3 posts were split to a new topic: New colors for the forum
Maybe we should also think about enforcing a rule that the #market is no place for discussing anything else. I think you should only reply to #market:wanted topics if you have a sincere offer and to #market:offered topics if you are interested in buying.
Otherwise some topics will constantly be arbitrarily bumped as off topic discussions unfold there, while other - more recent offers - could quickly vanish from the top of the category view.
Two options could be:
- Replying to #market topics doesnāt bump them up. Neither in /latest nor in the category view. That way really hiding them from /latest may not be that important.
- Replying is not possible, but anyone who has an open topic in the #market can be PMād by anyone - even new users - until the topic is closed.
Unfortunately I havenāt really found solutions for either on meta.discourse.
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Agree! Another option to achieve this would be to auto-close the new topics really fast, so no new reply is possibleā¦ Maybe set auto-close to 30minutes or soā¦
Edit: minimum is 1 hour. So I chose that 
Also; I think that there should be no discussion in that category. People can discuss in PMās if they want more information. It really is only interesting for the people involved and nobody elseā¦
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I strongly disagree. See above.
And what happens with topics now if the item was sold/bought successfully?
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What about new users who want to offer/buy an discussed product, but have no possibility to send a PM yet?
I know itās easy to get your status up and be able to send a PM, but people who only came to the forum to see if they can buy/sell a FP, are not always interested in reading how to āupgradeā. Or reading topics they are not interested in, just to be able to send a PMā¦
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Maybe a line like this should be added to the recommendations in the About the Unofficial Market category message:
ā¢ If you are offering, bear in mind all new forum members can only use the forum messaging system after a while*. You might want to allow them (and non-members) to contact you right away by providing alternative ways like your e-mail address (at your own risk).
*A link should be provided here that explains it (frankly I have not been able to re-find it now, it would be helpful if it was made easier to find in general)
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Or we could use topic templates that automatically add text to every #market post telling readers to contact the poster via PM and explaining how new users gain the right to send PMs.
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@TobiasF why do you think that questions and interest should be public? It only concerns the two people involved. Replies have the disadvantage that it bumps posts to the top that have no general interest. Also, if two people offer a FP1, and then a third person links the two to make it clear there is a price difference doesnāt sound to me like a nice or needed function.
There is the problem that brand new people on the forum canāt send PMās. But maybe that is also a blessing: we have no way of vetting people or knowing who they are. So maybe it is a good thing that people need to be somewhat more part of the forum before they can bidā¦ or is this to protective?
That is indeed an issue. Ideally Iād see people changing the topic title and add something like [SOLD] to it.
Is this even possible once the topic was closed?
I donāt think itās an issue of whether the topic was closed. But users until a certain trust level canāt edit posts after a while at all - I guess including topic titles. Regulars on the other hand can always change topic titles, even if they didnāt create the topic.
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Just to get this clarified because it was not definitely clear so far: For the time being, it is not possible to keep the marketplace posts from showing up in the ālatestā view, right?
Iām asking because I think this problem is actually the reason for closing all individual marketplace posts. And while I fully agree that they should not flood the ālatestā view, I also see a perception problem with closing the posts: A closed marketplace post might convey the wrong impression to readers that the item was now sold.
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Questions should be public because they can be interesting to other people. It should be avoided that different users ask the same questions.
Interest should be public so a potential buyer can see if he can expect a success or if there are many other interested persons and he probably wonāt get the item.
No. A third person should not link two sellers to each other. He should only answer if he is interested, but donāt want to pay the offered, but a lower price.
A third person can answer in āwantedā topics to link to āsellā offers if the seller did not do it.
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Can we change the name of the #market category to āMarketplace (Unofficial)ā? At the moment it looks like this:
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Good point. Changed it!
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No sadly we havenāt found a way to do this yet. If you happen to find a way on meta.discourse.com, please let us know! I agree that it be better to leave them open, if we could hide them from the latest topic view.
Maybeā¦ but then still weād have to be very strict to keep topics from going off-topic. I have seen fora where people start discussing if the price is right, or discussing alternative products that would be a better buy etc.
I think the market should be simple; you should only react if you are genuinely interested in buying or selling so not to waste the other persons time. Probably 90% of these questions and answers are only relevant to the people involved in the transaction.
Also, if I look at other 2nd hand markets online, there is almost never a public discussion section.
I think this can very well be achieved, and is best achieved in a direct conversation between persons.
Also here I really miss to see the need for this third person involvement. If you want to sell your Fairphone 1, maybe it is a good idea to first have a look in the section wanted if there is someone who wants one. And the other way around.
Sorry if I am not understanding what you mean. And I think that we could test a more open response system as soon as we find a way to hide them from the ālatest postsā stream.
It is probably not feasible and way too much hassle, but Iāll just say it nevertheless: Is setting up a second forum solely for the marketplace possible? (Could settings just be copied from the primary forum to make it less work to set it up?) Of course, this would only make sense if that second forum could be linked in such a way to the primary forum that would make this āmarketplace forumā well visible on the primary forum.
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Weāll first see how the current setup works and what is going well and what needs improvement. But if we would setup an entire new website for just a marketplace purpose, Iād go with software that is meant for that and not forum software. Maybe this tip might proof a good one:
The only thing that I am unsure about with bidhub if it allows people to bid, buy and sell without Fairphone as middle manā¦
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Uff, I see a lot of people offering phones with broken USB port, while this isnāt too hard to resolder by a good repair shop. I fear that a lot of those motherboards will be dumped because many people are solely searching for screens.
Can we somehow add a short note about broken USB ports and how to fix them?
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The problem is that more screens are breaking than mainboards, especially when the broken Micro-USB ports have been repaired. As then many FP1s with broken screens will not find a new screen, the complete intact rest (also the mainboard) will be dumped. The only solution would be new FP1 screens, but I doubt that they will ever appear.
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We are now almost one month down the road with the new market place. What do you all think?
Any recommendations or ideas for improvements?