geekhack Marketplace > Group Buys and Preorders
Introducing the "MK Vendor Trust and Safety System" for Group Buys
HoffmanMyster:
--- Quote from: Rhienfo on Wed, 08 November 2023, 20:43:30 ---This feels like a way to minimize damage and not actively prevent it, which is better than nothing but doesn't fix the issue long term and will allow people to get scammed still.
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There is unfortunately no way to fully prevent scams or damages. The best that anyone can do is minimize the risk, which is exactly what is being attempted here. If there are ways to do it better, then it should be improved upon and that is exactly what will happen. So, thank you for the feedback and sharing your thoughts. :)
--- Quote from: Rhienfo on Wed, 08 November 2023, 20:43:30 ---I have concerns with how concentrated the amount of power is through this system, in the hands of a few people. It does not help that the system feels like it's designed to benefit the big players in the hobby and not the small ones. I am worried about the massive conflict of interest here and I think a lot of people wouldn't trust a bunch of discord and reddit mods to handle this in a way that is unbiased. What is stopping someone from excluding someone from this list, someone who has not done anything wrong and is a reputable business just simply because someone on the team doesn't like the person running the business, or a large company, secretly paying someone to get rid of competition of the list, limiting the ability to advertise to a lot of the community, the way the system is currently implemented seems exploitable.
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I certainly appreciate a healthy dose of skepticism, so I totally get where you're coming from.
At the end of the day, any platform like this has humans on the other side who could be making biased/impartial decisions (knowingly or not), or as serious as you mentioned, taking bribes and engaging in intentionally malicious behavior. In practice, this new system is no more ripe for abuse than any modded platform is by default.
We've been manually approving Classifieds and Group Buy posts here for years now, along with a whole slew of other moderator activities/abilities that could theoretically be abused. The mod team has prided ourselves on transparency and fairness, and we've always been willing to share details on decisions when possible. I'm not here to beg and plead that you trust us - that is your decision and yours alone. Rather, I'm just pointing out that using any platform like GH or reddit means accepting that there is a mod team in place and those mods are human, for better or worse.
If any abuse does take place, I would hope that those affected would take the evidence to another mod team, community members, etc to make it known. No one involved in this project, from the moderators to vendors to designers or streamers wants that sort of behavior to go unaddressed if it were to happen.
rmendis:
--- Quote ---Further adding to this hurting new vendors, I think it's by design. They don't want so many untrustworthy newcomers when there is always an established circle of vendors who can pick any project.
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I have heard theoretical concerns from both sides now: that it somehow hurts new vendors by them having a new vendor rating, and it somehow hurts more established vendors by forcing designers have to work with new vendors as more established ones hit their GB promotion limits. It's virtually impossible to know for sure what will or won't happen. Instead of arguing theoretical possibilities, we would rather stress test the system to find an approach that is practical and neutral as possible based on actual real world data.
--- Quote ---Advertising on this platform doesn't mean much anymore, and during my last gb Reddit's r/mechanicalkeyboards wasn't allowing promotional posts by most anyone, however allowed some posts from larger vendors absolutely hurting the numbers and exposure for my set.
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I can't speak to your specific situation, because I'm not a mod on r/mk, but i'm pretty sure they paused GB promotion for all vendors regardless of size. Larger vendors may have promoted in-stock items, but that's not the same thing. Also, NK and CK were able to promote "rescue" projects related to Mechs&Co. Sorry that your set was impacted, but unless I missed something, the GB promotion pause was not targeted at small vendors specifically.
--- Quote ---There should be a process to prove that a business is in this hobby for real, however I don't think that's possible, but everyone should remember we had to trust novelkeys, Dixie, originative, zeal, etc without any reason to believe they were for real too. This rating system absolutely harms people attempting to profit from the hobby without an already established connection, harming lesser designers and vendors. There's absolutely no correct precaution for joining gbs other than giving people the facts and their rights as a consumer.
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I am still unclear how this system "harms people from making profit". It establishes a rudimentary vetting process. centralizes visibility, limits risk exposure for larger keyset and keyboard GBs based on track record of running said large GBs, and obtains commitment to timely updates and customer responses for those who wish to use the platforms as a promotional vehicle. The absence of any vetting at all has been shown to harm average consumers far more than the minor inconvenience to vendors that a simple system like this entails. It's certainly not perfect, and we are committed to hearing feedback and improving it over time. =)
rmendis:
I think that answers all the posts for now, but will check back in the next few days. Thanks again for all the feedback!
Kokaloo:
what did you type all of that with
rmendis:
--- Quote from: Kokaloo on Tue, 14 November 2023, 16:01:46 ---what did you type all of that with
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Like on what keyboard?
Yesterday evening I was responding on desktop with VE.A
This morning on my macbook
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