Post
by aferguson » Mon Jun 20, 2011 7:04 pm
ok.
A while ago, Jnew pm'd me and asked if it would be alright if he posted his items for sale in the main forum. I told him no. I explained my reasons and they pretty much mirror what toyktdlgh said. Jnew went ahead anyway and started posting ebay links in the main forum. While his disregard for what i had said ticked me off, i let it slide because some members seemed to enjoy it and it seemed to be doing no harm, for the moment.
I anticipated the exact problem we are now seeing, however.....that other members would object. The other inevitable fallout is that others will feel entitled (rightly so) to post their custom items for sale here. So where does it stop? Jackson posts his custom decals? Any tom, dick and harry who makes a custom piece of garbage can post here too? Is it fair to rule out some on the basis of my perception of quality, which is purely subjective?
Long ago, we had no cutoms forum and the main forum was used. It became glutted with customs and members complained that information on new products was being obscured by custom threads. So P-51 created the customs secton.
However, 1/18 was much busier then, then it is now. Very little in the way of new product is released, these days so the problem of cluttering up other threads is diminished.
Pickelhaube has always been and will always be, welcome to post here. He is essentially a manufacturer and i can't see anyone objecting if BBI or Allgo wanted to post here and let us participate in the development of their next release. No difference between them and PH, in my view.
Jnew is not a 'manufacturer'....something i told him in our pm conversation. He makes one off customs. Quality is irrelevent in my view. But because they are one offs, i don't consider him to be anything like PH. If he made them in batches it woud be different, then he would be a small manufacturer. Up til now they have been one offs. This fourm was not created so that Jnew, or anyone else, could have a nice free way of selling their stuff to a large targeted audience. For that, P-51 created the b/s/t forum.
However, in an attempt to be fair to all, and acknowledge the concerns of as many as possible, i propose a compromise solution.
Since 1/18 is so dead, i don't see the harm in people posting their customs for sale in the main forum with the following provisos:
1. They must of course be 1/18 and military
2. They must ALL be confined to one thread, which can be updated as often as is wished. But no individual threads for different subjects. That way anyone who is interested can look at Jnew's or anyone elses thread and for those who don't want to it can be easily ignored and won't cause very much clutter in the 1/18 forum
3. Customs shown MUST be listed on ebay or some other high profile internet site. This will help prevent the inevitable wise guy who cobbles together some piece of garbage, just to prove a point or make a joke. By listing it on ebay, costs are encurred and it gives at least a sense of legitimacy of intent for an honest sale.
4. If the 1/18 forum gets busy again in the future, this policy will be rescinded and all customs for sale will again have to be listed in b/s/t
5. P-51 knows nothing about this so as always, he has the final say and if he says no to this then it is no.
Will that satisfy everyone?
i never met an airplane i didn't like...