I came here because I was looking to talk to other people with similar websites about link exchanges. Looks like a great forum here! But then I find out I have to create 25 posts about other 'stuff' and be here 14 days to discuss that. This is a strange policy, I dont understand it. My goal is post in that forum, and now I need to "come up with" 25 posts. Its like your site is forcing me to post up fluff in order to participate in the forum that i truly want to participate in. I am 38 years old and run a legitimate and well respected business, im not here to spam in some dark corner, I'm just here to talk to others about building our websites. Your rules are built around incentivizing people to post fluff. My suggestion is if you want to dole out less infractions, dump these restrictions, they just dont make sense to me (I'm brand new here and can't figure out this policy rationale). And my feedback about it is that I think it is illogical.
If you want to talk about link development you can already... http://forums.digitalpoint.com/forumdisplay.php?f=13 If you want to utilize the Buy/Sell/Trade section (for example link exchanges), you would need to contribue to the forum.
When you contribute to the community discussions for a while, then you'll have permission to use the marketplace. The BST area is not the primary function / purpose of DP. Discussions are. The rule keeps out spammers who want to come here solely to promote their businesses, get links, or scam other members. Does it weed out all? Certainly not. But it does help. That's the rationale. And on a forum this size, there are a lot of spammers to deter.
Well, you'll have to join in the discussions (which is still connecting, and the most important part of networking by the way) if you want to reach the 25 post requirement to advertise. So spend some time in the link development section or something and talk about link-building strategy. It's relevant and will "connect" you with others interested in the same.
Believe it or not, This unique feature of DP makes it most reliable Free forum of its kind.. Other competitor forums of similar kind charge the members in order to force them be good. DP has no fees at all, still it is spam free to a great extent, relatively to other webmaster forums, which are struggling with spammers and lack of faith of members in each other. If there is no waiting policy, spammers may create a new account the same day when their account is banned, and thus jump into the buy sell section again with a different name and will spam and scam again. I love DigitalPoint ( as long as I do not get multiple infractions for silly things , lols )