Information regarding member poaching & outside links
Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 2:18 pm
A helpdesk ticket this morning prompted this post to review the rules on the CH Forum related to member poaching and outside links.
This forum (in all its incarnations through software) has been around more than 12 years. Trust me when I say the rules made for this Forum are not made lightly as we support and foster an environment of freedom and open mindedness. However, with that we also are not ignorant to the fact that wolves are everywhere and sometimes they show up in this community just as they do in every other genre of community in the world.
Member Poaching
This rule was put into place specifically when several incidents began to occur where someone would make a Forum account with the express purpose of luring members into other sites where their personal information was compromised and where they were bilked of money & left empty-handed. This unfortunately occurred on three, separate occasions and even after the rule was made there were incidents of the same. People paid money for bindings or services that were never rendered, or they found themselves in unwelcome situations.
We realize it's impossible to keep everyone safe all the time, I wish it were possible, but given the pattern of behavior it was something that had to be put into place.
Further from that there were several instances where members here were buyers that turned sellers and began duplicitous behavior where they behaved as normal members here but in private they were saying awful things about CH & the community here to try and secure members from here to stay only with them. I don't know about all of you but everyone here on CH works hard to build a trusted community & duplicitous behavior here isn't any more welcome than it would be in your home, your workplace, or your personal life from people you think are friends.
Outside Links
You are more than welcome to share links to your favorite sellers and we recommend starting a "Sellers You Love" thread in the seller review section.
Sellers are more than welcome to share links to their promotions, products, etc in the Sellers area.
You can share links to videos, webpages, information, etc to any website you wish as long as it's not porn, or a phishing site, or any other website that would compromise the internet security of members.
There are no links allowed to chats outside of this Forum. Again, this rule was put into place for multiple good reasons. There have been numerous problems with chat groups stemming from both buyers & sellers, and whether intentional or not it often reflects back on us because people think social links posted here represent CH, and they do not. On numerous occasions it has caused bad blood that not only caused a member to leave that linked chat group but also to leave CH. Which is unfair and unfortunate because we only host the single chat on the CH Forum homepage. We have no affiliation with any chat groups linked on our site to other sites.
I would hope that after 16 years of putting more than 100 hours a week into building this community & the entire CH website that the members here know that we have nothing but good intentions in providing an open & free environment for everyone. And that you would all have enough respect for us to know that we don't make rules flippantly or to be tyrannical. We make rules when something has happened enough times and with enough frequency it needs to be addressed.
This forum (in all its incarnations through software) has been around more than 12 years. Trust me when I say the rules made for this Forum are not made lightly as we support and foster an environment of freedom and open mindedness. However, with that we also are not ignorant to the fact that wolves are everywhere and sometimes they show up in this community just as they do in every other genre of community in the world.
Member Poaching
This rule was put into place specifically when several incidents began to occur where someone would make a Forum account with the express purpose of luring members into other sites where their personal information was compromised and where they were bilked of money & left empty-handed. This unfortunately occurred on three, separate occasions and even after the rule was made there were incidents of the same. People paid money for bindings or services that were never rendered, or they found themselves in unwelcome situations.
We realize it's impossible to keep everyone safe all the time, I wish it were possible, but given the pattern of behavior it was something that had to be put into place.
Further from that there were several instances where members here were buyers that turned sellers and began duplicitous behavior where they behaved as normal members here but in private they were saying awful things about CH & the community here to try and secure members from here to stay only with them. I don't know about all of you but everyone here on CH works hard to build a trusted community & duplicitous behavior here isn't any more welcome than it would be in your home, your workplace, or your personal life from people you think are friends.
Outside Links
You are more than welcome to share links to your favorite sellers and we recommend starting a "Sellers You Love" thread in the seller review section.
Sellers are more than welcome to share links to their promotions, products, etc in the Sellers area.
You can share links to videos, webpages, information, etc to any website you wish as long as it's not porn, or a phishing site, or any other website that would compromise the internet security of members.
There are no links allowed to chats outside of this Forum. Again, this rule was put into place for multiple good reasons. There have been numerous problems with chat groups stemming from both buyers & sellers, and whether intentional or not it often reflects back on us because people think social links posted here represent CH, and they do not. On numerous occasions it has caused bad blood that not only caused a member to leave that linked chat group but also to leave CH. Which is unfair and unfortunate because we only host the single chat on the CH Forum homepage. We have no affiliation with any chat groups linked on our site to other sites.
I would hope that after 16 years of putting more than 100 hours a week into building this community & the entire CH website that the members here know that we have nothing but good intentions in providing an open & free environment for everyone. And that you would all have enough respect for us to know that we don't make rules flippantly or to be tyrannical. We make rules when something has happened enough times and with enough frequency it needs to be addressed.