Member's (Shills) Signatures
 

Could we remove/restrict members from promoting websites of vendors? If people want to promote a vendor's item or service, they should do it in the review section, not in every single post they make. Just a thought to make everything fair for all involved.

To be completely fair it would require us removing the ability to have links in signatures for all registered members on the site. Obviously vendors could include a link to their site in their signature but everyone else would no longer have the ability.

I've thought about doing this but I would like further input from members to insure the policy is as fair as possible. The gray area is providing linking to your own website such as your photo gallery, your personal business (if none MINI-related), etc.

Mark

I like being able to have what I want in my sig.

Whether its a web address or a mod list what's the difference? They both are advertising in the end. I'm proud of the mods I have, each one of them signifies an amount of research and time spent installing.

i protest that the image in your sig is too provocative

:lol:
:popcorn:

Good discussion :thumbsup:

Dude...


Not so good discussion :wink:

Yeah... don't mess with my sig... please.... I think most folks are smart enough to interpret a vendor plug for what it is...

In the NAM Guidelines we've always had the following guideline:

To date we've allowed people to link to their personal sites and vendors on the site. That said it has been a problem from time to time when people have taken advantage of this and included links to their business or a MINI-related vendor that isn't on the site. Frankly its not a problem of the link but the search engine optimization benefits the vendor receives without contributing to NAM as a sponsor. In other words they would be riding the coat tails of the work I've put in to make the site search engine friendly.

I don't want to make any changes right now regarding linking but if we see a signature linking to a non-supporting site vendor it will be removed. As for your mods that is the real intent of the signature so that won't be changing.

Mark

Good, I really like having the sig. pointing at my photos and personal blog. :)

Well, that picture is a capture from a MINI promotional video, so who are we to complain? :lol:

Next, you'll be saying the girl with the vinyl catsuit and riding crop from the Canadian MINI site is "provocative" or something silly like that. :wink:

i'll complain about that when someone gives me a reason to :wink:

Uumm. I think (now that I look at it) that I'm maybe shilling Fish 'n Chips... :sad:

The deeper it sinks the more they grasp.

And I thought that you worked for Gorton's :lol:

http://www.gortons.com/product_photos/141fishsticks.jpg

Nope. I was a left coast fisherman. Didn't look good in yellow slickers. Liked the bright orange survival suits a lot better.:nod:

Posted right underneath a large sig with BOTH an image and a heap of text. Maybe the existing guidelines need review before adding more restrictions?

I understand this, Mark - but I wonder how simple it might be to tweak the sigs to insert "nofollow" references on the links, like Wordpress does on comments?

Its not something that is in vBulletin so I would need to implement it or find an add-on that would address just links in signatures. Good idea though and I'll see if, at some point, I can find a solution for this.

Mark

I'm confused as to what you are concerned with or where the line is drawn. Is it

A) a web link specifically
B) listing of and item i.e. brand X control arms

What if only two manufacturers make strut tower plates. Is that fair to other vendors?

What if my sig has a link to a NAM thread where I describe all of my mods and vendors?

I'm just trying to see where this is going, and where you would really draw the line? It seems other than banning non-NAM vendors and such, it's a real slippery slope on where you draw the line. Sounds like a whole new string of threads to rat other members out and start fights. I for one like to see at a glance who has what.

Are there any examples of what is specifically out of line?

Good questions here.

I'm basically putting out a question/topic to stir debate. There has been a lot of talk/debate lately about who can/should promote a vendors products and when. See Rustyboy and Longboard...no offense guys! The sig links are IMHO, a way to promote a vendors products. Many people, I think, consider sigs to be something to 'mark' their MINI like a personalized plate or sticker that sets their MINI/car apart...somewhat territorial. The questions I pose is what is different about repeatedly supporting a vendor throughout a thread/s and linking/supporting a vendor through each and every post you make.

Now mind you, I have in the past displayed links to my mods and their respective vendors. I guess I'm kinda past this 'territorial' part of marking my car as different from others.

I don't necessarily mind people linking in their sigs, but if the site is going to limit members repeated promotion of others products, how does this differ?

I'm not saying you shouldn't list your mods, but should you be allowed to link/advertise to them...in the context of how NAM is now being run?

Ohhh look, trader ratings are enabled!

Not quite yet...gnatster and I were working on getting it running on the site tonight, working on layouts, etc. We'll be getting some how-to info in place so we can point people to it, describe how to use it, what the information means, etc.

Mark

Not quite yet...testing

Should be live on Thursday.

Damnit!!!...highjacked my own thread :lol:

This is something we happen to be currently discussing in the moderator forums as well.

As of right now listing a site thats not a NAM vendor that one has bought parts from is the norm, however the link cannot be live. Partsman's sig is a good example of that. Of course some paying vendors have an issue with this practice and others do not. Some member are the same way, they have an issue with the listings and others do not. The idea is to find the balance that makes the majority happy. (I'd bet the majority don't even notice them anyway, sigs become visually ignorable after seeing them multiple times)

Since I didn't start the thread I'll provide my 2 cents on what I had originally intended the signature area to support.

Non-vendors
The original intent was that it would be used just like I see it on a lot of other sites...it would be a list of what you've done to your car, your favorite saying, etc.

Vendors
For vendors that are on the site their signature could include their banner, contact information, and a tag line for their business if they wanted.


In earlier versions of the software there wasn't the ability to restrict links to URLs and that has been used to the advantage of businesses that have customers on the site but do not support the site directly. Unfortunately because the setting is pretty course

so if it were to be turned on at this point it would break users that are linking to a favorite thread, their personal blog, offsite gallery, etc. For this reason I have hesitated turning off the ability to include linking in sigs and have opted for contacting people when we notice that they are linking to some type of business. Unless another link goes to something R-rated we don't make a big deal out of it.

To make things easier for the mod team it would help to turn off the ability though.

My 0.075 cents worth given the current exchange rate :wink:

Mark