The BST forums aren't dead...they're just fine...people are just doing their business through private messages, as they should. It's no longer a system where members compete to strategically outbump each other's thread or ask their buddies to say "great service", or use their duplicate accounts to bump otherwise useless, ordinary, illegal, or disreputable sales offers. This reasonable method of displaying threads by start time allows every reputable member to post their legitimate offer, and now everyone has an equal opportunity to make money and attract business without worrying about shillers, scammers, dupes, and other jackasses who believe that their product or service is the only one worth considering. Now, those who are really serious about promoting their business will take the time to write a worthwhile, content-rich thread (with all the necessary information presented in the original post), without writing some ambiguous piece of shit offer that forces every member to post "what niche is this?", "does this ebook involve actual work?", or other sneaky tricks to get members to ask unnecessary questions that only served to send their thread back to the top, much to the OP's delight. The real businessmen are going to thrive under this system, and the fly-by-nighters are going to fail. Let's see who has what it takes to succeed!
Now there's absolutely no point in creating a thread that describes your services, because it'd buried completely within couple of days. I already saw a couple of duplicate threads in the Services forum. But! I actually like the new way of sorting. I guess it keeps the spammers away. PS: I like the idea of paying for submitting your thread (for providers).
I agree with sadekjake. I don't think that the change is good. Old threads were buried forever and all I see were threads with 0 replies. This is just not the way. The old system is just fine: Good & popular threads deserve a "legal BUMP" while mods take action on illegal BUMP. Just my voice.
Yeah, me too. I do not think that it is a good thing. Our threads would be buried, even though someone would take interest in it :/ This is from a point of view of someone who is selling a service in DP As the thread is buried, no one would be able to see what services we offer
That's because you have a reputation as a bump-deleter, someone who posts, and then deletes their post and then posts again to regain the top position in the forums...unfortunately, that's a trick that doesn't work when you display threads by start time.
And you're not a fan of the new style of thread posting because you're a Wordpress theme sponsor who relies on auction bumping to boost his own threads.
Does this means that people are allowed to post short messages in BST like "PM me"? Is what I am thinking is correct? "PM me" alike posts are now allowed but if it seems as a violation of the rule "Running up post count" then it will not be tolerated. Correct me if I am wrong.
I am not in Favour of this .. I posted a thread and within 24-48 hours .. it will be on page 3 or 4! So now .. If I ask my buyers to leave a Review on my thread.. what is the worth? There Review will be unseen by new buyers .. as mostly buyers just look at the first page or 2nd (probably 3rd) for what they are looking for! In my case .. I used to get a sale every time someone leaves a review on my thread!! .. As Time Passes my thread will be on page 16-17 and on page 8-9 for my Search tag! Which Means No sales = I have To Report the thread to be closed = No Money for me Than I again have to change the price, change the service type and change everything to start a new thread!! which kinda sucks! Yet again .. Its Just "I" .. and "I" cant do anything about it .. So I have 2 option .. Leave or Live With it. I choose to live with it But Please change it back if you can .. If not now but atleast after sometime!!
Shawn your approach is really wrong. It's not like the whole of India or Africa is after spamming on DP. Nor Indian users are all scammers. I agree with you US makes more profit in the world of Internet than India. But if you still think Indians are like a bad rep to the community then god save your forum man: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/india-to-have-3rd-largest-number-of-internet-users-by-2013/494285/ LoL Oh ye, am not defending India cos I am an Indian but I am a broad minded person
This is absolutely bad and unfair change for respected sellers at least, in my opinion; I have a 120-days-old thread in vouchers forum, nearly the only thread selling that specific voucher in regular basis. Now I don't even know where is my thread gone. I posted a special offer, no one is gonna know about it, no use of reviews, this encourages duplicate threads. Many users sign up for DP because of a trusted service in B/S/T forums they want to get, now this will never happen unless they were lucky to find the thread in Google. So, it cuts up new users and kindly asking reputed members to leave DP for alternatives. I am sure this is gonna be rolled back very soon.
@sadekjake As for moderators, we did just add two more (sawz and deluxdon). And it was difficult enough to find people and agree on them even just with two. We'd love to have lots more, but finding them isn't as easy as you'd think. When it comes to looking for people you want to hire, you still have the option of sorting things the old way. Just change the setting in your usercp. Because you have that option, the change doesn't affect people looking for ads at all. The bulk of people "punished" are those who bumped their threads or got others to do it for them by being vague to incite questions. They won't reach as many people through that bumping anymore. The spamming example you give is a little offbase. First, the spammers / scammers were some of the worst thread bumpers, so they kept themselves ranked higher anyway. Now they're on an even playing field. Second, posts aren't likely to stay a long time on the first place as you mention. In fact, more people are complaining that they're not. So by that logic then, we could say those scam threads are buried faster. @seeker If the only value you saw in reviews was to bump the thread, then you'd be exactly the kind of seller this change was meant to stop. Also, you shouldn't be posting new offers within an existing offer thread. That's the equivalent of posting to change prices, which falls under the bump rules. So again, it's precisely the kind of thing the change was meant to stop. If you really want to bring attention to your older thread, put a link to it in your signature. It really can get attention that way. The purpose of reviews is then to do what they're supposed to do - lend credibility to your offer rather than just bump a post.
I didn't say all Indians were bad users. I was just pointing out that Indians were not the #1 users on this forum and like the poster over here was implying.
Shawn i think you should reconsider how the B/S/T is configured coz it may affect people selling in the B/S/T Section specially coz we arent allowed to create a second thread so basically once a thread is created it will just die as new post come. So please make it as it was before
I have people sending me private messages about a sales threads I created 1 year+ ago. They find it by google, msn, and searching the forum. I got really good results of placing advertisements of my websites and products in my signature too. Then going and make informative and relative posts to threads about the same type of product or just reply to something I find interesting. Those are the people that are looking for your product and are not just looky loos. The only down side of this I can see is that auctions that rely on the bump to get new people to see it and those that will keep the auction going for over 24 hours. I don't know what a typical user does, but myself when I go to the b/s/t area I look at the first and second page of posts and then run out of time or get interested in something I see on those pages out not go forward to more pages. I do this usually once a week. So, if someone posted on a Wednesday and by Friday it is on page 4, then I will not see it. Also, those that don't know you can manually change it back. This might be a good thing, because it sort of opens up the option of digitalpoint forums to charge a small fee to keep the post on top for a set amount of time(s). $5 for 3 days, $7 for a week, $10 for two weeks. It will still have the spammer aspect to it, but would allow for people to be on the first page for a while. Another thing is they could sell the aspect of buying a second (duplicate) post. $5 for each repost of a sale. Again that doesn't take away from the spammers that would abuse the system, but it would give us the option of being in the spot light of new quick looky loos for a bit longer. I see this as digitalpoint forums trying to combat spam and spammers that would abuse the system, which is a good thing, yes, but it comes as a price to those that would not abuse the system. Myself I am for the change. If in time I come to not like it, I am glad you kept the option of manually changing it back. Thank you. **Edit after a few hours of viewing b/s/t: it makes it way simple to view the newly posted stuff. Liking it so far. Those I like I subscribe to.. to follow the updates to bids.
I would easily pay 1000usd for a sticky here on DP bst for a week(s) I think you underestimate what kind of (bidding) wars would happen and waiting lists would be 2 large if the price was low Anyhow I am willing to pay to have my threads "featured" please make it an option (perhaps based on listed sales price)