Uh, nope, not me :) I'm not sure I'd know what to moderate. :razz:

I do, however, like the Portal option, all the ugly goes away -lol

Hello,
Okay finally have been able to read through these properly in front of a computer. I try to respond to the comments and queries as much as I can.
If we use Prefix to select locations, we'd have the same issue though one can say province acronyms are shorter which is something I'm keen to make it so for the existing prefixes as well. Otherwise, I can look into removing these prefixes in the New Posts results.

You mean linking as in most but the "Want To Buy" category are linked to the FAQ with explanation? No need to be afraid. While it doesn't mean we can cater to every requests it doesn't mean we can't listen to them and see what we can do about them as long as we keep the discussions civilized.

It appears that you are not aware there are indeed links in place for the Notice area above each of the Buy / Sell forum pages, and most of the Prefixes themselves, to the FAQ section explaning what the categories are.

Haven't forgotten about the membership who drives the traffic to the site, though not sure why we have come across as such because the implementation was meant to generate stats for me to see how the site is being used and who may be abusing it.

I agree. I hate the current way of how things are but that's how they have been for quite some time already. If we can make them shorter I'm all up for it but I'd get confused with "FS, FT, FF, LF, etc". One of the reasons for the prefixes is I want to have a process in place where the person starting the thread is also declaring the nature of the thread (ie recurrent or one off, etc). If someone keeps on doing recurrent sale of quality corals every 3 weeks then we need to keep an eye on it. If someone keeps on doing one off sale of quality corals then we need to start investigating if someone is knowingly making false declarations. It is similar to the intention of filling in the Custom's entry card declaring how much and what kind of goods you are bringing in to the country. Yes people can falsify declarations but that's another story. However, this can partially be achieved by using simpler categories such as "For Sale, For Trade, etc" and us building a smarter reporting tool for generating the metrics.

Can you give me the acronyms you have in mind? I disagree with no links as not everyone have the same interpretations. I know myself is one of them.

Understood on what you meant by part of the title says you have read it and part of it says you haven't. However, depending on how we take this I may adjust the way the page is displayed to remove the Prefixes. The idea of choosing a city is great but that should be evident from the Location you have entered when you registered. As for agreeing with a limitation, we haven't set a limit. The Prefixes is a means for assist us in collecting information on the types of posts being made over time.
For "One Off Sale of Excess Goods from Personal Shipments", we don't expect someone to order 10 bukets of salt every month and then have to do this one off sale for 9 buckets in the shipment. This doesn't mean there is an issue with someone ordering sand and rock in the first quarter and have to get rid of some because there is too much, and then ordering snails in the second quarter and have to get rid of some because there were 5 too many, then followed by ordering ordering carbon and have to get rid of a few extra bags. But for those who declare this every month and selling off rock, then yes I'd start wondering what's happening.
For "One Off Sale of Personal Items", we don't expect someone keep having Protein Skimmers of all sorts of varieties being available and selling them every so often.
For "Recurrent Sale of Personal Items", this is the category which fragging corals belongs to and sure do this once in a while no problem. If there is an abundance of all sorts of corals and every month we have a sale, then yes something I'd like to know about before some paying sponsor write us a good PM or one of the Staff members getting fed up because they inquire the involved member, who then give them headaches, and in either case we have to read through all the threads and posts the involved members have made in order to get a feel of the history and jist of what happened.

You will not be able to post without choosing one.

You mean everythign starts with the same Prefix so they all appeared to be mixed together? This would be an issue as long as we use Prefix, even if we use it to categorize seller's location, or using acryonyms as suggested. And the thread editing feature was removed for an entirely different reason.

Believe it or not we do have to deal with issues with some selling quite a bit of stuff. If I do a report on the top 10 person electing this category and it reveals the top 2 have been making 5 of this type of posts of similar goods, then yes some discussions will start happening. This is now being done manually by some of the Staff members viewing the site scanning through the threads. I hate to see them having to do this and would like to have some process oriented manner that is done on an automated basis.
The "One Off Sale of Personal Items" is meant to assist us to distinguish from "One Off Sale of Excess Goods from Personal Shipments", both belonging to the "FS" category. We might in the long term be using the acronyms or something simpler like "For Sale". Just that the Staff have to read through the threads to find out whether it is from a new shipment or something that has been used for a while and is now being sold.
And yes the location as explained, is on the post as part of your member information.

Vendors have their own forum to post and are not expected to post in the Buy / Sell forums.
If it's a frag every 6 months, then it'd be "Recurrent Sale of Personal Items" as we expect you to frag every so often. Regarding the purchaser not caring what category it is in, we can either change to make the Prefix not appear or change to use it to distinguish whether it is a "For Sale" or "Want To Buy", etc manner which is to be decided.
As for someone constantly selling large quantity of stuff, it's being done manually at the moment. As explained above I'm trying to find a way to automate this to relieve the Staff team from having to read through each post, remember who has been doing what, and then bring up for discussions. One of the aims is to find an automated way to do this.

Titus

Hello,

I have to break this into two posts as the system is complaining it's too long to fit into one.

Don't recall when I saw a commercial sponsor making a thread to sell stuff in the Buy / Sell forum. If you can find someone doing this all the time, please let me know.

We have no intention of shutting the door to fragging. I expect this to happen therefore the category "Recurrent Sale of Personal Items" which I expect to be the case for those who has larger tanks.

We may ended up changing to the simpler categories. The prefixes are indeed mandatory as of this moment. You may see threads without prefixes being listed at the top of the search due to someone making a reply to a thread started before this change.
Regarding you not liking how the category is not bolded on the New Threads result page, this would happen even if we change to the simpler categories.

I've already started liking the idea of the simpler category and this gives me another reason for it.
No need to rant and Canreef don't bow before sponsors, but we practice good business ethics so we don't take their sponsorship fees and do something that is detrimental to them. If we come across a time when we conflict with keeping the sponsors or providing a forum for members to trade, it'd be sponsors who go. In fact I recall we refunded one of the ex-sponsors of his remaining terms because we don't want that sponsor anymore because too many members have had problems with him. Luckily we haven't have to do this too often, and we may very well introduce a work around by accepting sponsorship from members rather than sponsors. Maybe we should start a poll on this.

Okay. +1 on the member sponsorship.

Hopefully wiht my answer to Slick Fork above you shouldn't be worried about stepping on vendors toes if that's what you have been doing. For some, however, we do have to engage in discussions with them but they belong to the extreme minority.

This would have triggered an alert on the reporting and someone will be knocking on your door the next day with a search warrant to take videos and photos of your setup. Just kidding! You'd have instead receive a PM from one of us asking you what are you planning to do.

Yes this is why we promote fragging amongst members. We don't oppress anyone. Will not put announcements on all the forum pages saying we promote fragging. So don't worry.

Okay. +1 on the member sponsorship.

Okay. +1 on the member sponsorship.

I have turned down the idea all along is I have always wanted to keep it as opened as possible. However over time I did have pondered on this as a means to provide different types of service to members. And again if this ended up conflicting with sponsors who sell frags, it's not the member who goes.

Think a poll is required for this. In return from sponsoring, anything you'd ask for specifically?

Can you recommend a few sites for me to reference this idea of different levels of sponsorships? Any suggestions of how we may implement this?

Thanks. Exactly one of the reasons for this prefix thing.

It doesn't. But assist us in identifying who we need to speak to.

This is a separate issue.

Better yet we find a workable solution together.

We appreciate the feedback, comments, and discussions. Some have indeed drove some of us crazy but a lot of good members here indeed.

We will go with either one. I need some time to investigate and think about it through.

Good points about the time frame and confusing aspects. You shouldn't have to if it's being done naturally and not in an abusive manner. But I see how it may still come across as such.

Titus

The sponsor fee for AquariumPros is $3060 per year
The sponsor fee for Reef Central is $6000 per year
And Canreef is less than half of AquariumPros

Your solution to start taxing the members is not the answer to get cheaper fees for sponsors.

THanks Titus for taking the time to address our concerns. It is not just the members that make canreef special but it is the staff too. Cheers!

Now how much to purchase a banner add that proclaims my awesomeness? That would be awesome.

Agreed, thanks for taking the time to reply Titus. Always nice to see ownership involved in these things.

Your logic is flawed my friend.

Relating sponsorship to cost requires a quantity variable, in this case membership. Reefcentral has 289,000 members, Canreef has 9600 therefor by your logic a Canreef sponsorship should cost around $206.00/ year.

You also brandished me by inserting the word "Tax" into my mouth, please reread my statement at no time have I suggested a mandatory payment to all members.

As for the effect, if the site is bringing in revenue from paying members how could that not go to offset the cost of paying sponsors?

I was just thinking the same thing. It's impressive that we've got 7 pages of what is potentially a pretty charged topic and it has remained civilized and thoughtful throughout. Says a LOT about both the members and the staff we have here.

You cant see it as taxing members if its just an optional fee for special percs as preivously mentioned.

Like I said previously, lots of us here visit regularly and have made friends that are interested in this great, but expensive, hobby. If someone wants to come by and visit the forums and not pay a cent, Im sure they will always be able to do that. Those that have mentioned contributing to a optional user fee, would do so for the added percs (<-misspelled on purpose). Lots of other sites give free monthly draws, discount cards for sponsors, tshirts, stickers, special icons, allowing edits of posts?, etc...

It would be up to the admins/owners of the site to work out what, if anything, would be offered for any optional fees.

Just think of it like having 2 versions of canreef:
Basic Version (no fee): The same canreef that you know and love.
Upgraded version (optional user fee): Beefed up version of canreef with a few extra percs.

I have my Visa card waiting if this is the case :lol:.

I would be happy to be a canreef supporter like on reefcentral but of course I don't think it should be manditory.

Like most of us I have membership on various reef sites but canreef is home. I have no problem supporting our community of hobbyist which supports my addiction.