By implementing this 3-like requirement, DP is abandoning genuine dialogue. At least the way things were dialogue was natural. Now people will post only because they have to, and that's when quality goes out the window.
Actually, quality is WAY up since the change... the thing that was causing quality to go down was the old policy of requiring 25 posts of any time (it didn't matter if they were quality).
As a mere mortal on DP, and not one of the Super-Gods, I have noticed a big improvement in parts of the forum I frequent, which used to be a lot more spammy. A bit less posts, but definitely less rubbish ("What is forum", "u yes do organic blog comment natural link back" and similar junk). You seem to have it backwards.
I can see how the quality would go up in that respect, but lack of resources goes down. If people can't find solutions in one place what do they do? Leave. Quality in content is important, but so is quality in the number of available resources and the overall experience for that matter. This change only focuses on one factor, but there are many to consider. It's too soon to say exactly how much this change will help or hurt DP but I can say this...As far as the Buy, Sell, Trade category goes...I am a buyer on this forum more than anything. Tonight was my first time on the site since the change and I already had to go looking elsewhere to find a service provider. So this change is affecting both buyers and sellers, and economics 101 tells me that's not a good sign. Even if this were a non-profit, you still need supply and demand to have a successful site. Can DP survive on a scarcity of commercial threads and limited yet high quality non-commercial threads? Time will tell.
Yes, I am sure that garbage replies are a big loss. Do you really SEO advice off someone who tells you spamming forums and blogs is "natural" and "organic"? No. And if you look in Search Engine Optimisation, PHP, Google, Link Development, etc, people are getting help. Read this post by Shawn (the owner): https://forums.digitalpoint.com/threads/new-site.2628210/page-21#post-18439736
We would survive without even having a forum. We have been around since 1995, and the forum didn't open until 2004. As far as the changes to the marketplace, so far since the change, there have been more bids, more sales and a higher average price per sale (quality going up basically). So it really depends on what you are looking to buy/sell. If you are looking to buy articles written with poor grammar by Fariad, the Afgani goat farmer for $0.50 an article... yeah, hopefully that stuff goes away. lol
Quality of what is way up? No disrespect intended, but your idea of quality may not be the general population's idea of quality. I came here tonight as a buyer and guess what...I couldn't even post my job. I'm not here to spam, or cause problems. I came here to hire someone and perhaps help somebody dire need of cash earn a little extra money tonight and I wasn't even allowed to post my job. I respect DP's proactive approach to cleaning up things, but don't throw out the baby with the bath water.
You may have been around since 1995, but what does 1995 have to do with today? I don't know anyone who says "hey, I'm going over to DP's main site". TODAY, people come here for the forum. I couldn't even tell you what the home page looks like.
The average quality of posts are up, as are the average quality of the products/services being offered in the marketplace. When it comes down to it, the Buy/Sell/Trade area was NEVER intended to be anything but a *benefit* for "good" users on the site (good meaning they contribute to the site in some way). That's why you couldn't post anything in there until you were a member for 14 days and made 25 posts. While that was a mediocre way (at best) to measure if the user contributes to the website, it was the best option we had at the time. Now we have a better way to measure it based on *quality* of posts, vs the old way which was nothing more than quantity. While *you* may just use this site for Buy/Sell/Trade, it was really just a poor way of measuring what a contributing member was that allowed it in the past. The reality is that the Buy/Sell/Trade area does absolutely nothing for this site other than cause headaches. We don't make any money from it, and we deal with thousands of spammers/scammers, etc. trying to use it... which again, amounts to a grand total of $0 in revenue for us. We don't even use it ourselves to buy or sell things (I've never once bought or sold anything in it). Bottom line is now we have a better way of measuring what users contribute quality posts to the site, which I wish we had all along. But at the same time, the bar is set so incredibly low (getting 3 people out of 669,000 to like something you wrote really isn't all that hard when it comes down to it). And even then if someone *truly* can't or doesn't have the time to contribute anything useful to the site, they STILL can get into Buy/Sell/Trade as a premium member. The forum was started in large part because we needed a support venue for our EXISTING customers/users. In all honesty, we could just turn off the forum and make just as much revenue as a company that we do with it on.
Actually, I was looking to hire a programmer, but I couldn't even post my job. And I have been a member for years in good standing. So it looks like this improvement is a little one-sided.
You can still hire people without posting your own thread, just look in the Programming section for people offering programming services. https://forums.digitalpoint.com/forums/programming.103/
That's great to hear! I wasn't implying that DP wasn't already successful. But I've been around a long time and I know what people come here for...at least people in my industry and it is a big industry. But, this discussion is about the forum, and surely you didn't create it (and allow the general public in) for it all to crumble. Not saying that it will, but there is always the possibility, especially when the voices of your loyal visitors go unheard. I've seen several post on this board with people voicing their discontent for the new policy and the only responses I see from DP are excuses of why it's a good thing not taking into consideration at all why people are not happy with it. Stop taking it so personally and start listening to your members.
I understand exactly why they are not happy with it... the change was never intended to make more people happy, the change was intended to raise the overall quality of posts, quality of products/services being offered, lower the number of scammers/spammers, etc. Obviously no system is going to be perfect, but I'm quite certain that the old system of determining who was a contributing member was far less good then the new one. Again... if our business somehow revolved around (or had anything to do with) the Buy/Sell/Trade area, we would open it up to non-contributing members as well, but it was *always* the intent that it was only for contributing members as a benefit.
With the passage of I'm pretty sure the DP would be the No.1 trustable market place around its competitors in the near future due to getting "3 Likes" to be an established member. I think most of the members make forum posts roughly on other forums, but here they thought so many times before posting at DP to make sure quality of their posts. Am I right ?
digital point, you claim you could just turn the forum off and still make just as much revenue ? How ? Where would you be getting the additional hundreds of thousands of dollars a year from to make up the lost ad revenue you receive ? (conservative estimate). Literally no one is here for your main site as has been pointed out and we know thats an accurate statement. The current system of 3 likes is not much different to 25 posts. Both systems require users to post as much as possible - in fact the like system is worst because people will just keep posting rubbish until they get 3 likes. As it stands its easier to give them the likes to avoid the spam posts. So if you dont want the "spammy" posts, why keep introducing measures that involve people having to post ? To say the buy sell section does nothing for the site is an interesting claim....its the busiest place on the forum and more traffic means more people being exposed to ads earning DP money. People are not naive enough to swallow that one in my opinion. I am not sure why DP thinks it needs to try and reinvent the wheel that doesnt need reinventing and manage to alienate thousands of quality members at the same time ( by labelling them as non quality because their primary interest is in the trading area). I think miche11e hits the nail on head with the comment about throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Just to say that for sometime quality will go back up but once groups of noobs spammers will find a way to register a few accounts post a few nice threads, once 3-5 will get enough likes then it will be back as where it was. I bet you will even see people selling Likes on other forums (you find anything nowadays). Just My 2 cents
Lol... We don't make anywhere remotely close to hundreds of thousands a year from forum advertising. Lol
First, some people may post only because they have to. Then they will understand themselves the real reason why they have to. It's just like the natural process you grew old, when you were a child, first you may learn because you have to.