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Yeti101

Trade Thread issues

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I'm not sure if this is the place to raise it (so mods, feel free to delete or move this as appropriate), but what is going on in the free trade thread? It appears that at least someone hasn't honoured their trades and there is some implication of scamming by 'new' members (by the way, 99% of you seem 'new' to me :wink: ).

In the interests of keeping discussion out of that thread please air your concerns here, or if about a specific member with a mod in private. Also, don't forget to use members' trade reputation threads.

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Thanks for creating this thread. I know I am still new here so maybe I don't really have a right to comment. I am feeling quite let down, though, because I have traded good stuff I value in the thread. If I had known I wouldn't receive some of the items advertised, I wouldn't have posted in the thread.

EDIT: My whinge-fest has resulted in a flurry of PMs and now it appears likely that most of the trades will be honoured after all. Thank you, everyone.

I get the impression from reading some posts in the members feedback forum that many people think if it's a free trade with no cash involved, you shouldn't actually expect to receive the item. Fair enough you can't expect them all to come through, but you do 'pay' for those items by sending your items to the person who posts after you. Every time someone fails too honour a trade, the cost is borne by the other members in the thread.

The whole point of it is to be an honour-system. Otherwise there is no point to the thread. Maybe I have been a bit naive.

I probably just need to spend a bit more time getting to know the members here so I know who is reliable.

Maybe this should be in 'Bitches & Gripes' instead lol.

Edited by Cimi

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It really upsets me when this happens

Ive also had a problem or two with members with less then 10 posts never sending the goods they offered

Now i only trade with respected members that have a good track record.

PM me what you missed out on Cimi

Ill see if i can dig you up a few freebies to even the universe back out :)

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I too wish that people would take the free trade thread more seriously. A number of times I have let something that I really wanted go to someone else because I didn't feel that what I had to offer was good enough. To see subsequent trades either not fulfilled or be just plain lacking is disappointing.

The trade thread (and trading in general) is not supposed to be a way of getting something for nothing!

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I wasnt aware that there had been any dramas. Although these threads are always prone to blow ins scamming a freebie.

It is torstens forum, but i dont think he would have any problems with any of the moderators initiating some rules if the community thinks its needed. What about maybe a minimum post count to offer in the free trade thread? What are everyones suggestions?

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No Cimi its not a hazing...lol

It was a good thread, and great for new members to start building a collection.

I've given up on it due to a few parasites....I'd rather just give stuff out outright.

Edit - PM me Cimi and I'll see if I have a few things you may be interested in

Edited by waterboy
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Thanks for the support and input, guys. You have all been awesome. As it turns out, I have now received a few pm's indicating that most of the trades will indeed be honoured after all. I will now only be missing out on one trade, which is pretty good odds for the free trade thread. So thanks for your generous offers, but the universe is re-aligning and I'm happy with the outcome of this thread.

A minimum number of posts sounds like a good idea. Maybe 10-15? What does everyone else think?

Edited by Cimi

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Minimum posts threshold by itself is easily gotten around. You could add minimum times as well? Some other forums have quite onerous rules for trading and I wouldn't want to go too far.

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i agree that min post counts mean nothing. That word asc thread is a good example as to why (or the entire chill space)

If you want to check out who your trading with have a look at there last few posts. If the subject matter is pokemon's and dubstep, then i would think twice

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i agree that min post counts mean nothing. That word asc thread is a good example as to why (or the entire chill space)

If you want to check out who your trading with have a look at there last few posts. If the subject matter is pokemon's and dubstep, then i would think twice

The thing is though, this is how we end up with a stuck thread. We alll see a potential trader that might not follow through and stay away. I have noticed this quite regularly in the free print thread and even posted to take one for the team and get it moving again. We kinda need to fix it at the front end

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Maybe a minimum time would be better? I guess that's why the rep forum is there, though. That and involving a mod if you have repeated problems might be the best approach.

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The rep forum doesn't fix the free trade thread though - there is nothing stopping anyone from someone with a bad rep or no rep jumping in on the thread. Likewise, adding a minimum time will not totally alleviate the problem - you would just get 3 months of people posting any old drivel until the time and post thresholds were both passed.

Now if it were the case that you had to have a certain amount of positive trade feedback (and/or no negative trade feedback) to participate, as well as time and posts, that would help, but I imagine it would be hard to automate.

For every screening process though, there is away of gaming it to scam people. Whatever the solution, I am more coming around to the idea that participating in the free trade thread should be seen more as a privilege than a right.

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I sure back when I was using it there were not that many problems.

I think the best way to help clear things up would be to leave clear, non judgmental and honest feedback on their trade rep. maybe create one for them.

you would be doing the rest of the forum a great service. I also think once people see they can't get away without at least a little tarnish things may improve. This also allows the offending trader to make good publically and get back on track. Most of the time people just forget.

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I am happy for mods to establish some rules to keep that moving. I take a pretty dim view of scammers, so if the mods can come up with ways to reduce that frustration then go for it.

I also urge members to use the trade rep threads more. Remember that YOUR failure to report a bad trade could cost many others dearly as well. The key to using the trade reps is to simply be factual. if someone is 3 weeks late then state they are 3 weeks late. If you don't speculate and don't make accusations then there is nothing you will ever regret about putting into a trade rep thread. Other members can then make up their mind if they want to trade with someone. That should also apply to the free trade thread where the giver should be able to veto a receiver if that receiver has a reputation of not honouring their trades. That way the thread should not get stuck as often.

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I know I've made a point of this many times before, but I think a lot of people still don't get it...

 

I also urge members to use the trade rep threads more. Remember that YOUR failure to report a bad trade could cost many others dearly as well. The key to using the trade reps is to simply be factual.

This is SOOOOOOOO important. People don't realise that they are doing the community a disservice by avoiding posting about bad experiences in the rep forum. They don't want to look like an arse by posting something negative, but they end up being an arse by not posting it.

If someone is late with one or two trades, it doesn't make them a bad trader, but as Torsten said, other members can make their mind up about whether they want to take the chance based on how many people had a problem with the trader and the nature of the problems. And if a trader gets upset because you posted factual statements in their rep thread (I'm not aware of this having happened, but it seems to be what people are afraid of), then that is on them and not on you.

How unfair on a member who looks at another member's trade rep thread and sees one hundred positive comments, to pay for an item and when the item doesn't arrive find out that they were the tenth person who this had happened to but the first nine were too coy to provide accurate feedback.

When someone gets found out to be a scammer, there are always people who come out and say "this happened to me, but it was only a $20 trade and I assumed that it got lost in the post". Well, they should have said that in the trade rep thread. If it really did get lost in the post, you will not be hurting the trader by posting this factual information in a thread with dozens of positive comments. But if ten people in a row have the same experience, then it gets less and less likely that it actually was lost in the post, and future potential buyers can make their mind up about whether it's worth the risk dealing with (and potentially giving large amounts of money to) this member. Many of the people who have been scammed out of large amounts of money laid down this cash after several people had already been scammed out of small amounts. A person who thinks their $20 loss is not worth complaining about may end up costing someone else hundreds of dollars by not 'complaining'.

Also, while the trade rep forum is not a discussion forum, it is also unlike ebay in the sense that there is infinite space to qualify any complaints you have. On ebay you may have to choose between "great seller. A+, very happy" and "always late with postage", on here you can go into detail and say something like:

"Condition of the items was perfect and very happy with what I got for the price. Have bought from this member many times and have always found them to be slow in getting things out, sometimes as much as a couple of months, but when it's been longer than a couple of weeks they have always thrown a few freebies in to make up for the inconvenience. Will definitely purchase from this member again in the future."

^if it's completely factual, it gives subsequent buyers what they need to make an informed decision about how a trade with this member is likely to pan out.

/verbose rant

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It's a shame that you have had problems with dishonest people on the trades forum.

The people I have dealt with have been extremely generous and helpful.

I agree with the member reputations being the best way to deal with this problem, but you still have to give the newbies a chance. We were all new once.

And it's very likely these new members are extremely generous and helpful too, maybe just start off small.

The whole trading system is built on trust and if we start building a mentality of suspicion it will fall apart and our community will stop continuing to grow.

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Would it be possible to get a trade rep addon for the forum?

I understand it'd be very hard, probably impossible, to port in the old rep info from the rep forum but as the saying goes... "The best time to plant a tree was 10 years ago, the second best time is now".

The reasons for a rep addon:

  • It can be displayed on the users's profile & posts. No need to go hunting for their rep thread.
  • It's far more concise. Going through a rep thread can be a bit of a pain. Especially if it's a long one.
  • Easier to keep track of with username changes and whatnot.
  • You can use it as an ACL. Got no rep? You can't post in the freebies thread or rate anyone else (so stop abuse). I'm not sure if it can be that fine grained but you get my point, I hope.
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I am happy for mods to establish some rules to keep that moving. I take a pretty dim view of scammers, so if the mods can come up with ways to reduce that frustration then go for it.

I also urge members to use the trade rep threads more. Remember that YOUR failure to report a bad trade could cost many others dearly as well. The key to using the trade reps is to simply be factual. if someone is 3 weeks late then state they are 3 weeks late. If you don't speculate and don't make accusations then there is nothing you will ever regret about putting into a trade rep thread. Other members can then make up their mind if they want to trade with someone. That should also apply to the free trade thread where the giver should be able to veto a receiver if that receiver has a reputation of not honouring their trades. That way the thread should not get stuck as often.

So, if I were offering something in the free trade thread and the person who accepted my offer had a bad rep (or possible no rep) I could veto the trade. I assume that I would need to notify a mod in that situation?

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Things could get messy in that thread if trades were vetoed, particularly if someone had already accepted the trade offered in the vetoed offering.

It all seems to be coming back to what aTom said above, but as he said it would be complicated to instigate such a setup retrospectively. In an ideal world the trade rep score could qualify/disqualify a user from such a thread with a factor based on recent trades to identify recent failures.

Maybe a standardised poll at the header of each trade rep thread would give a prospective trader a quick insight into the person they intend to trade with - excellent, good, fair, poor. That way you could look at the poll & the last page of the trade rep thread for each person and get an idea of what they are like. Again messy to apply retrospectively but .....

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I guess we just need to check the rep of the person before deciding to post after them it the free trade thread. If their feedback is poor or absent, trade at your own risk. But then the thread will get held up because nobody will want to post after someone with bad rep.

But we really need to use the feedback forum more. There wasn't a thread in place for the one trader who didn't end up sending my stuff, even though I now know that people had trouble with him before. But since I posted a feedback thread, at least people are coming out of the woodwork to concur.

Edited by Cimi

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Things could get messy in that thread if trades were vetoed, particularly if someone had already accepted the trade offered in the vetoed offering.

I think it would be better if that approach were an interim measure only, for that very reason. I guess what has to happen in that in the example I used above (where I was offering a trade and wished to veto the next person in the chain after me due to bad rep etc), I would contact the person who had accepted that vetoed trade as well and negotiate to skip the problematic member. This makes sense when you think about it because someone who doesn't honour a trade in the free trade thread is really ripping two people off - they are obtaining the offer above them fraudulently by breaking the promise to pay it forward as well as ripping off the person they fail to deliver their own offer to.

In the long term I think at0m's solution or something like it would be more manageable.

But we really need to use the feedback forum more. There wasn't a thread in place for the one trader who didn't end up sending my stuff, even though I now know that people had trouble with him before. But since I posted a feedback thread, at least people are coming out of the woodwork to concur.

Yeah, I was one of those people, and I'm really sorry for that. I found it hard to start a trade rep thread specifically for the purpose of giving negative feedback - and the fact that no one else had raised the issue led me to think that maybe it was just me. I can't speak for other members but I'll know better next time something like this happens.

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Besides the fact that I don't really want custom scripts on this forum [as I can't maintain them myself during updates], the poll functions and other reputation functions are all open to abuse as they are not about facts and details, but simply about clicking a button. The easier the system the more abusable it is as we have learnt in the past. If all reputation votes have to be backed up by a narrative it is easy to work out if the complaint is real or frivolous. if you are a trader, don't be so lazy - go and look up the reputation of the person you are trading with. It only takes a few seconds.

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I made a trade rep thread for Matt1208 since doublebenno did not.

I had been hoping to jump into the thread again but this has now been delayed because I don't know if mystical oyster has already sent the stuff to Matt1208. If s/he has, Matt1208 has abused the thread at everyone else's expense and stuffed up the trade thread's progression. If mystical oyster hasn't yet sent Matt1208 his stuff, s/he should hold on to it and instead give it to the next poster.

Edited by Cimi

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See, this is the thing - I have never waited to receive anything before I sent my contribution on to the next person. If someone was to rip me off by not sending me what they had promised in the free trade thread, that would be between us - the recipient of my wares could still carry the thread forward and disruption would end with me.

True, this approach might mean that I end up being sent nothing. But I figure that the free trade thread isn't just about me.

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