Paying for Classifieds

[endersgame]

How do you generate revenue and weed out the crap at the same time AND not turn this place upside down?

How about a one-time membership fee to participate in any forum on SZ. Non-paying members can only lurk.
Is this too much to ask?

SZ classifieds is a hard sell because you can sell anywhere for free.
The experience of SZ as a whole is worth more to me.

If you want to focus on the classifieds and charge fees a-la-cart, it will look something like this..

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/photopost-classifieds/index.php

and this looks like a lot of work...

[Heirloom]

I don't know man... I just.... I don't know..

[MikeN]

How about a one-time membership fee to participate in any forum on SZ. Non-paying members can only lurk.
Is this too much to ask?

I like this idea the best. I also think that charging just for classifieds will seriously reduce the amount of "amazing" deals that we get here. I know that I browse SuperFuture classifieds just as much as I browse the SZ classfieds, because over there's an OK chance that dumbass put up some rare item for dirt cheap because he doesn't know any better. I think the majority of my "wow I cannot believe how cheap I just got this for" moments happen over there because it's a pig sty free for all (no offense mikelowery ).

Also, what's the real number one priority here? Making some money for the site, or keeping the site in check? If it's the latter, then maybe we should just have some kind of option where Faust can grants the ability to post in classifieds to whomever he deems fit. Or maybe have some kind of reputation system where a new member can only post in classifieds after he builds up enough positive reputation, which is given by fellow members. Just some ideas.

[asho]

surely the result would be:

$item cost$+shipping+paypal fee+1%sz fee

...all paid by the buyer

[Spencer]

With sellers like Nakata, they are not selling crap. Its all desirable goods from the brands we love (and for less than retail), I am sure many people here at SZ have benefited from his membership. Imposing a small fee on the users is fine but is not going to deter sellers from abusing the classified. The problem is with the unnecessary and aggravating process of dealing with people speed posting to use the classifieds and once they have the ability to use the classifieds abusing the privilege with tons of unnecessary bumping and posts to indicated that they have a wanted item. The structure needs to change, possibly adding the restriction of a 1 year of active membership to the 100 post count limit would eliminate the problem of speed posting, but it may just delay it. The moderation really just needs to step in and stop the needless bumping (maybe by completely eliminating the ability to bump threads in the classified) and holding sellers responsible for deleting threads once an item has sold or only allowing one active sales thread per member (and it must be paid for to active, one time fee). Sorry its been a long day so this may just be incoherent rambles.

I like a lot of this. Adding a 1 year active membership + 100 posts = free FS posting. Anything below that and you must pay a nominal fee to SZ.

How about a bump per week limit? And one FS thread per user at any given time? We don't need three new posts for three new items from so and so.

I certainly have no problem donating to SZ. I've been here a long time and I certainly owe SZ more than I'll donate, but if there's a button, it will come......

[MoFiya]

^ second everything of that.

[whitney]

i think its strange that nakata would say he brought so and so and then it would be in the classified shortly after..i think that is the difference between him and some of the few resellers i have seen in classified.

[lowrey]

what would be a good thread bumping interval? some forums allow anything, some once in 24h and one place I know where they sell car parts allows once a month bumping which is the longest I know.

I feel like 24h on SZ is too quick as threads from roughly the last 1.5-2 days fit on the first page, this means that there is no reason to bump so quickly. threads from the past week fit in the first 5 pages, so even a 1 week bump time would not be that lethal. maybe 48h? 4 days? a week?

[stereophobic]

while I myself have been here less than a year, I'm indebted to the classifieds here in liquidating stuff that doesn't fit me or I feel doesn't hold a place in my wardrobe.

as for the ones using the classifieds as some sort of method to earn some side-income: I agree with Zamb that finding out that someone is selling something because they got it cheap on Y!JP and wants to turn a profit is like a hair in the mouth, grail or no.

before I start rambling incoherently, all I wanted to say is that instituting new forum rules/procedures that affect all of the population of the forum for the sake of the 0.2% that are at the core of the issue here is akin to performing heart surgery with a hacksaw.

[Chant]

^if you were here in the early days when a pair of ccp derbys or a Rick leather would cause a minor meltdown for everybody, you might understand my point
and would you qualify as a professional reseller? seems to me that you would but I doubt you would define yourself as that -- so basically my larger point is that you have to have someone define your position which is a bad idea. 1% is nothing

Just a side note, to reply to the nod :
- Rick Owens opportunity thread was obviously a profesionnal reselling (even though I was nothing but a middleman). So, to reply precisely, I would with no doubt define this thread as a znakata reselling thread. Same goes with the DD thread. But, and believe me or not, I did it for SZ (and both threads were posted on SuFU a long time later, when everything really interesting hab been purchased by members here), not for my personal enrichment - or I miserably failed.
EDIT : Anyway, I would have gladly accepted to be put in the professional reselling thread and paid the fees.

- Paris proxy service includes fees, but they're not worth the time I spend answering questions, inquiring, running here and there, queuing up at the post office, etc. (and I never bump it for these reasons). So, I'd say it's a half professionnal service.
- When I resell my beige DRKSDHW, it's regular selling.

Actually, I don't see the problem. As I stated, it's very easy do define who is and who is not, and you don't need the seller to approve your classification.

But what I said in the first place is that you can profit of SZ, but not without participating. This was my main idea.

[sshum88]

I thought this thread came to life as some members had created a mini-business inside the classifieds. As others have already asked, is there more than 1?

I don't believe in creating a whole new set of rules & policies to address one issue rather than deal with the sellers directly. It's too difficult to administer & enforce. I believe we need to keep things simple.

[ProfMonnitoff]

On the note of excessive bumping... perhaps this could be curbed by not allowing bumping at all unless something meaningful (ie new items) is added to the thread? This could be done by making all replies in classifieds require moderator approval. The downside of course is that someone would have to spend the time to those posts - but there wouldn't be that many I assume.

Otherwise, once a week seems reasonable too. But what if somebody wants to add a new item before the week is over? To me that is always a legitimate reason to bump the thread.

With regards to reselling/fees, I don't know how good of an idea it is. The idea originally seemed to arise because of 'professional' resellers, but it seems to me that they are a tiny minority of classified posts. A fee on classified posting seems to be a way to monetize classifieds rather than curbing reselling. After all if you're making $200 on a flip, $5 isn't that much. Nothing wrong with monetizing classifieds, but it seems like it's missing the original point.

I have personally in the past sold an item for more than I paid (on sufu), but I had bought the item with the intent of keeping it and it didn't fit me, and the original asking price was just stupidly low so why not profit... - where is the line drawn between reseller (all classifieds posts really) and professional reseller?

Also, in some cases I'm not sure how 'evil' these resellers are. If somebody beats you to an item at $350 and then flips it for $600, maybe the $350 asking price was just too low? Of course classifieds aren't auctions so there is no way to outbid the reseller on his original purchase.

[Faust]

A couple of points:

1) The rules, whatever they might be, would have to be super-simple. I cannot spend my time differentiating between resellers and not resellers - it would be way too hard and time-consuming. So, it would have to be a blanket rule.

2) I don't mind experimenting first with a simple donate button and see what happens. But I guarantee you that nothing will - donating doesn't work.

3) A part of the intent, obviously, is monetizing classifieds. I stated that from the beginning.

4) Bumping once a week seems like a good rule.

5) About sellers leaving to Ebay that someone mentioned - that's nonsense. And if they want to go to SuFu - no problem.

6) I don't like the 1 year rule - it's too much. Speed-posting is easy to detect and I think we've done a good job curbing it.

So, it seems like the best so far proposed is 1% fee on the total amount of the initial asking price for all items in the thread paid via PayPal. Additional items = additional cost. Bumping once a week. Failure to pay = thread removed. Three failures = ban.
Is this more or less acceptable? Seems reasonable to me.

I think at first I would make this a one month pilot and see what happens.

[endersgame]

So, it seems like the best so far proposed is 1% fee on the total amount of the initial asking price for all items in the thread paid via PayPal. Additional items = additional cost. Bumping once a week. Failure to pay = thread removed. Three failures = ban.
Is this more or less acceptable? Seems reasonable to me..

i think this is too difficult to manage. the payments, the multiple items, curbing bumps, counting failures..

i mean it's up to you guys, you're doing all the work..

[Castor]

Seems more than reasonable. Though, I think anyone who is clearly running a business in the classifieds should perhaps be hit with higher fees than those just offering things at the price they paid, simply because they did not work out. I realize this may be very difficult to assess, but I imagine you already know who these resellers are.