ZG & Trade posters - open discussion

There has been discussion recently about how ZG should treat posters who are quite clearly involved with the audio industry.

Some time ago we ran a poll and established a strong body of opinion in favour of trade posters making their credentials clear in their signature and/or avatar.

But we need to look at the wider issues such as what those in the trade can and cannot say on open forum, where advice and recommendation crosses the line into sales and promotion of product etc.

I will give my own views which are as follows:

Trade members generally have a lot to offer in terms of knowledge and experience and it would concern me if we adopted a rigid policy that effectively gagged these members from posting their opinion and advice.
The danger of course with a 'no rules and anything goes' policy is that we might encourage blatant selling to members and that would not be acceptable IMO.

Therefore I suggest we encourage those in the trade to share their knowledge with freedom to refer to their experiences and research but draw the line at mention of specific products on the open forum. So for example, an amplifier manufacturer would be free to discuss amplifier design and refer to their own experiments, design ethos, manufacturing processes, sales model etc but cannot discuss a specific product by name.

As an addition we could perhaps adopt the system I've seen recently on Subjectivist where quite specific company and product discussion are confined to a thread with a clear heading - so for example we would have - 'Linn Products discussion thread' and effectively that is a free for all - anything goes with direct questions to the designer and the ability to reply and advise on specific products. The line here would be actual selling - so still no actual sales activity.
This effectively ring-fences these discussions.

Of course we do not charge a Trade Member fee on ZG and do not offer special facilities to Trade members and this should be remembered when giving these issues consideration.

So please post your opinions and we'll promise to go away and draft something.

Over to you.

 

Rob.

TBH it's a simple thing.

Forums self moderate. Any trade poster stepping outside the spirit of the forum or going after individuals will fall foul of the members. IMHO the mods are there to stop it getting nasty.

Any official sanction against trade would handicap the forum.

Freedom to post on any thread is vital for any member. Anyone having an agenda will soon be found out.

I'm a new boy here but I think the above is the best way forward.

Andrew.

 

It wont work because there are gangs on most forums and favoured manufacturers and biased moderation. Wigwam is worst as there is a gang of posters there who act like rabid dogs, if you in the in crowd you can do what you like if not you are attacked from every direction. Pink Fish is second worst because the likes of you can create as many LP12 threads as you like and spam continuously and get away with it, and if anyone criticises you or your continuous plugging of your bit of metal TonyL protects you with biased moderation. AoS has consciously gathered together a group of pet *recommended* manufacturers and they spam the forum continuously, but the pre-requisit is to bow at Marcos feet. Here is not so bad apart from a couple of manufacturers are entrenched and protected yet others like Zanash in the past have been attacked like a pack of dogs on a rabbit, but I have been impressed with Robs turn round of this forum.

Obviously I think Subjectivist has the best model as any manufacturer can have a thread (eventually it will be a room) and people can ask and manufacturer can reply and if they want to sell in their thread they can, so what, it bothers no one else. People don't have to go there if they don't want to. It has fallen down a bit with nva because most member are nva users at Subjectivist so nva tends to appear all over, BUT changes are afoot.

I only started the forum because I got booted off so many others for speaking my mind, but now the forum is going independent, it is moving to a new server and new forum program. Admin will be Uglymusic (ex Audiophile reviewer Dave Wiley) mods will be JimKemptom and Gromit and I will be locked up in the nva room. Seriously though we are even recommending an idea that came from Beresford in manufacturers giving a 5% forum discount for orders placed through the forum, or giving a 5% contribution to the forum.

Forums should not be scared of becoming commercial as long as it is open and unbiased, not based on favouritism or gang ruling, and lets face it at 5% it is a bit cheaper than the 40-50% retailers charge.

 

I will do as I a told ( as always ) , but I do believe it should be completely obvious when a poster is in the 'trade'.
Keith.

 

I quite like that idea as it can offer the best of both worlds - potentially.

Dave Wiley - didn't he take over the Sound Organisation after Roger & Hamish left?
If so he once set up my old LP12

 

No after Jonathan Kettle left Haymarket (as Teapot was Daves mate) he was out of favour. In the late 90's he started Cyber-fi which was the first on-line Hi-Fi Magazine, but it was too early and revenue lines couldn't be created. Since he has been a copywriter and general computer techy. His blog is called dangerous thinking and is quite interesting. Dave Wiley is his pen name.

He hate analogue and turntables with a vengence he is a serious computer audio techy and is leading the thinking in this and it is much discussed at Subjectivist - along with free form jazz which he loves and I love to hate and take the piss out of, one day one of them might just pitch an actual note

 

I was banned from a forum recently cos I am not one of the gang!! I started putting a few bits in the classifieds for a mate who has hoarded for years and has been told he better shift it all or else, he must run 6 different systems in hios home so imagine the trial and error over 35 years and he never ever sold anything on, it just went in the garage or spare room!

Anyway I listed some stuff and there were complaints so I spoke to the mods and paid £50 to keep everyone happy on the understanding I sold his in the trade and mine in the personals, but I got immediately restricted to the trade section and the trade rules.

I had one person in particular who was on my case 24/7 over there if I even mention I was using a Rowland amp he would come straight in and post telling me off calling me every name under the sun!! I aint the type of person people usually wanna pick a fight with but it was relentless and the other boys in blue joined in too and I would never rise to it ever!

I could not mention anything to anoyone about anything.....'ur classed as a dealer so obide by the dealer AUP, eles u will get more than a smacked wrist!'

There are other dealers on there who can say what they want, I werent even one but still paid a 50!

I think personally u wanna stay a bit lax Rob as said everyone will eat a dealer alive if his conduct is deemed unfair or biased, although some people have strong views on things I think that savage self promo is obvious and for all to see.

Personally guys like Kieth from Purite and a couple others are gems IMO and if they were to push a product on me in a private convo or on the phone etc I would really value their opinion, cos its guys like Kieth who have ernt their respect and deserve to be taken seriously IMO! We can spot the others from a mile away!

Pheeewww! That was a long post sorry guys!

 

The spirit of these forums is to share and discuss products as a community. There's no better way to remove doubts, myths and misinformation about a product or its use than to have the product's maker involved in those conversations. Having those discussions in a communal setting is not only efficient for the manufacturer who no longer has to answer the same question a thousand times over in private emails but the rest of us receive the benefit of a central knowledge base as well as the chance to converse with the maker himself.

If we must have moderation, I suppose a room or dedicated thread would work. If I were the admins I'd make it clear that those who have real or imaginary problems with a fellow manufacturer have no excuse now but to stay off the manufacturer's thread or out of his room if this is going to be the new model.

 

I'm perfectly happy for people in the trade to say whatever they like so long as it is obvious they are in the trade (and in what capactiy) and so long as they are not slagging other people's products. I'm not sure there's a need to put them in a seperate room.

Stuart.

 

I think this comment about another trade member is a good example of why many people don't like trade.

 

There should be a mandatory flag to disclose trade status in people's profiles. Trouble is, there's variations on the theme of 'trade'.

Restricting trade members to their own area would serve no great purpose, as many trade members provide healthy contributions to forum discussions. The few that don't invariably get thrown off forums on a regular basis, and that's almost self-policing.

Trade people are just like people people; some will be interested in a discussion qua discussion, where others will use a discussion as a launch-pad to deliver their personal agenda payload. Some will play nice, some you wonder how they manage to wipe all the bile off their keyboards each time they post.

The only real difference is a mouthy trade member who is so vitriolic that they get removed from every forum time and time again only serves to paint their products in a dreadful light. The thing about viral marketing is it's about 'marketing', not about the 'viral' part. Good viral marketing - like 'will it blend?' or the Dove 'evolution' video - is clever and makes your point for you. Unless your plan was to paint all trade members in a bad light, making yourself a royal PITA and ending up with most people treating you like some kind of audio leper, is simply bad marketing, not viral marketing.

 

Andrew's post (#2) says it all - freedom to post allied with appropriate moderation is the key.

 

I have no problems with Trade contributions per se, only with rude and insulting ones.

I do think that trade members should be flagged as such, so that their contributions can be judged in the light of their vested interests, however.

Chris

 

I think all trade should be allowed to post whatever they like whenever they like and however they like.

And they should be subject to the same dissection and zero protection from criticism that other posters have.

But they should all be listed, not just as trade but what their interests are.

Many of the trade are solid contributors to forums with years of experience and the ability to give this out in an unbiased fashion. Sadly too many of them are increasingly over opinionated part time fuckwits who shouldn't be let near a PC.

 

The model I am refering to means trade members can post where they like about what they like on the open forum apart from about their own products and company. For that they need their own thread or room depending on how the forum is set up. It is very simple, the company needs a rep, pref the designer, to be a member of the forum, if it is a marketing man then you tend to just get dribble and bullshit, but at least it is confined to one place and people can decide if they want to go there or not.

 

I'm for a relaxed open ended approach as Trade people have wider & valuable experience they can share.

What would happen if a Trade Member finds his products subjected to attack ? They must have a right to reply

Overt self promotion becomes obvious after a while & for my part then becomes negative marketing, so those people end up shooting themselves in their own foot

 

Of course, but that with that right comes the responsibility of not behaving like a petulant child. There's no special pleading that comes with trade status.

 

Set trade status on profile
No seperate room as they are trade cos they are still individuals with different knowlesge on different products and still use hifi alot like the rest of us at home and their opinions can help in any number of posts and the fact they have access to more products can be invaluble to us

Its also handy in a situation where we may be discussing a certain aspect of a product and a trade guy gets involved and that feature may be something thats missing on his and we all agree it would be a good feature to add and then if he does we all become winners.

Keep them in the community and let them speak freely is my opinion.

Shame Stan Beresford wasnt given the right of free speach over on the other forum and now he is a fixture on AOS forum and they love him over there by all accounts!

But then that other forum is biased towards their sponsors and dont like any competition!

 

So many forums, so much policy and so much politics...... I can't keep up with it all!

 

We shouldn't be discussing them.