Reminders and clarification

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NYWoodturner

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I wanted to take a few minutes to remind everyone of some of our rules, and some of the reasons behind them. We all get caught up in the beautiful wood and awesome talent we have here and do not take the time to refresh ourselves on the rules.

First up is the "gauging interest" threads. WB is free for all to use. Specifically, there seems to be a disturbing trend where a member will find an interesting piece of wood on Ebay, and then post the picture here as if it were their own. This has especially been happening in the Coming Attractions forum. Or, they ask if there is "Any interest" in this wood in another forum. If there is, they buy it, mark it up, and sell it to you. If there isn't sufficient interest they simply quit bidding because they cannot assume the risk to resell it here. For them it is a not a risk at all. While that may be a great business model, it's just not what we are all about. Can you sell a pen or a bowl or even a table or bookcase for a profit? Absolutely! Its your work and we encourage that. We even made forums for it. Surely you can see the difference.

Second up is "All trades and sales must start and end in the open forum".
This is really the foundation of WB. It exists for many reasons, but the first I used as an example dovetails into the previous one. If I am looking at a piece of wood on Ebay for $40 and I post it here and cut it in half with each piece selling at $40, you will collectively point out, by your non-responses that I am way over priced and you are not interested - as well you should. That would keep a new woodworker from just accepting it as a fair price because WB is a trusted place to do business with a great group of folks. If I tell that new woodworker to PM me if he is interested and I tell him $40 for each half, he does not get the benefit of the collective knowledge here, relies on his trust in WB and gets hosed. When he finds out down the road, or tells his woodturning club what he got and what he paid for it, we are no longer a trusted site and all the WB members are tarnished... to the entire club. That is the quickest way I can think of to lose the culture that has been built by all of you. We will simply not allow that to happen if we can help it.

No specific member is being singled out here, but the staff has been alerted to a rash of violations over the past several months, and it seemed like a good time for a refresher course on the rules. Rules aren't fun sometimes , but without them, we will cease to exist. This is a friendly reminder and nothing more, because we all need reminding occasionally. It's also a sincere thank you, to the vast majority of you who are obviously following them.

We all spend a fair amount of time here and honestly I communicate with a lot of you more than I do family, therefore I am just as protective with you as I am family. Keep looking out for each other and thanks for indulging my diatribe.
 

ripjack13

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I was just going through the new posts area and clicked on the Recent Profile Posts tab and was reading through them.
I noticed one new member had just made a slew of posts recently and was leaving his contact info everywhere on peoples profile pages trying to buy wood from them.
If you guys see that someone has posted any contact info on the open forum including the profile pages, let one of the mods know, and we will take care of it.
Thanks so much.
 

Schroedc

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Good Morning Ladies, Gentlemen, Bipedal Mammals, Tree Worshiping Aliens, and Tony,

The staff has been discussing etiquette suggestions to help things run smoothly:

If a thread has been created to satisfy the requirements that all transactions must take place with pictures in an open thread in response to interest expressed in other threads or via PM that has established first refusal prices would not be required as the deal has been worked out between the parties involved. However, if the items shown do then go for sale to the rest of the forum it would be nice to see prices listed.

Our reasoning for this is there may be cases where a seller has decided to provide a deal to a party for one reason or another and we don't want them to be required to post that in an open forum as it might cause expectations of that pricing going forward- For example, Kevin might be willing to sell me 100BF of primo KD FBE for 73 cents and a piece of gum based on our past history but doesn't want everyone and their brother expecting the same deal or other sellers might be willing to make a deal to help out a newbie or someone they have had an ongoing relationship with since by and large this is a fairly generous group of people but that shouldn't force a person to do that all the time.

Now for regular for sale items,

This forum is a wonderful place where for the most part we do the best we can to keep our members from getting abused by buyers and sellers and while we do what we can we obviously can't be the wood police. Sellers set what price they feel is fair for their product and by and large if it's too high folks won't buy. Placing pricing in your for sale posts helps to keep everything out there and makes things run smoothly for several reasons, it makes it easy to see what the item costs without lengthy back and forth via PM, It also helps keep transparency in the for sale posts which allows the staff to keep an eye on things and help the forum run smoothly.

We feel that the issue hasn't been all that widespread (I reviewed a good chunk of for sale posts and only found a couple without prices posted) We would suggest you place prices in your post to help things run smoothly. By and large, if a post doesn't have prices folks will either ask for pricing or skip over it.

Please let me know if you have any questions regarding this that have not been addressed and I will do my best to answer them.
 
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ripjack13

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For those looking in here in the future, I usually go through the "Wood Central" topics every few months and edit the ones older than 6 months, and post up in the newer ones to check to see if all is shipped/received.
I don't mind....I have lots of time.
I've already done the majority of the Wood Central topics to show they have **ENDED**....it took a few months, and it's done.
But I digress. Moving on, I have had a few members recently ask me about what was going on with it, And why I do this....
Here is my answer...
It is technically required to post in that topic that you have Shipped and Received the item in question.
rule 3 says...

"All trading activity must start and end in a thread in the Wood Central section in the appropriate forum."

So in order to "End" it, you need to post that you received it, and as well, the seller should also post that they have shipped it.
To go a bit further, the seller is encouraged (but not required) to edit the title of the topic to reflect that it has ended, After the buyer receives it, and by doing so, that shows us they have followed through and the deal is completed.

If you want to edit the title of the topic, Just above the first post, on the right side is the wording, "Thread Tools" with an upside down triangle next to it.
Click that and a pop up box will appear that gives different options. the first one being to, "Edit Thread".
Click that, and another box shows up with your title in the text box. Click in it, to edit it to say, closed or ended, either is good.
Then click Save Changes....and you're done.

easy peasy lemon squeezy....

:thanx2:
 

ripjack13

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To avoid some confusion on the acronyms that we all may or may not use and or know about, I would like to suggest that if you do use an acronym in either the title or the post, that you should spell out what you are referring to exactly that is for sale/trade/whatever in at least one or the the other of the Title or Topic.

As an example...
In the title of the topic, you could say,

"BEB blanks for sale"

And in the topic, the first post would say either Buckeye Burl or Box Elder Burl...

While this is not a rule, it should be an etiquette that is followed to make it so anyone looking in on the topic knows upfront what it is you are posting.
You may also go one further and use the Scientific/Latin names of the wood species as well.
Thanks....


Acronyms List Link
 

ripjack13

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This is just a friendly reminder and nothing more because we all need reminding occasionally. It's also a sincere thank you, to the vast majority of you who are obviously following them.

In our rules, it says that "Lots" of wood are fine, but that the site is not really intended to sell large lots. It doesn’t say that large lots are forbidden... it means that’s not the purpose of the site.
This is a fine line rule, and If we remove that rule, Then we (mods and admins) would need to stay out of it when the fallout happens, and it would. That's just opening a can of worms. Its a good rule but it is always being tested. There always needs to be boundaries.
As long as you post pics of the blank/block of what is being actually offered for sale then its not a gauging interest thread. Asking "If/is Anyone Interested In...." type of threads to "gauge interest" are not permitted anywhere on the forum. It is either posted as for sale or trade - or not at all.

I believe Kevin’s intent was to keep people from listing items they didn’t actually possess. It’s ridiculous to expect someone to cut up planks into blanks only to find people want something else.

If you do decide to offer a large lot to be cut up into blanks, the proper way to do this is to post a board and/or a blank or 2 with the size and price and say "I have plenty of lumber and can cut specific sizes", then take it from there when someone wants to purchase a bowl blank from you, then you have to cut it and post an actual picture of the item for sale and the price. Otherwise, it is considered a gauging interest thread, and that is not allowed. If someone does it and then someone sees it and says, "Hey he did it so I can do it too." And then that guy wants to argue with you over the details of the rule.

We do need some more sellers who will take the time to piece things out and do all the shipping details when they could just sell local and in large lots. Just remember, you're not going to get rich selling stuff here. So keep your prices respectable.
 

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Howdy fellow WB peeps. We have had something pop up a few times that was likely to happen as we grow. We thought it best to go ahead and address it now.

There was some discussion by the staff here some time back about whether or not we should allow sellers to demand only cash or check.
I've come to the conclusion that we shouldn't need to make this a requirement/rule. However, we can tell the forum members if they do choose to send payment not using PayPal, they are on their own, and we cannot help them get their money or product from the bad deal.

We have had a couple of members scammed out of money paid to sellers for wood here lately. I gave a gentle nudge in the topics and then it moved to a private conversation when they did not respond to that. In those situations we did not insist on people using Paypal, We just cannot do that. By doing so we can be classified by Uncle Sam as a Barter Exchange.

"A barter exchange is an organization which serves as a third party to coordinate barter transactions between members of the organization."

That comes with legal requirements and a whole lot of headaches. It is a very serious issue that we just can't take chances with. - Kind of like juggling chainsaws...

On the other hand, we still have the obligation to keep the intentional scum bag types out of here. A lot of our members have a blind trust in us that they will get a fair deal here. If they see a price on WB they automatically associate the trust they have in us with the price and buy it. Then when they find out they got screwed its not only the seller that they remember, its WB too. Then we all lose credibility. That protective sense is what drives us as mods to jump in when we see something out of whack. Just be conscious of that going forward. we have a certain responsibility to keep things fair and honest. It is what our unique forum is about.

If we make this a rule then we become a barter exchange. That's another thing Kevin didn't want. The Moderators are here to keep the peace on the forum and help out the members on the forum. Not be a strong arm on the forum. If they choose to pay with PayPal, great. They're covered. If they choose other ways, great too. But if the deal goes south, they made the choice. There is nothing keeping folks from agreeing to whatever payment they want through Private Conversations anyway.
If we require you to use a certain payment, then that is another legality we get into. No thanks.
All we ask that we be notified about bad deals so that we can take appropriate steps.
WoodBarter just provides a forum/place to get wood, and, please remember, you're not going to get rich selling stuff here. So keep your prices respectable.

Disclaimer :
PayPal business only and not friends and family, is strongly encouraged, but if you choose to accept another means of payment, you are on your own. If someone rips you off on a barter,(trade not sales) there is no recourse, other than banning the member. This is not a business site, so the best we can do is encourage good judgement.
 
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