Redisplay Messages: Compact | Brief | All | Full Show Messages: All | Without Replies| Author: | Cyberclark  | | Posted: | Aug 20, 2014 15:47 | | Subject: | Re: BL Development Team: Test before rollout! | | Viewed: | 49 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, QCBricks writes:
| | Are you alleging that the vocal few represent more than 50% of BL users? I find
that hard to believe.
Scott
|
Scott you don't need to have more than 50% of the users to get something
done, apparently you only need to be .03% of the userbase, much like the need
for a Chinese localization 
I think threads like this just go to prove how valuable the chatroom was. If
we still had chat we could all go in there and post all these rants, get it off
our chest, and keep the forum clean for real issues. Wish I lived closer to
Arizona I would take you out for a beer and hug it out! 
-Steve
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 20, 2014 15:28 | | Subject: | Re: BL Development Team: Test before rollout! | | Viewed: | 59 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| Opps his post before I attached the image. My apologies. Here is what the screen
looks like after blocking the image
In Suggestions, Cyberclark writes:
| | | | | | In Suggestions, legoman77 writes:
Also find a solution to get that COMMUNIST FLAG OFF MY SCREEN.
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|
I found a solution John. If you are using Firefox, install an addon called AdBlock
plus. Once the addon is installed load bricklink.com. Go to the flag and right
click on it. A popup menu will appear and there will be an option AdBlock Plus:
Block Image. Click on that and it will give you some options to setup the filter
like just blocking on the current page or I set to block that image CN.gif
from any page on the Bricklink domain. reload the page and voila it should look
like the attached image. Enjoy The only downside to this solution is if
that flag (CN.gif) is used elsewhere like in the order screen or something, then
that image will be blocked there as well.
As you can see in the image in my google search bar I am researching how to write
a Greasemonkey script that will block the image so that you don't have to
use AdBlock Plus. But I am by no means a javascript coder so not sure if I will
be able to accomplish the task. If there are any Greasemonkey coders in our
midst, it shouldn't be too hard to whip up a userscript that will block that
image and maybe even the link
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 20, 2014 15:27 | | Subject: | Re: BL Development Team: Test before rollout! | | Viewed: | 61 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| | | | | In Suggestions, legoman77 writes:
Also find a solution to get that COMMUNIST FLAG OFF MY SCREEN.
|
|
I found a solution John. If you are using Firefox, install an addon called AdBlock
plus. Once the addon is installed load bricklink.com. Go to the flag and right
click on it. A popup menu will appear and there will be an option AdBlock Plus:
Block Image. Click on that and it will give you some options to setup the filter
like just blocking on the current page or I set to block that image CN.gif
from any page on the Bricklink domain. reload the page and voila it should look
like the attached image. Enjoy The only downside to this solution is if
that flag (CN.gif) is used elsewhere like in the order screen or something, then
that image will be blocked there as well.
As you can see in the image in my google search bar I am researching how to write
a Greasemonkey script that will block the image so that you don't have to
use AdBlock Plus. But I am by no means a javascript coder so not sure if I will
be able to accomplish the task. If there are any Greasemonkey coders in our
midst, it shouldn't be too hard to whip up a userscript that will block that
image and maybe even the link
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 20, 2014 14:01 | | Subject: | Re: BL Development Team: Test before rollout! | | Viewed: | 72 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, QCBricks writes:
| | Fortunately for the complainers, they will have a whole new host of minor issues
to blow up over on Friday when the MOC shop opens.
Scott
|
That is the funniest thing I have read all day Scott, you actually think the
MOC shop will be open on Friday
But come on you have to admit there were bugs in this last release that could
have easily been avoided with some proper QA and testing.
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 20, 2014 13:53 | | Subject: | Re: BL Development Team: Test before rollout! | | Viewed: | 59 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, lovaquero writes:
| | Bricklink World Class Programming & Customer Serivce team -
Test before release. This concept is not hard. Perhaps in your eagerness to
pacify the crowd with pitchforks and torches you have forgotten it. Perhaps you
may just not know. Here is how you do it:
For EACH (individual) change to Bricklink:
-----------------------------------------
#1 - Scope your change to know its impact
#2 - Write your test plan to match the requirements for the change
#3 - Recognize that there are at least three (3) internet browsers to support:
Chrome, Firefox & Internet Explorer (IE)
#4 - Make sure that the test plan fails before any change is made
#5 - Implement the change, and only that change, in a development environment
#6 - Execute the test plan (in an isolated environement that matches the live
environment) for Chrome, Firefox and IE
#7 - Repeat steps 5-6 until the test plan passes for all three (3) browsers
#8* - Run the full test plan on the ENTIRE site to ensure everything still works
#9 - If anything fails, return to step #1 and repeat
#10 - Release the change to the live site.
(* Bricklink is written with ancient software that has so many dependencies,
querks, gotchas and 'hidden' features that it is impossible to know what
a change will do to seemingly unrelated features. That is why the software used
to run Bricklink is no longer used nor even supported, not even by the company
that originally created the software...)
Your new mantra must be: "test! Test! TEST! And then test it again!"
Any modern development team worth being paid - especially one that performs
web development - knows this.
Regards,
Rodney
Software Systems Engineer
Solution Infrastructure - Guidance & Machine Automation
John Deere Intelligent Solution Group
|
I would add a step between 8 an 9. Give access to test sandbox to a select group
of user volunteers. Let them "beta" test your changes for a day or 2. Users
that have been here for years are going to more quickly find what was broken
with the updates then the "world class" dev team will. Plus lets face it when
programmers go back and test their own product they may be too quick to judge
because they just want to get the code out the door and on to the next project.
So why would the be objective testers anyways. Also if you get the right volunteers
they are going to know much better than some developer that was just hired what
the non technical fallout is going to be for the community. For instance the
feedback % update. While it technically works, it really doesn't add any
value to the site or it's users, at least not like they thought it would.
And if you truly want good beta testers, you could even give them an incentive
to help you test your product and report bugs by maybe giving them a fee discount
after they submit x number of bug reports or something. The amount you give
them doesn't have to be huge, but in the end having real users work within
the test environment before you go live will help save you time from having to
read all of the posts we have seen today as well as save you money in lost sales
when the site isn't running 100%. You can even have them sign an NDA so
as to not leak any of the upcoming changes.
All that said. I don't understand why they don't rollback the site to
the last stable version. The latest update has caused at least 3 major bugs.
Rolling back the sites code won't affect the database at all and should
make all these issues go away. Then you can follow lovaquero's advice and
properly test this update and then roll it back out when it is ready.
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 20, 2014 09:26 | | Subject: | Localization settings | | Viewed: | 238 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | | Status: | Implemented | |
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| Bricklink is a Global marketplace. Awesome. So let's looks like one.
Not sure if it is just the American in me, but logging in to a site and seeing
a little red Chinese flag in the corner of the site with some chinese characters
next to it, just sets off a lot of little alarm bells in my head. It reminds
me of that movie with Sandra Bullock, The Net, where there was a little hidden
symbol on a page and when you clicked on it you were taken to somewhere bad.
If I were a new user and unfamiliar with the site that little icon might make
me think twice about using the site.
Why not do this like most other Global companies do it. Have the main domain
go to a splash page of sorts. A very plain page with a Large Bricklink logo
in the middle and right below it a dropdown box that says choose your location.
Then for now they can have North America and China (the only two localizations
currently available) then as other languages are made available you can easily
add the links for those to the dropdown and users can be directed the the version
that best suits them. Also below that dropdown box have a checkbox that says
Remember this setting on my computer. Checking this box will create a cookie
file so that the next time the user comes to the site they will be auto-directed
to the proper site.
Here are some examples of other companies that use this approach:
http://www.ups.com/
http://www.fedex.com/
Option 2 - You could do what companies like Apple, Microsoft, Google and many
others do and that is route the user based on their IP address. For instance
when I go to http://www.microsoft.com I am seamlessly redirected to http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/default.aspx
with no interaction on my part. And then at the bottom left side of the page
they have a picture of a globe, not a US Flag mind you, with the words United
States - English after the globe. If I click on that it takes me to a page when
I can then pick a different localization if for some reason I didn't want
to be on the US site. I know though that this option can be problematic espeically
for people who may be visiting or temporarily living outside of their home country
that they may want to view the site in.
Or Option 3 - If the above 2 take too long to implement. For now just remove
the Chinese flag!! Chinese in this case is a language, you shouldn't need
a national flag to represent that. Isn't the Chinese language used by
more people than just those living in China? Plus, When you click on the link,
to come back it just says Eng? No British or US flag? So why do you feel the
need for the China National flag? Also move the link to the footer of the page,
not the header. Most of the other large sites I am looking at have it in the
footer. And most are just simple text links. Look at Amazon.com for another
example. So internet users are used to having to look for it in the footer,
if they need it. Plus in the upper right there, what happens if you add even
more localizations, are you going to have 30 flags up there in that little tiny
space?
Now I know I gave you 3 options so since they don't give us an option for
a poll in the forum it will be hard to vote on. So how about this, A yes vote
just means that Bricklink needs to look at these options and do something to
change the way localization is currently. A no vote means you are 100% happy
with the way they rolled it out so far
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 6, 2014 23:45 | | Subject: | Re: New forum topic suggestion. | | Viewed: | 35 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, Inventrious writes:
| | I dont think its that easy....
|
Maybe not that easy if they wanted to integrate into the existing database so
that it seamlessly uses the login and passwords data from the website, but being
that it was taken down due to security concerns I think it would almost be better
to have it separate from the catalog database. (They could probably at least
pull all the usernames from the database and put them into the IRC database,
with generic passwords and send out emails to every user with the new generic
password and have them change it on first login. But that is a story for another
day)
Anyways here is the install instructions on how to install the original IRC server
ircd-irc2 in Ubuntu Linux: https://help.ubuntu.com/10.04/serverguide/irc-server.html
Here is slightly more complicated instructions on how to install the "Ultimate
IRC server"
http://www.codeography.com/2012/09/23/howto-irc-server.html
Once the server is setup, they would have to install the actual hardware into
the server cabinet that hosts bricklink.com. (Or they could put it in a closet
in their corporate office and use that connection, it isn't going to be heavy
traffic, I would say if you had 2000 users a month the bandwidth would be 500GB
at most, but I really doubt you are going to have 2000 people chatting away on
this server) Then they would have to open ports on the firewall to allow the
traffic to the new server. Update their domain record so that, chat.bricklink.com
or whatever subdomain they wish to put it on, points to those ports they just
opened. And voila IRC would be functioning.
It isn't a resource intensive service either. The backbone serving the site
could handle the bandwidth just fine. And hardware wise they can run on a P133
with like 128MB of ram and that is overkill ) And not sure if they use virtualization
on the current servers, but they could really just setup a small virtual slice
on an exisitng web server and not even have to bother with new hardware of any
kind.
So now IRC in it's basic form would be working, meaning users would have
to have a client such as mIRC to access it. Which would be an added bonus if
you ask me. But in todays web based day and age you have to make things easy.
So the last step is they would have to add a web front end. I would use Kiwi
IRC for that. It is an Open Source web based front end for IRC. And the install
instructions for that are right here: https://kiwiirc.com/docs/installing
Very last step. Put a link on the main page pointing to a new page that details
the instructions on how to login to the IRC server such as server name and port
numbers as well as a link to the Kiwi install and bam....
Yes it is that easy. With the resources they have I could have it running in
less than a day.
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 6, 2014 23:07 | | Subject: | Re: New forum topic suggestion. | | Viewed: | 26 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, Inventrious writes:
| | In Suggestions, Cyberclark writes:
| | Chat is such a highly requested function that would help answer new peoples questions
to further facilitate buying more product and hence more fee revenue for Bricklink.
I don't understand why they don't just setup another chat server totally
separate from the webserver, throw a link to it on the main page and let people
have at it. I wouldn't even care if it required a separate login and password,
kind of like the help desk does.
In Suggestions, mhn1957 writes:
| | In Suggestions, Bighurt writes:
| | I think ranting goes against the intent of BL forum's, why do you think Chat
disappeared.
|
Chat disappeared because it was full of security issues.
Mark
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|
There are tons of good chatrooms that BL can buy from a different site, and put
a link to it here.
|
They wouldn't even have to buy one really. IRC Deamons (Server software)
are normally freeware and run on Linux boxes. They could take an old server
they have sitting in a closet somewhere collecting dust and set it up in a day
or so and have their own private IRC server dedicated just to Bricklink users
if they really wanted to, and the cost would be very, very minimal.
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 6, 2014 22:05 | | Subject: | Re: New forum topic suggestion. | | Viewed: | 44 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| Chat is such a highly requested function that would help answer new peoples questions
to further facilitate buying more product and hence more fee revenue for Bricklink.
I don't understand why they don't just setup another chat server totally
separate from the webserver, throw a link to it on the main page and let people
have at it. I wouldn't even care if it required a separate login and password,
kind of like the help desk does.
In Suggestions, mhn1957 writes:
| | In Suggestions, Bighurt writes:
| | I think ranting goes against the intent of BL forum's, why do you think Chat
disappeared.
|
Chat disappeared because it was full of security issues.
Mark
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Aug 5, 2014 11:08 | | Subject: | Change or add proper links to the helpdesk | | Viewed: | 111 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | | Status: | Already Exists | |
|
| Back on July 13th CS_Sean informed us that you use a help desk software called
Smarter Track. http://www.bricklink.com/message.asp?ID=836748
In his message he said: .... Right now we're not using the Smarter Track
portal
as we already had the Help Desk page set up and usually everyone can find it....
Hmm. Well the other day when I had a technical answer I searched and searched
on Bricklink for this new help desk and I couldn't really find it. I ended
up sending an email to admin@bricklink.com and I am happy to report after some
back and forth and many replies from Jaclyn, the issue was finally resolved.
(Big thanks to CS_Ryan, who ultimately fixed the issue after I forwarded my
emails from Jaclyn to him)
Anyways fast forward to today. The forum is flooded with replies to a post about
non-payment of fees. Really all the OP was asking was how do I pay my fees and
how do I get my store back to where I can sell! The thread has been inundated
with people berating the OP about how silly he is that he didn't pay on time!
Post with questions about technical issues or payment issues really shouldn't
even be posted in the forum, as it is no longer the communities role to answer
these questions. There are now people who get paid a wage to answer these questions.
I feel though that the OP felt it best to use the forum because either A) he
couldn't find the help desk or B) the old help desk is nothing more than
an email form that you have no idea of where or who those emails are going to.
Anyways based on Sean's post I just searched google for bricklink smarter
track and found the elusive helpdesk, it is setup here:
http://helpdesk.bricklink.com
Apparently I did have an account there but my Bricklink password didn't work
so I reset the password, logged in, and guess what?!? My previous emails with
the admins were there, as well as a status of what was going on. it is actually
a pretty handy tool. So my question/suggestion is, if you are going to utilize
this software, why not have link to it in the open so that others can utilize
it? This would cut down on questions in the forum that should be, being answered
by the people paid to answer such questions. And leave the forum open for general
discussion not constantly answering and sometimes assuming things about policy.
So after all that here is the suggestion. If you go to the Help tab up top it
takes you to: http://www.bricklink.com/helpMain.asp. Great page as it answers
alot of quetions. But at the bottom there is a link that says Contact Bricklink
underneath of which is a link that says Help Desk. That link currently goes
to: http://www.bricklink.com/helpDesk.asp. This page once again is helpful
as it has answers to some common issues, but then if those answers don't
work it gives an email text box. My suggestion is, remove those text boxes and
just put some simple text, that says "If the above solution doesn't work
please file a ticket with our help desk. And that text can be a link to http://helpdesk.bricklink.com
The advantage is they will be creating a ticket that they can then follow up
and see that it has indeed been read. Currently when you submit an email there
is no way to see if they got it, if it is just being ignored or what. The help
desk is a powerful tool in your arsenal admins, now you just have to make sure
people are using it!
Right now when people ask how do I get help, I see lots of reply's saying
message Jacylyn, message Sean, email admin@Bricklink.com. There are 100 different
ways to contact you guys. There should be one method, and then you all can see
every message. That way if Sean is on vacation (which maybe he is since his
last forum post was on the 16th of July) or worse yet no longer employed, then
every CS sees the issue and can jump on it. Rather than just one. The standard
answer to how can I get help? File a ticket in the help desk located @ http://helpdesk.bricklink.com
I am afraid that the answer is going to be, why sure this is all setup to be
linked in BL 2.0!! But noone knows how far off BL 2.0 actually is. This is
an easy fix that can help the customer service response time right now in BL
1.0!
Thanks for reading!
-Steve
Brick Outfitters
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Jul 30, 2014 13:39 | | Subject: | Re: Please give us a sub forum for the MOC Shop | | Viewed: | 35 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, DagsBricks writes:
| | Just swap it out for Vanilla and it would be a vast improvement.
Brian
|
Or IPB
http://www.invisionpower.com/
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Jul 30, 2014 13:29 | | Subject: | Re: Please give us a sub forum for the MOC Shop | | Viewed: | 36 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, cs_ryan writes:
| |
May I ask what is it you guys don't like about the new forum? Is it the fact
that it uses the "Entire thread on one page" format? or that new comments
appear at the top? Is there other any specific features you'd like to see
over there?
|
Dagsbricks already posted a good start of things that are sub-par with the MOC
forums.
http://moc.bricklink.com/pages/moc/comm/forum_view.page?id=1
I'll summarize what he wrote:
1 .Comments are limited to 560 characters? Many many posts need to be much longer
than that.
2. A one line text entry field is just wierd? Should be a text box like in this
forum. If you write past the one line it just scrolls and you can't look
back at what you wrote?
3. A new tab opens everytime you click on a forum thread. Why? Most people know
how to use back in their browsers. No need for a new tab
Now I'll add some new ones:
4. This community is used to a threaded style board. Using a flat style makes
it hard to see who replied to who and makes it hard to have a conversation.
One thread per page is fine, but there needs to be some indentations between
posts or at least add the post that was replied to in quotes so that you can
somewhat follow the conversation.
5. What posts have I read? Which posts have new replies? I just clicked on
a few posts, closed the 5 new tabs it created. Reloaded the base forum page,
and the posts I already clicked on didn't change color or anything? How
do I know what I have already read?
6. Loss of Profile info in post. This is supposed to foster community spirit.
Was nice in every post to be able to quickly see a users feedback rating as
well as a link to their store. In the new forum all you see at a glance is their
pic and their username? You have to click on their name to see any of their
info, but even then it only seems to show MOC info. I hope when this forum is
integrated into Bricklink 2.0 we will have more info available about them as
a seller/buyer since that is the focus of this site.
7. No way to preview your post
8. Doesn't interact with the database. No way to link Set/Part numbers like
you can here. ie
9. No image linking / uploading?
10. Doesn't auto-resolve html links. In this forum you just copy and paste
a link and it automagically makes it work. There you post a link and you would
have to copy and paste it again.
Well that is my start of what is wrong with the MOC forums. Hope that helps
get you started. I'm sure some others will think of more things
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Jun 27, 2014 12:11 | | Subject: | Re: Show All Fees on Checkout and in Terms Page | | Viewed: | 31 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
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| In Suggestions, speshy writes:
-but, then again, you have the option of showing
| | or hiding shipping costs on your PayPal shipping labels. I can imagine: "Gee,
my scale must be off. I definitely paid for a 10 oz. package for your Wald minifigure".
|
It doesn't show the price on the shipping label. But it does show the weight.
So if they said they paid for a 10oz package and the label says 2oz. You could
call BS for sure.
|
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Jun 27, 2014 11:13 | | Subject: | Re: Ban sellers asking for Friends PayPal payment | | Viewed: | 63 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
|
| In Suggestions, mabccc writes:
| | I'd like to see a ban on bricklink sellers using T&C asking their buyers
to pay for merchandise using the Friends and Family option.
|
When I first read the title as I skimmed the forum. I thought it was about people
paying for orders with friends sets I don't think those people should
be banned. But if they try to pay with Galidor or Jack Stone then a ban may
be in order
|
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Apr 28, 2014 12:09 | | Subject: | Re: Shipping Notification (drive thru) suggestion | | Viewed: | 27 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
|
| No offense Katie, but this suggestion makes no sense to me
You want Drive-thru's to be sent automatically to every user, but you yourself
find them a waste of space and do not read them? Why would you want to force
something that you personally deem as a waste of space on everyone?
I send these, also I appreciate getting them when I do buy as I know when the
package was sent in theory
I like it as it is, because sometimes I set something as shipped in the morning
after I print out the labels, but I won't send the drive-thru message until
the evening when I know it has been physically received by the USPS and hopefully
there has been some action on the tracking number.
Just my 2 cents and it is a no vote for me, not that votes on suggestions mean
much
In Suggestions, AlltRightBricks writes:
| | I would like to see a couple of things change in regards to shipping notifications
that are sent out by Bricklink.
First, I would like to have emails sent automatically when an order is set to
shipped by the seller. There are many sellers who do not send drive thru emails,
but if the buyer is looking for this message, it would be nice if the system
automated it so that this email gets sent with every order.
Hand in hand with that, would be allowing buyers to opt out of receiving drive
thru emails. I personally never read them, and they just take up space in my
email. I appreciate the sellers who send them as I believe it is good customer
service (I send them). But I don't wish to receive them.
Thanks,
Katie
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|
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Apr 22, 2014 00:37 | | Subject: | Re: Weekly Fix Idea. | | Viewed: | 44 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
|
| In Suggestions, jamesuniverse writes:
| | Too long? I'll take care of that: Fix 1 bug or add 1 suggestion a week or
4 a month and BL has a ton of happier sellers and buyers. Plus it shows progress.
~JU
|
I voted yes, nice idea.
And for week 1 they already have code in hand that they could implement!
http://www.bricklink.com/message.asp?ID=808997
So they are ahead of the game already
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| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Mar 28, 2014 10:29 | | Subject: | Re: No suggestions Implemented? | | Viewed: | 26 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
|
| In Suggestions, Royroy writes:
| | I noticed that this part of the forum is empty. No suggestions have been implemented?
When so: What is the use of this forum Part?
|
I just noticed that this morning as well when I posted a suggestion. Just to
be clear the link he is talking about can be seen when you view the suggestions
forum. Click on it and it takes you to:
http://www.bricklink.com/messageList.asp?ID=8&v=c&max=200&status=1&viewSort=Y
Maybe they should make a new link, Features implemented that were never suggestions.
MOC Shop ....
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|
| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Mar 28, 2014 09:19 | | Subject: | Better Communication when privileges change | | Viewed: | 163 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | | Status: | Open | | Vote: | [Yes|No] | |
|
| So there was a post today here: http://www.bricklink.com/message.asp?ID=807655
We see this all the time! Help my privileges were revoked, why what did I do,
how do I fix it? Fortunately I have never had this happen to me but I could
see it as a source of great concern to those who it does happen to. How many
people say never mind this is too frustrating and never come back to buy here
again?
As a website that is trying to move into the 21st century and bring in new buyers
and be more user friendly I think a very simple fix would be to improve the communication
that is made when a users buying/selling privileges are changed.
I assume there is some form the admin goes to to make such changes and that there
are check boxes that are checked to close a users store. Upon hitting the change
user status button, Why not make the system also send a message through the messaging
system that briefly explains the reason for the closure and points them to an
FAQ page that lists the possible reasons for closure and what the steps are that
they need to do for reinstatement. A simple message asking to contact the admin,
with no details on how to do so is pretty vague.
The message template could vary based on the reason for closure, but here is
an example for an email that could be sent to store being closed for preemptive
action.
----------------------------------------
Dear [Username],
Thank you for your interest in Bricklink. Your store has been temporarily suspended
from selling due to [reason from system here] (ex. having too many rare items,
complaints from community members, suspected underage operator, etc.). We apologize
for this inconvenience but we must take such actions from time to time to protect
the community and ensure new sellers are listing items in compliance with the
TOS of the site. We would like to get this resolved as quickly as you would so
you can get back to selling. In order to resume selling we just need you to
provide us with the following documentation. [list of items from system] (ex.
photo proof of inventory, photo of ID, etc etc). You can send the proper items
by sending them to [insert proper email here]. If you have any further questions
there is an FAQ for this subject listed [url here] and as always you can contact
the site administrators [help desk email/webpage here].
Thank you again for your use of our Website.
Bricklink, LTD
-------------------------------------------------
Or something along those lines. I'm not the best at writing these type of
things, so I would leave the exact verbage to the Customer Service gurus, but
I didn't want to provide a suggestion without also providing a possible solution.
One of the biggest barriers to entry to this site IMO is the end-user experience.
How many websites do you browse, but never pull the trigger on buying something
because it was just too convoluted? So now put yourself in a new users shoes,
you take the time to navigate a website that looks to be from 20 years ago, only
to be greated by a vague message telling you you can't do anything yet? I
think the addition of the CS team has been a great first step in the right direction
to solving some of these issues. This suggestion is just an example of another
step you could take to keep moving forward to having a more pleasant end-user
experience.
You know the old Customer Service adage, For every one person that has a good
experience they may tell one other person. Every person that is unhappy with
a service and walks away they tell 10 other people about their issue, thus keeping
more potential users from checking into the site. I want as many new buyers
as possible to come and see the site and buy, buy, buy
|
|
| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | Mar 18, 2014 15:42 | | Subject: | Re: Suggestion: Forum voting | | Viewed: | 30 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
|
| I voted yes, but only if it was user configurable. So basically if someone wanted
to see every post posted they could click an option and see it chronologically.
But if you don't have time to read every post and just want to see the most
popular ones so be it. All the data would still be there, every voice could
still be heard, it is just a user preference thing. Right now the forum gets
so cluttered I guarantee every post isn't being read anyways. Alot of people
just go to the post with the most replies because they think it must be important
and then they skim it and reply with their 2 cents, often repeating what has
already been discussed because they didn't take the time to read it. How
many times do you see people even say "Well I didn't read this whole thread
but here is what I think..."
More options is always a good thing in my opinion as long as they are just that
options. Users can still choose to view the data anyway they want.
In Suggestions, Bricks writes:
| | For the past 9 years, and most notably lately, I've noticed forum members
reply or create posts often with meaningless content (e.g., "how do I post feedback?,"
"me too," "that was good," etc.) and sometimes with misinformation (such as posting
incorrect info to a question). I myself am guilty of making poor-quality posts
here.
I propose we change the forum model such that posts can be voted up or down.
The more highly voted posts will appear before posts which are not voted as highly.
Very large community-oriented websites such as Stack Exchange and Reddit use
this model to prevent spam and make favored content more visible. These websites
effectively moderate themselves by their own community. We have a very strong
community with good standards, and this feature would allow the discussion forums
to reflect that.
The aforementioned websites use a Wilson score for posts to prevent good but
unvoted posts from being invisible.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binomial_proportion_confidence_interval#Wilson_score_interval
http://www.evanmiller.org/how-not-to-sort-by-average-rating.html
Currently, the message tree and forum front page show the newest posts first.
If the Wilson score is implemented, favorable content would appear first, while
users would still have the option to have newest content first. This reduces
flaming, abuse, inaccuracies, etc.
What does the community think?
|
|
|
| Author: | Cyberclark | | Posted: | May 10, 2012 14:43 | | Subject: | Re: (Cancelled) | | Viewed: | 61 times | | Topic: | Suggestions | |
|
| In Suggestions, DadsAFOL writes:
| | In Suggestions, renhoffman writes:
| | In Suggestions, Cyberclark writes:
| | In Suggestions, Cyberclark writes:
Why was this canceled? Would it be too much for a moderator to send a simple
message informing us why our posts our canceled so at least we learn from it
and don't do it again?
I am assuming it is because someone felt I posted a users name in a post? But
I did not post any real name. I posted two obviously fictional alias's. Which
as the original topic talks about should be disallowed as the orders are supposed
to be legally binding contracts, but obviously you can't have anything legal
and binding if it isn't a legal name to begin with.
|
It was not "obvious" to me or to the members that submitted complaints that you
used personal info in the forum. If you like to answer my pm, I am sure we can
resolve this quickly.
Darren
|
@Cyberclark I believe one of the names you posted, while unusual, may not acually
be fake. I've sold to that individual before. You assumed that the name was
a fake and posted it. But having worked for years in an industry where I see
many people's names, I have long since abandoned all hope in American parents'
abilities to name their children.
-Jason
|
Could be one of them is real, Jason. I assumed they were fake because they didn't
match. My transaction with that user went well and I meant no harm or ill-will
to the user. I just wanted to share my experience dealing with a user that had
mismatched names between Bricklink and Paypal and merely listed that as an example.
I personally don't understand why everyone is so secretive about their god given
legal name. But the fact remains that the name used on bricklink did not match
the payee's name, which could leave a seller open to potential paypal chargebacks.
All it would take is for the paypal user to make a claim saying he didn't buy
something. And then when you send an invoice with a different name as your "proof"
they could say see this proves nothing it is someone else name. So back to
the original posters message I just agree that the offical account name should
be your legally binding name. In my example, Of the two names I listed I would
guess the Paypal name is the fake one, I guess if I wanted to really push the
issue I could contact Paypal and inform them, because I would bet their TOS/rules
would dictate that you have to use a legal name. But as I said, I am not trying
to hurt the user in question. Was merely an example.
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