole to chew: All advertisers would have to own a web site. A lot of good people who want to sell an animal or two, or a cage, or spare rats don't happen to own a website.

But thats another thought~ for those that do have a GGC~ or those that have had one in the past and it was pulled for whatever reason~ how about a link in our little user profile at the side to our GGC? That would help buyers and actual good guy sellers. And I think a lot of people forget about the GGC (I admit~ I have one and was not giving good votes for things I purchased because I forgot about it!)

Don't they go hand and hand? For my part it is more protection of the buyers. The scammers will still make money, unfortunately, just not on this site

I think the tools are in place for protection of the buyers. The GGC's can be suspended if the negative votes outweigh the positives. Searches can be done on the BOI. Trader ratings can be researched.

There may be some validity in adding a search feature "stickied" to the top of the classifieds, and urge people to check there. However, you can't protect people from themselves. If someone is not going to check out a vendor, then they are not able to be protected. I think implementing a "bad guy list" is making an assumption that people are not intelligent enough to make their own determinations.

I keep trying to say something~ and I think I am not coming across with my thought clearly (I tend to do that a lot).

I think IF you want to make it a change~ don't just look for the negative. That sucks. IF you want to make a change make one that highlights whats already here and gives recognition of the "Good Guy" threads as well as the "Bad guy" threads.

Some of us who are good guys don't want GGCs. I suppose we, or me since I can't really speak for anyone else, will simply be unable to post classifieds here simply because my faith and liking for the GGC is not sufficient for me to want one again.

It's no big deal but some of the little guys will get squished were this to be put into practice.

Here Be Dragons!! or in this case Bad Guys.

Should be interesting to see where this leads...Randy