The Sales Policy Poll

Maybe a better question would be, how do we answer the feedback e-mail that follows this format (and believe me, we get more of these than you might imagine):

"RubberslugUser101 is ripping people off, can you close their site?"

We pretty much have three choices:

1) Keep everything how it was before. Deal with complaints. This is tedious, and confusing as to what goes and what doesn't.

2) Be really heavy-handed and say that nothing goes. (Mods can't easily see who donates and who doesn't, so they treat everyone based on a) do I know this person? b) do they seem level?) Easy, but makes us all seem really mean.

3) Think of some other way to live in harmony.

I only skimmed a few of these posts but the donation thing really isn't that big of a deal. A donation -- even a token donation -- lets us know two things:

a) you're somewhat serious
b) your real name and address

Donating removes a layer of anonymity for us. This is the *most* important reason why we ask for donations. The money is nice but in reality, the site would be up either way. I do this because I like it, not because it even covers monthly gasoline money.

The mods and I will continue to discuss point 3, "think of other ways to live in harmony". Us collectors should stick together. Thanks for participating in the discussion.

Well Greetings noisywalrus ^_^

Now I understand the problem a bit better. Thanks for taking the time to elaborate on the issue. Makes much more sense now.

I think as long as rubberslug allows any transaction of any sort between members, that there are always going to be complaints. That's just how the world works.....You try to do something good and chaos breaks lose.

The other issue is, as klet mentioned already, there is no way for the mods to stop the transactions between members because there can always be posts in other forums that the mods have no control/authority over. So as long as the transactions are around there will always be complaints.

So in my opinion, there are two solutions to this problem.

(1)The mods should either clean their hands off of any transaction related buisness....that is to say that the transactions are at the members own risk. That way the mods have nothing to do with it and as such you would not have to deal with such complaints.

With that said, there should always be a set of rules that a gallery should satisfy in order to remain open in rubberslug, but those rules have already been established here....eg. you should use the site to display cels, all cels should be in your possesion...etc.

(2) If you feel complelled to intervene out of the goodness of your hearts ^_^, then you should deal with each complaint that you receive on individual basis....meaning you have to intervene with each side...get their info and try to make a judgement.....in my opinion this is just call for disaster because you will never be able to satisfy both sides.

There are no third options. You decide to either have a hand in it or to just shrug whenever someone complaints about someone else (regarding transactions).

If the emails are not regarding transactions then RS already has established a number of rules which I think are perfectly logical. In that case the mods will just go along with those rules. As an example, if someone has stolen an image of a cel and is claiming it as his own, then his gallery should get shut down until the image is removed.

This is just my opinion.....of course everyone has their own opinions...just thought I put in my two cents... ^_^

ps. So just out of curiosity Jason, can the Canadian collectors stick to the US collectors ??? or is it just the US collectors that are supposed to stick together??? ^_^ I joke, I joke ^_^

Demonic wrote, "The mods should either clean their hands off of any transaction related buisness....that is to say that the transactions are at the members own risk. That way the mods have nothing to do with it and as such you would not have to deal with such complaints."

I did address this:

JWR wrote, "I would strongly suggest that they place them in the RS shop for the Mod's will not take any action on an deals gone bad between members who engage in private transactions."

Demonic wrote, "The other issue is, as klet mentioned already, there is no way for the mods to stop the transactions between members because there can always be posts in other forums that the mods have no control/authority over. So as long as the transactions are around there will always be complaints."

I don't believe we have ever proposed stopping any private transactions between members. What we have been discussing and are enforcing involves what is displayed inside the gallerys and in the blogs. Having in one's gallery a separate "For Sale , For Offer , For Trade Ect." section is what we have decided is against the rule as is the mention of "For Sale of For Offers" in the weblogs.

I hope this clears up some misunderstandings and I'm sorry if I did not fully address yours and others conserns. One of the problems with this system is when you go to the responce screen to post your reply you don't have the previous messages to read unless you open another window and login again so I may have missed replying to all points made. Please feel free to contact me directly via feedback or Email at any time.

Question!
I say on my front page that there are *NFS* cels (not for sale) which basically means forget about ever making an offer on it.
I don't say "oh this cel and this cel are for offers", but is marking cels *NFS* and some not considered okay?
I also state if someone has a cel of Phibrizzo I'd be willing to trade/sell things in my collection for it. Is this okay too?
I don't actively look for buyers, but I do let browsers know some cels are just plain off-limits. Is it okay that I am basically inferring that my non *NFS* cels are up for offer if someone wants to leave feedback?

I'm positive that's OK sletia.