Concerning the new Buy/Sell posting format

[Zoaelite]

Most of my concerns have been voiced by the general canreef populace, the only thing that I can add is I have no problem paying a membership fee (Something similar to RC) if this would help circumvent high vendor fees.

By all means this wouldn't be a "pay or get lost" thing, just give general members the option to "support" canreef. Paying members could get a little avatar indicating they have personally contributed.

Just my 2 cents.

[reefwars]

I would contribute reguarily , for people like me how is sponsorship possible where I don't own a business and my revenue from frags is small, I'm not someone who posts only when frags are for sale I post answers, I visit houses, give people tester frags free and offer any service I can....I rarely charge for anything just frags I swallow all other costs and time......its kinda sad that I have to be careful not to make sponsors mad when people like me put in the real blood and tears.
...I bet I can name 50 people I've helped one way or another free of charge since Christmas
....and when its time to sell some frags I'm stepping on eggshells

Not trying to start a revolt just stating what's obviously fact

[Borderjumper]

I really didnt want to comment, as none of us has really knows the story behind
why this has been implemented. Yet.

But it's not hard to guess where it's going tho. It's to stop people who are selling multiple frags. I find it kinda sad that I am "breakin the law" because of my 15 acan frags I started 2 months ago planning on December sale for some extra Christmas money. Guess there's too much competition here.

I'm not going to stress over a message board rule change...I have the real world for that! It is what it is

I stand by my sig line tho..

[Zoaelite]

Originally Posted by reefwars

I would contribute reguarily , for people like me how is sponsorship possible where I don't own a business and my revenue from frags is small, I'm not someone who posts only when frags are for sale I post answers, I visit houses, give people tester frags free and offer any service I can....I rarely charge for anything just frags I swallow all other costs and time......its kinda sad that I have to be careful not to make sponsors mad when people like me put in the real blood and tears.
...I bet I can name 50 people I've helped one way or another free of charge since Christmas
....and when its time to sell some frags I'm stepping on eggshells

Not trying to start a revolt just stating what's obviously fact

No need to toot your own horn Denny , that's what were here for.

I couldn't agree with the statement above more, never even meeting me Denny SHIPPED me a Nuc. Green frag free of charge. It's people like this that act as the proverbial glue here at Canreef, remove their ability to provide help and you have a house built of sponsors, not a home built for us.

In addition most of these sellers are providing something very few vendors provide, actual aquacultured frags, grown in their own home systems. Not a single store in Calgary at the moment has an actual propagation system. What option does this give us besides wild caught?

Please Canreef, stop oppressing the little guy before its too late!

[gobytron]

Lol...

guys, this website is a business and like it or not, we the users are it's commodity.

This will not be the last change created to stifel the "black market" we create for ourselves as lets face it, the easier it is for us hobbysist to communicate, trade and sell at fair prices the harder it is for vendors to make their margins.

He who has the gold makes the rules.

We fear change

[Proteus]

Originally Posted by reefwars

I would contribute reguarily , for people like me how is sponsorship possible where I don't own a business and my revenue from frags is small, I'm not someone who posts only when frags are for sale I post answers, I visit houses, give people tester frags free and offer any service I can....I rarely charge for anything just frags I swallow all other costs and time......its kinda sad that I have to be careful not to make sponsors mad when people like me put in the real blood and tears.
...I bet I can name 50 people I've helped one way or another free of charge since Christmas
....and when its time to sell some frags I'm stepping on eggshells

Not trying to start a revolt just stating what's obviously fact

Originally Posted by gobytron

Lol...


This will not be the last change created to stifel the "black market" we create for ourselves as lets face it, the easier it is for us hobbysist to communicate, trade and sell at fair prices the harder it is for vendors to make their margins.

If vendors are worried about loosing money to guys like Denny then maybe they should one up him and bring in new exciting pieces we all drool about over the web

[Northernseacorals]

Originally Posted by Zoaelite

Most of my concerns have been voiced by the general canreef populace, the only thing that I can add is I have no problem paying a membership fee (Something similar to RC) if this would help circumvent high vendor fees.

By all means this wouldn't be a "pay or get lost" thing, just give general members the option to "support" canreef. Paying members could get a little avatar indicating they have personally contributed.

Just my 2 cents.

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.

[Snaz]

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.

[Slick Fork]

Originally Posted by Snaz

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!

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.

[Slick Fork]

I don't think it's a matter of making things cheaper for sponsors. I think this is more of a conflict of interest issue and how we handle it. The conflict being someone like Coral Master who sells exclusively frags and a non-sponsoring member who runs a frag system of unknown size. I don't imagine guys like Red Coral or Aqua-Digital really have a large concern as we almost never see people saying "Hey, I brought 15 bubble kings up from the states... who wants one"

SOlutions:
Sponsor favourite is to squash the buy and sell forum to limit competition

Member favourite is going to be to tell the sponsors that they buy advertising space and that's it, no guarantees of non-competition from members.

Right now we're trying to meet in the middle and say guys who magically have 10 "surplus" bubble kings every month are out of line but we're going to try to leave individuals alone. This is great in principal but has to be a nightmare for Mod's, especially if some vendors are very vocal and high maintenance causing a lot of unnecessary "investigations". So, I get the need to track who's hitting the buy/sell forums lots to help with complaints.

If I read correctly, Zoaelite is not proposing a mandatory membership fee or tax... more of a voluntary contribution to allow us to reduce the dependency on sponsors and move to a "you're just buying advertising space" kind of model.

I'll suggest a refinement of this idea. We could introduce varied levels of membership/sponsorship with the perks for paid membership being more priveliges in the buy and sell forums. A quick/rough example:
Level 1: General member very limited # of unique buy/sell threads allowed every month - FREE
Level 2: Preferred member: More unique buy/sell threads every month, indication on avatar or in signature of preferred status. - Cost = $$
Level 3: Sponsor: Own forum, banner adds, indication of sponsorship in profile/avatar/signature. - Cost = $$$$ minus the funds raised by preferred members. So if we have 10 sponsors (Just pulling numbers out of a hat here) who currently pay $1200/year for sponsorship status and we raise $2000 from selling preferred memberships, the sponsors have thier cost offset by$200 each. This would keep board revenues the same, help appease sponsors who might feel slighted and allow guys like reefwars and others to continue as they have been.

In my above example, non-sponsoring actual businesses (Brick and mortar store or website) would still be prohibited from selling/advertising/marketing on the board.