General discussion thread - keep the other threads clean 29 29

[Old Fashion PB and J]

If anyone posts books in the for sale forum, all books are (supposed) to have scans, description,grade, and prices. Anyone who does not do this is generally told within a few minutes. You are not allowed to post books with offers accepted, has to have a selling price. But you can post books in the announcement thread saying they will be available, with just the photo, no price, or grade. Doing this, allows people to make offers on books through PM. Which defeats the purpose of the sales forum rules. Seems like a loop hole to me.

[drbanner]

If anyone posts books in the for sale forum, all books are (supposed) to have scans, description,grade, and prices. Anyone who does not do this is generally told within a few minutes. You are not allowed to post books with offers accepted, has to have a selling price. But you can post books in the announcement thread saying they will be available, with just the photo, no price, or grade. Doing this, allows people to make offers on books through PM. Which defeats the purpose of the sales forum rules. Seems like a loop hole to me.

 

Wow, you're jumping to many conclusions that aren't accurate...you don't have to provide "scans, description,grade, and prices", only "scans or information about the grade of the offered books". Additionally, there are no rules for posting in the announcement thread. (thumbs u

[Transplant]

Additionally, there are no rules for posting in the announcement thread. (thumbs u

I don't know if this is sarcastic or not, but there are. The announcement thread is a part of the For Sale forum. I don't think it's right to announce a sale and solicit offers on books.

[Sal]

I don't mind it so much, only because it's not taking up space in the Marketplace, but rather in a thread designed to get the word out about upcoming sales.

 

If you want to solicit offers on books prior to pricing, well, sure. I guess if you have the time to deal with that nonsense, more power to you. As long as the actual prices are listed in the actual SALES thread, working within the confines of the Announcement Thread seems like a nonthreatening way to go about it

[drbanner]

Additionally, there are no rules for posting in the announcement thread. (thumbs u

I don't know if this is sarcastic or not, but there are. The announcement thread is a part of the For Sale forum. I don't think it's right to announce a sale and solicit offers on books.

I agree that you shouldn't proactively solicit offers on books using the announcement thread, but there are no "special" rules as to how that thread should be used. The poster above notes that you "can post books in the announcement thread saying they will be available, with just the photo", but that you can't list prices or grades. However, as I pointed out, there are no rules that state you can't list prices or grades in that thread. Maybe we need a "Usage Guidelines" for the announcement thread, and maybe a "Pre-Announcement Thread" where you announce what you're going to announce in the other thread so everyone can have a 10-page discussion of whether or not your proposed announcement is acceptable before it can be announced!

 

 

Either way, if something interesting looks like it's coming up for sale, it would certainly behoove an interested party to inquire about it. I imagine most sellers don't mind either as many of the better books sold through the boards are exchanged through the "PM only marketplace" anyway.

 

 

[FlyingDonut]

10 pages? Maybe if you've got your page limit for 100 posts it'll be 10.

[Transplant]

Do we have to have an explicit rule for everything around here? First, I read the forum (the Comics Market - Forum Only Selling Forum) guidelines as requiring that threads soliciting books have a price that the books will sell for. How happy is everyone going to be if people start posting a complete for sale thread (with thumbnail pictures, grades for books, payment methods, delivery options, etc.) within the announcement thread? The only thing missing would be a price for the books. What if the posts are made days or weeks in advance of the anticipate thread creation date? What if the resulting thread that does get posted only has a fraction of the books listed that were announced b/c the others sold via PM? How much are people are going to view the announcement thread as just that vs. a solicitation for PM offers?

 

This place is a good thing we have going. I personally am not aware of anyone crossing that imaginary line yet. However, it is a sliding scale people. The more you appear to be soliciting PM offers on books, the more some people will be upset about it. Again, I think all threads within the For Sale forum require prices. The Announcement thread is no exception.

[mjacobs8]

Either way, if something interesting looks like it's coming up for sale, it would certainly behoove an interested party to inquire about. I imagine most sellers don't mind either as many of the better books sold through the boards are exchanged through the "PM only marketplace" anyway.

 

[skypinkblu]

I just don't understand WHY people are putting so much effort into an announcement, seems like double work to me, list books here with scans, then on a thread.

 

I think this thread started because people were complaining that October was listing stuff and they missed it ? so...to me, this was a simple...HEY, just in case you are interested, I will be listing ...whatever it is that you plan to list.

 

I just can't think of a good reason to bother putting in all that work, unless you think the prices you are planning to use are too low, and you want to see if bigger fish will bite? In that case, just start them higher and have a sale price later.

 

I must be missing something somewhere...Where is the shrug icon when I need it;)?

[drbanner]

Do we have to have an explicit rule for everything around here?

No, bingo!

 

And that's exactly why people should not start making up their own rules ("You can't post grades or prices in the announcement thread."). For example, the guidelines state that we should "Group your for sale items into as few threads as is reasonable.", which is fine. However, divad recently had several active threads and when someone joked with him about it, he said "You're allowed to have 2 threads." Well, that's not correct - you're allowed to have as "few threads as is reasonable.", which is not "2 threads". Shortly thereafter, Dale Roberts started an earth-shattering 3 threads, which was infinitely more than divad's 2 threads, so divad was outraged that Dale violated the guidelines and we ended up with a 20-page discussion about it.

 

So no, the announcement thread doesn't need any rules, and if you're going to announce that you're going to be selling books, buyers are going to ask about buying those books...always have, always will.

[divad]

If anyone posts books in the for sale forum, all books are (supposed) to have scans, description,grade, and prices. Anyone who does not do this is generally told within a few minutes. You are not allowed to post books with offers accepted, has to have a selling price. But you can post books in the announcement thread saying they will be available, with just the photo, no price, or grade. Doing this, allows people to make offers on books through PM. Which defeats the purpose of the sales forum rules. Seems like a loop hole to me.

 

Wow, you're jumping to many conclusions that aren't accurate...you don't have to provide "scans, description,grade, and prices", only "scans or information about the grade of the offered books". Additionally, there are no rules for posting in the announcement thread. (thumbs u

 

Hulk have no rules!

[drbanner]

I just don't understand WHY people are putting so much effort into an announcement, seems like double work to me, list books here with scans, then on a thread.

 

I think this thread started because people were complaining that October was listing stuff and they missed it ? so...to me, this was a simple...HEY, just in case you are interested, I will be listing ...whatever it is that you plan to list.

 

I just can't think of a good reason to bother putting in all that work, unless you think the prices you are planning to use are too low, and you want to see if bigger fish will bite? In that case, just start them higher and have a sale price later.

 

I must be missing something somewhere...Where is the shrug icon when I need it;)?

Not exactly...people were starting their own thread announcing that they were going to be listing some books at some point in the future (and sometimes the books were never posted), so October started a single thread where everyone could consolidate those announcements.

[divad]

I just don't understand WHY people are putting so much effort into an announcement, seems like double work to me, list books here with scans, then on a thread.

 

Well, according to some members, there are no guidelines for the sales announcement thread, so you can list books there, and entertain all offers without listing a BIN.

[skypinkblu]

 

So no, the announcement thread doesn't need any rules, and if you're going to announce that you're going to be selling books, buyers are going to ask about buying those books...always have, always will.

 

So, what you are saying is, the announcement board is a place to solicit PMs? That's really what I thought all along. I'm certainly guilty of sending an occassional PM, I sent one to someone posting in this thread and I bought a few books 2 weeks ago, but do some people think that's a bad thing, and if so, why?

[skypinkblu]

I just don't understand WHY people are putting so much effort into an announcement, seems like double work to me, list books here with scans, then on a thread.

 

Well, according to some members, there are no guidelines for the sales announcement thread, so you can list books there, and entertain all offers without listing a BIN.

 

On a sales thread, I could see that being a big problem, you'd have Shudder ...DISCOURSE and Pain but in a PM? Of course you should be careful who you PM;)

[divad]

Shortly thereafter, Dale Roberts started an earth-shattering 3 threads, which was infinitely more than divad's 2 threads, so divad was outraged that Dale violated the guidelines and we ended up with a 20-page discussion about it.

 

I don't recall expressing any outrage but I do recall others conducting a 20-page discussion over a simple point.

[drbanner]

So no, the announcement thread doesn't need any rules, and if you're going to announce that you're going to be selling books, buyers are going to ask about buying those books...always have, always will.

So, what you are saying is, the announcement board is a place to solicit PMs? That's really what I thought all along. I'm certainly guilty of sending an occassional PM, I sent one to someone posting in this thread and I bought a few books 2 weeks ago, but do some people think that's a bad thing, and if so, why?

Pretty much...many times a seller would start their own thread "announcing" they were going to be selling x, y, or z, but ended up selling x, y, and z before ever listing them in the thread. People think it's a bad thing because it's "not fair" to them that they don't get an even shot at the books, unfortunately, life's not fair...buyers and sellers develop relationships, friends get 1st shot at books, people know who is looking for a certain type of book so they offer them those books via PM, etc.,.

 

I wouldn't mind doing away with announcements altogether, when you have the books ready to roll, start listing 'em! Unfortunately (and this has happened), someone would then complain that the seller should have announced when they were going to sell the books so they could have a fair shot at them, and away we go round-and-round! (thumbs u

[nik]

So much unwaranted bickering in the selling forum lately.

[divad]

So no, the announcement thread doesn't need any rules, and if you're going to announce that you're going to be selling books, buyers are going to ask about buying those books...always have, always will.

So, what you are saying is, the announcement board is a place to solicit PMs? That's really what I thought all along. I'm certainly guilty of sending an occassional PM, I sent one to someone posting in this thread and I bought a few books 2 weeks ago, but do some people think that's a bad thing, and if so, why?

 

Pretty much...many times a seller would start their own thread "announcing" they were going to be selling x, y, or z, but ended up selling x, y, and z before ever listing them in the thread. People think it's a bad thing because it's "not fair" to them that they don't get an even shot at the books, unfortunately, life's not fair...buyers and sellers develop relationships, friends get 1st shot at books, people know who is looking for a certain type of book so they offer them those books via PM, etc.,.

 

I wouldn't mind doing away with announcements altogether, when you have the books ready to roll, start listing 'em! Unfortunately (and this has happened), someone would then complain that the seller should have announced when they were going to sell the books so they could have a fair shot at them, and away we go round-and-round! (thumbs u

 

I agree. I think we should do away with any and all of the guidelines.

[VintageComics]

Why do you selectively answer questions?