superpotato_30
New member
so can we suggest a way to curb that?
Suggestion for the Buy/Sell section
- Thread starter Namrehs
- Start date
templar03
Member
What about people who sell fake goods?
Report to moderators so that they can remove the offending advertisement.
Alerting people about higher prices than shops should be justifiable, shouldn't it (if items are identical, no false info, etc)?
But of course thread spoiling shouldn't be acceptable, e.g. if they make irrelevant comments, especially falsehoods and defamatory statements. So (see below) - should we ban comments altogether? Or should the community self-police? I think SOFT is a microcosm of Singapore society - we shouldn't always turn to authority to regulate how we act. We should encourage self-policing. If people are behaving badly - we can shoot them down ourselves by proving them wrong.
Not true, let me list some good outcomes of comments:
1. alert to fakes
2. alert to previous bad deals, e.g. played out, scammed, etc
3. alert to outrageous prices (OK, this is debatable, but if it's available in the shop for $X, and people sell for $2X, I think it's a good thing if people can alert us)
4. people can post to add more useful information, e.g. helping to identify model, year, components of the guitar - which helps the sale
5. people can help the sale by alerting others that the sale is good value, that the seller has a past record of good deals, etc (I'm not sure if this is good)
6. people can ask relevant questions, or alert the seller (e.g. I only get my PMs replied if comments such as "PM sent" are posted)
How do the moderators feel about being asked to police Buy/Sell? Do you think it's better to have the forum community police it (my preference)? Or that we cannot comment/police ourselves, and have to refer problem threads to you and request you act on it?
templar03
Member
Remember the old buy/sell system where you couldn't comment and sell threads with fake epiphones were rampant?
We don't have such happening as much now because of the ability to comment.
I agree, we should keep the commenting in the buy/sell forums.
On the subject of fakes, the key word is education. We have a couple of posts around about how to identify fake guitars, we should sticky them so that buyers can tell fakes apart by themselves, which is beneficial for everyone in the long run. Google is always there too.
We should cultivate a culture of self education rather than spoon feeding, think about it, if buyers always rely on a group of self policing forumers to point out fakes rather than educating themselves, what is going to happen when the group of self policing forumers happen to be away from the forum? They will end up buying fake guitars without checking for themselves, then start a thread asking if they bought fake guitars. If unsure, check yourself, there are so many online resources these days no need for spoon feeding. If lazy to check, don't buy.
Self policing has its problems, because unqualified people can make untrue comments saying that an authentic guitar is a fake guitar, which ends up slandering the seller, wrongly influencing potential buyers, and negatively affecting the sale. Case in point:
http://www.soft.com.sg/forum/showthread.php/225975-WTS-Epiphone-Les-Paul-Goldtop
We should cultivate a culture of self education rather than spoon feeding, think about it, if buyers always rely on a group of self policing forumers to point out fakes rather than educating themselves, what is going to happen when the group of self policing forumers happen to be away from the forum? They will end up buying fake guitars without checking for themselves, then start a thread asking if they bought fake guitars. If unsure, check yourself, there are so many online resources these days no need for spoon feeding. If lazy to check, don't buy.
Self policing has its problems, because unqualified people can make untrue comments saying that an authentic guitar is a fake guitar, which ends up slandering the seller, wrongly influencing potential buyers, and negatively affecting the sale. Case in point:
http://www.soft.com.sg/forum/showthread.php/225975-WTS-Epiphone-Les-Paul-Goldtop
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@BeFair
There are benefits to both self-policing and educating everyone about fakes - but they're not exclusive ideas. We can always do both! :-D Unless you want to argue we have limited resources to allocate, so it's one or the other - which I highly doubt. Since self-policing is done by forumers on their own free time anyway.
Re: culture of self education vs spoon feeding... is this really spoon feeding? Whether there are people calling out fakes or not - most people have the common sense to know about caveat emptor when purchasing second hand items. I believe when people call fakes - it results in more research being done on items - it improves self-education. But I have no proof. Maybe I am wrong - and SOFTies are trusting other random SOFTies too much. SOFTies might be poor judges of character (e.g. not able to find out if other SOFTies are reputable, credible commentators, etc). In which case - what is really worth "teaching" is a broader form of information literacy, isn't it, i.e. going beyond Google (search for data), to be able to cross-reference from multiple sources, assess the reliability and bias of sources of information, etc. In fact - one great thing about living in the information age (if you are information literate) is we don't have to re-invent the wheel all the time. We can share our common pool of knowledge in SOFT to obtain the greater good (e.g. as you recommended, having stickied threads, or having people chip in with a comment).
Re: the thread you posted - well you did post up new information to counter the accusations and I think people can (at least use the posts as a starting point to) judge for themselves whether your guitar is genuine. And you did sell your guitar after all (hopefully without too many problems because of that one post which you responded to very quickly). We already recognise that the potential for abuse is there - but it's a cost-benefit analysis thing. I think the benefits of having comments outweigh the costs.
And maybe one last point - maybe it's about how selfish we are. Some of us in the forum are very knowledgeable about gear and prices - but we want to use it for our own profit instead of sharing with the community. That's everyone's own prerogative of course. But won't the world (and more importantly, Singapore) be a much nicer place to live in if we can prioritise the human touch before cold hard cash?
There are benefits to both self-policing and educating everyone about fakes - but they're not exclusive ideas. We can always do both! :-D Unless you want to argue we have limited resources to allocate, so it's one or the other - which I highly doubt. Since self-policing is done by forumers on their own free time anyway.
Re: culture of self education vs spoon feeding... is this really spoon feeding? Whether there are people calling out fakes or not - most people have the common sense to know about caveat emptor when purchasing second hand items. I believe when people call fakes - it results in more research being done on items - it improves self-education. But I have no proof. Maybe I am wrong - and SOFTies are trusting other random SOFTies too much. SOFTies might be poor judges of character (e.g. not able to find out if other SOFTies are reputable, credible commentators, etc). In which case - what is really worth "teaching" is a broader form of information literacy, isn't it, i.e. going beyond Google (search for data), to be able to cross-reference from multiple sources, assess the reliability and bias of sources of information, etc. In fact - one great thing about living in the information age (if you are information literate) is we don't have to re-invent the wheel all the time. We can share our common pool of knowledge in SOFT to obtain the greater good (e.g. as you recommended, having stickied threads, or having people chip in with a comment).
Re: the thread you posted - well you did post up new information to counter the accusations and I think people can (at least use the posts as a starting point to) judge for themselves whether your guitar is genuine. And you did sell your guitar after all (hopefully without too many problems because of that one post which you responded to very quickly). We already recognise that the potential for abuse is there - but it's a cost-benefit analysis thing. I think the benefits of having comments outweigh the costs.
And maybe one last point - maybe it's about how selfish we are. Some of us in the forum are very knowledgeable about gear and prices - but we want to use it for our own profit instead of sharing with the community. That's everyone's own prerogative of course. But won't the world (and more importantly, Singapore) be a much nicer place to live in if we can prioritise the human touch before cold hard cash?
superpotato_30
New member
If the true intention of the person is to inform that shops within SG are selling the item brand new at a cheaper price, by all means that person is welcome. However, how are we to discern who has good intentions and who does not? Look at the thread Ep.tjan linked us. The guy simply condemned him being a nasty person just because he sells his items higher than the norm. So does that person have good intentions of warning others or is he simply a thread spoiler? Who knows?
One solution i can think of is simply to PM the person if you have a concern/inquiry about the item. This would make the seller reflect on his thread, and at the same time you also show the seller some respect instead of blatantly slamming his thread as being crony and corrupt/out for profit making.
superpotato_30
New member
Apologies. oversight on my part.
Frankly speaking as long as the reply function is there anyone can reply whatever he or she wishes.
Then again this is a forum.. the freedom of speech IS what makes a forum a channel for discussion/providing of views.
Maybe we should make a poll..
Frankly speaking as long as the reply function is there anyone can reply whatever he or she wishes.
Then again this is a forum.. the freedom of speech IS what makes a forum a channel for discussion/providing of views.
Maybe we should make a poll..
Some good suggestions so far - I guess the ball's in James'/SOFT's court now... to see what they wish to do with our input (not that our views are very representative of the entire forum, seeing as there's so few of us).
@superpotato - yes I think a poll will provide useful information and a rather strong argument re:dis/allowing comments - but let's try as much as possible to word it in a neutral way, and provide sufficient options for people (not just strictly allow vs disallow, but maybe also conditional or qualified allow vs disallows, e.g. allow comments so long as they do not violate (a), (b) and (c), etc? similar to what templar03 posted from VR?) I'm not too familiar with how to use the forum functions e.g. setting up a poll, though (usually I just lurk in Buy/Sell) - I just spoke up on this issue because, well, nobody else was really making the points I thought needed making.
@superpotato - yes I think a poll will provide useful information and a rather strong argument re:dis/allowing comments - but let's try as much as possible to word it in a neutral way, and provide sufficient options for people (not just strictly allow vs disallow, but maybe also conditional or qualified allow vs disallows, e.g. allow comments so long as they do not violate (a), (b) and (c), etc? similar to what templar03 posted from VR?) I'm not too familiar with how to use the forum functions e.g. setting up a poll, though (usually I just lurk in Buy/Sell) - I just spoke up on this issue because, well, nobody else was really making the points I thought needed making.
Thanks for all the suggestions/feedback. We had deactivated the 'reply' function sometime back but the number of complaints (PM/emails/ReportPost) increased so much that we had to reinstate the 'reply' function.
I believe in collective efforts by the community to help make the site better for everyone. Although there are a few incidents where troublemakers try to sabotage the forum, most of the time, fellow users are quick to step in and clarify the truths.
I will continue to monitor the situation and make the necessary improvements. Thanks!
I believe in collective efforts by the community to help make the site better for everyone. Although there are a few incidents where troublemakers try to sabotage the forum, most of the time, fellow users are quick to step in and clarify the truths.
I will continue to monitor the situation and make the necessary improvements. Thanks!
willbassyeahindo
New member
i think its okay to buy goods at lower prices and sell them at a higher rate, i mean i dont see the problem with that, i mean if the original seller sells it at cheaper price despite the fact that he can sell it at higher price, its his loss, there is no 2nd hand, 3rd hand item in general, there are used, mint condition, or almost new,
my suggestion is James should make a rule to state the condition of the item, i think he should make a list and description of the degree of how much the item is used;eg mint, almost new, perfect condition, full of scratches but working properly
if the first seller sells item at lower price then what 2nd sellers sells, its their loss, it doesnt concern the 2nd seller. bcoz the first seller should know that he can sell the used item at higher price. the condition of the item is what is used to derive the price of the used item, even though sometime it is not applicable when
a)the items are vintage model, like old boss pedal -oc2 etc etc
there are other arguments like we want to sell it cheap bcoz we want students who don't have pocket money to buy the item, i guess that is something you should look upon into and i have no idea how haha
my suggestion is James should make a rule to state the condition of the item, i think he should make a list and description of the degree of how much the item is used;eg mint, almost new, perfect condition, full of scratches but working properly
if the first seller sells item at lower price then what 2nd sellers sells, its their loss, it doesnt concern the 2nd seller. bcoz the first seller should know that he can sell the used item at higher price. the condition of the item is what is used to derive the price of the used item, even though sometime it is not applicable when
a)the items are vintage model, like old boss pedal -oc2 etc etc
there are other arguments like we want to sell it cheap bcoz we want students who don't have pocket money to buy the item, i guess that is something you should look upon into and i have no idea how haha
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yubsesperat
New member
just my 2 cents:
i think bidding should not be allowed.
a. no documented bidders and bid amount - allows seller to manipulate the interested buyer to raise amounts
b. results into a game of cat and mouse - waste of time and pointless really
if one is keen to sell, set the price you would be comfortable with seling the item, adding a little bit of buffer in case you will be open to negotiation for an urgent and convenient sale.
i think bidding should not be allowed.
a. no documented bidders and bid amount - allows seller to manipulate the interested buyer to raise amounts
b. results into a game of cat and mouse - waste of time and pointless really
if one is keen to sell, set the price you would be comfortable with seling the item, adding a little bit of buffer in case you will be open to negotiation for an urgent and convenient sale.
