Classified Ads
 

I'm tired of same old classified ads being jammed into our OB pipe. I've deleted them many times, but seems when we offer free classifieds we get a lot of opportunist from various countries trying to plug their product... cloning benches, greenhouses, jars, etc

One way to eliminate this is to introduce a nominal charge. When you post classified ad, it will now cost you 1 credit. You can buy credits as you need them.

Perk for forum supporters, all ads Free.

Any proceeds that we raise will be used for OB operation.

• Prices will be as follows
• Listing For sale ad for 2 weeks will cost 1 credit
• Listing an add for 1 month will cost 2 credits.

• You can purchase credits
• $5 - 5 credits
• $10 - 12 credits
• $20 - 25 credits

Hopefully we will only get serious ads now and not borderline spam.

:bump: for all to see

Will you be removing the very old adds that are still around, like, for example, the person who wants 100 flowering phalaenopsis for their wedding in the summer of 2012? The are a number of others that are years old.

hallelujah!! sounds like a much better way of manageing it!!! great idea!!

Why are there still classified ads that are years old?...Jean

It would be so nice if we could get rid of the ancient ads. With all the old ads still around it makes it hardly worth looking; you have to spend a lot of time looking at the ad just to determine if it is current. For example, the banner just presented an ad for Preorders from Ecuagenera ... for a March 2011 show.

I think this might have been done. I don't really know my way around the classified section but I've realised I do have the ability to close adds. However looking around it I can't spot any older than a couple of months.

Let me know if they are still there and I can take another look.

Here is an auction where the last and only comment was posted (with no reply) a year ago. Is this auction really active?
AUCT CALLAS ORCHIDS-B.DIGBIANA X LC. PICASSO HUGE SPECIMEN - Orchid Board - Most Complete Orchid Forum on the web !

It has a 'Time Left' of 2w and 5d. I'm guessing that even if the user did not post a comment and bump it then they have either come back to lengthen the time, or they set a long time in the first place.

I guess we come back in 2/3 weeks and see if it's changed.

Hee are a bunch of for sale ads from a user (gixrj18) that I cannot send a private message to and who I cannot find in the member list.
vBClassified - Orchid Board - Most Complete Orchid Forum on the web !

gixrj18 is a member, but hasn't posted on the forums in a long time.

At some point earlier this year Marty set all such users to a status of 'awaiting moderation' which means their account needs to be re-activated to post in the forums. (I've had another user like this who I asked Marty to re-activate).

It also means they don't show up in the standard member list. I can see them in a moderator member list though.

It's possible for members of this stats to still post clasified adds, and I think there are a lot of clasified adds from users who only come here to do that and so because they don't post in the forums they also do not show up in the member list.

These adds were posted recently so I think are still current.

Here is another one, taking Ecuagenera pre-orders for a show in March, 2011.

FS TAKING PREORDERS FOR ECUAGENERA - Orchid Board - Most Complete Orchid Forum on the web !

I've sent a message to the poster to ask if it's still active. It was last bumped by the poster in January this year and is set to expire in just over a week. I will check back in just over a week and see if it's still active.

1 week later and the time left on the ad is now 4 weeks.

Hmm, yes.

I've asked Marty for info on why this might be (whether the user is changing this, or if something automatic is happening). Not sure yet.

I am not certain, but always thought it must be automatic ...

Seems odd, what's the point in and end date on a listing if it then automatically updates to something else when it gets to the end :scratchhead:

True