Why have a website feedback forum and then close topics ?

[Gargamel]

Case in point

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

This was no small thread that people were asking why it had been closed. I ran to many pages, responses and was informative and a collection of several themes, trading, affiliate marketing, newspaper reports of "crimes against French Bulldog" and Beard transplants - which I know many PH'er were woeful underinformed about.

In giving space to a Website feedback forum, this should be a space to discuss calmly why threads were closed, and whether a similar thread could be re opened, with new content and spell out what the rules are.

First we get prohibition, then we are banned from talking about prohibition in the feedback forum. It's a nonsense in my view.

Also, Posting rules are unclear. Does this mean we can NEVER post a twitter feed on here ? Because lots of threads start with comment about a tweet. EG the Donald Trump thread, why isn't that banned it has tweets in it - whats the difference ?

Mod Jack - I think you should have let the debate run - at least in the Feedback Forum - just looks high handed. Plus I am unclear what legal risk you are running... I didn't see anything offensive, just a robust debate about whether these guys are traders or affiliate marketeers.

[Jack Mansfield]

Gargamel said:

Case in point

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

This was no small thread that people were asking why it had been closed. I ran to many pages, responses and was informative and a collection of several themes, trading, affiliate marketing, newspaper reports of "crimes against French Bulldog" and Beard transplants - which I know many PH'er were woeful underinformed about.

In giving space to a Website feedback forum, this should be a space to discuss calmly why threads were closed, and whether a similar thread could be re opened, with new content and spell out what the rules are.

First we get prohibition, then we are banned from talking about prohibition in the feedback forum. It's a nonsense in my view.

Also, Posting rules are unclear. Does this mean we can NEVER post a twitter feed on here ? Because lots of threads start with comment about a tweet. EG the Donald Trump thread, why isn't that banned it has tweets in it - whats the difference ?

Mod Jack - I think you should have let the debate run - at least in the Feedback Forum - just looks high handed. Plus I am unclear what legal risk you are running... I didn't see anything offensive, just a robust debate about whether these guys are traders or affiliate marketeers.

Hi Gargamel,

It was closed because there is not a great deal more to discuss, the original thread has broken our rules thus ending with a close/deletion.

The website feedback thread was not started in a calm manor and so I shut it down quickly - comments like that can have a snow ball effect, and when I had already explained it had broken the rules, there is nothing more to add.

Donald Trump very much wants to be in the public eye, a regular member of the public may not and it is a very different circumstance - nonetheless, we have today discussed being a bit more comprehensive on this rule.

The thread will not be making a come back as it has broken the rules of posting through many posts.

Cheers

[Gargamel]

Surely everyone who posts on Twitter wants to be in the public eye, as that is exactly what that platform is.

I agree, sleuthing is not on, especially for LinkedIn profiles etc.

But - again, there is a whole thread which only consists of facebook posts, so your rules on privacy for public domain information appear to be a nonsense.

Especially when that thread had linked newspaper articules, as well as instagram accounts, whatsapp screen shots that had been reposted elsewhere - all over many pages, with a lot of information disclosed already. So to suddenly rock up and close it - looks very very odd.

Did they make direct contact or complain ? I am assuming yes, that thread was a good cautionary tale for anyone thinking of investing in buying trading signals via affiliate marketing companies. I think there was a better way of doing this than simply locking it.

[bigandclever]

Jack Mansfield said:

Hi Gargamel,

It was closed because there is not a great deal more to discuss, the original thread has broken our rules thus ending with a close/deletion.

The website feedback thread was not started in a calm manor and so I shut it down quickly - comments like that can have a snow ball effect, and when I had already explained it had broken the rules, there is nothing more to add.

Donald Trump very much wants to be in the public eye, a regular member of the public may not and it is a very different circumstance - nonetheless, we have today discussed being a bit more comprehensive on this rule.

The thread will not be making a come back as it has broken the rules of posting through many posts.

Cheers

"manner" ... and I was perfectly calm, just pissed off.

Deleting the thread serves no purpose other than protecting the miscreants peddling their scams to the uninitiated. Well done, a proud day at Haymarket Towers indeed.

[eldar]

I have to note that the application of the rules is whimsical, to put it politely.

[Jack Mansfield]

Gargamel said:

Surely everyone who posts on Twitter wants to be in the public eye, as that is exactly what that platform is.

I agree, sleuthing is not on, especially for LinkedIn profiles etc.

But - again, there is a whole thread which only consists of facebook posts, so your rules on privacy for public domain information appear to be a nonsense.

Especially when that thread had linked newspaper articules, as well as instagram accounts, whatsapp screen shots that had been reposted elsewhere - all over many pages, with a lot of information disclosed already. So to suddenly rock up and close it - looks very very odd.

Did they make direct contact or complain ? I am assuming yes, that thread was a good cautionary tale for anyone thinking of investing in buying trading signals via affiliate marketing companies. I think there was a better way of doing this than simply locking it.

Again, we're looking at possibly being a bit more comprehensive on this rule.

I'm not at liberty to discuss any complaints. The other option would be to read through the entire thread and delete every post and quote that broke those rules, unfortunately that would be extremely time consuming and not viable. Surely the better solution would be for users not to break the rules in the first place, as that would have allowed the information to stay on site.

[Jack Mansfield]

bigandclever said:

"manner" ... and I was perfectly calm, just pissed off.

Deleting the thread serves no purpose other than protecting the miscreants peddling their scams to the uninitiated. Well done, a proud day at Haymarket Towers indeed.

Deleting the thread actually protects PistonHeads/Haymarket - as much as we are against any possible scams, it is not our responsibility to police it and puts the brand at risk.

ETA our name and shame policy - https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

[CoolHands]

its pretty simple - haymarket don't want to spend any money at all resulting from anything caused by a website. If anyone makes a complaint, no matter how baseless it may be, they shut the thread, end of story. That way no cost is incurred.

[bigandclever]

Jack Mansfield said:

Deleting the thread actually protects PistonHeads/Haymarket - as much as we are against any possible scams, it is not our responsibility to police it and puts the brand at risk.

You'd better delete the entire Ringing kits for sale on ebay thread then.

So much for "community". I'd hazard a guess that a large proportion of the PH make-up is the same as the target for the scammers ... young males on social networks. People with a bit more experience & knowledge looking out for others is exactly what a community should be, binning a thread in case some ahole gets all uppity that they're being called out on their scam isn't.

But, yeah, you've made your point, I'll get back in my box.

[Monkeylegend]

Jack Mansfield said:

The other option would be to read through the entire thread and delete every post and quote that broke those rules, unfortunately that would be extremely time consuming and not viable.

Shouldn't this be ongoing though if the mods are on the ball? It should be dealt with as and when posts that break the rules are made, not wait until 30 pages or so and then say it's too big a job to do. PH have been happy to let it run this long, warts and all

Seems like a poor excuse to cover up some other agenda.

[Jack Mansfield]

Monkeylegend said:

Shouldn't this be ongoing though if the mods are on the ball? It should be dealt with as and when posts that break the rules are made, not wait until 30 pages or so and then say it's too big a job to do. PH have been happy to let it run this long, warts and all

Seems like a poor excuse to cover up some other agenda.

Only if the posts are reported as the thread goes on, which in this case, they weren't. The mods are on the ball, but it's impossible for me/the moderators to read through every part of the site as it is absolutely huge, we're very open in the fact that we encourage members to report anything they think might be a bit iffy - ie. no hidden agenda.

[andrewrob]

Would a better solution be a post from a mod giving 24 hours to clean it up then members can self prune it to save the thread being deleted?

[Monkeylegend]

Jack Mansfield said:

Monkeylegend said:

Shouldn't this be ongoing though if the mods are on the ball? It should be dealt with as and when posts that break the rules are made, not wait until 30 pages or so and then say it's too big a job to do. PH have been happy to let it run this long, warts and all

Seems like a poor excuse to cover up some other agenda.

Only if the posts are reported as the thread goes on, which in this case, they weren't. The mods are on the ball, but it's impossible for me/the moderators to read through every part of the site as it is absolutely huge, we're very open in the fact that we encourage members to report anything they think might be a bit iffy - ie. no hidden agenda.

If it was a recent thread maybe, but that thread has been around for ages. Are you saying in all that time the mods haven't had time to peruse it at all and note the fact that some posters were breaking the rules. Or has somebody externally made an issue of it and put pressure on HM/PH to close it.

PH have been happy to let the thread run for too long for it to suddenly decide some posters were breaking the rules.

[Gargamel]

Monkeylegend said:

If it was a recent thread maybe, but that thread has been around for ages. Are you saying in all that time the mods haven't had time to peruse it at all and note the fact that some posters were breaking the rules. Or has somebody externally made an issue of it and put pressure on HM/PH to close it.

PH have been happy to let the thread run for too long for it to suddenly decide some posters were breaking the rules.

Look we all know what happened, a perfectly decent thread that had run for many months, recently came to the attention of someone who personally knew two of the "affiliate marketeers" concerned.

After a few exchanges with them, the thread is suddenly closed.

Which is dissapointing, I don't expect Haymarket to take a moral stand on the topic. However closing down the feedback thread too was very high handed in my opinion.

I would hope that in future PH might consider opening a new thread, with the same title, reminds everyone of the posting rules and lets the debate continue.

[pincher]

Monkeylegend said:

If it was a recent thread maybe, but that thread has been around for ages. Are you saying in all that time the mods haven't had time to peruse it at all and note the fact that some posters were breaking the rules. Or has somebody externally made an issue of it and put pressure on HM/PH to close it.

PH have been happy to let the thread run for too long for it to suddenly decide some posters were breaking the rules.

You probably already know the answer to your question, don’t you?

[Monkeylegend]

pincher said:

Monkeylegend said:

If it was a recent thread maybe, but that thread has been around for ages. Are you saying in all that time the mods haven't had time to peruse it at all and note the fact that some posters were breaking the rules. Or has somebody externally made an issue of it and put pressure on HM/PH to close it.

PH have been happy to let the thread run for too long for it to suddenly decide some posters were breaking the rules.

You probably already know the answer to your question, don’t you?

Well I know what we have been told

[havoc]

bigandclever said:

So much for "community". I'd hazard a guess that a large proportion of the PH make-up is the same as the target for the scammers ... young males on social networks. People with a bit more experience & knowledge looking out for others is exactly what a community should be, binning a thread in case some ahole gets all uppity that they're being called out on their scam isn't.

PH isn't a 'community' from Haymarket's perspective - it's a marketing opportunity to be sold.

That the collective members gain benefit from the 'community' is just a side-issue for Haymarket, and is only good if it reinforces the post-count / visitor-count.


The old adage: If you're not paying, then you're not the customer. Sadly that's now true here...

[Voldemort]

Jack Mansfield said:

I'm not at liberty to discuss any complaints.

I don't believe you.

Jack Mansfield said:

The other option would be to read through the entire thread and delete every post and quote that broke those rules, unfortunately that would be extremely time consuming and not viable.

This is EXACTLY what you should be doing, even if a thread needs to be temporarily closed to allow for pruning. Otherwise why do we have moderators? If it is too onerous for you, resign as a mod and let somebody who has sufficient time and enthusiasm take your place.

Jack Mansfield said:

Surely the better solution would be for users not to break the rules in the first place, as that would have allowed the information to stay on site.

Of course. But in the event that didn't happen and instead of saving information for the benefit of the majority, you have taken the easy (no effort) option. AS USUAL.

[Oakey]

The rules are, frankly, inconsistent bks.

I remember almost 8 years back when my brother fell out with me and started a thread airing my entire personal life on here, could I get them to delete the thread? Could I bks! I'm sure it still exists! "Sorry, we can only delete it if the OP asks us to!"

And I'm pretty sure the 'no sleuthing' rule was aimed at digging up information on other PH'ers, not random internet 'personalities' who are deliberately publicising their lives on social media

[surveyor]

Happens all the time. Usually by Big Al. Makes a comment on a feedback, and rather than let anyone have a polite say back he just locks it. IMO it's actually rude.