Established Users System

[Overlord]

I'm going to keep this short, as the acceptance of real suggestions on this forum seems almost fictional.

Clearly a lot of things in this site don't work, partly due to a lot (or a majority) of immature members and also just because logic is hard to find around these parts. Trolling is pretty high for a marketplace oriented forum.

Perhaps you want to start an established users system.

http://digitalpoint.com/help/established

That's how digital point controls established users.

How about you make it so a user needs 5 positive ratings to become promoted to the established users 'usergroup'. Initially, only staff would be able to give them. As users are added to the group, they are able to give ratings, as well. So this system would be entirely controlled by the users.

Ratings are meant to be given by positive contributions. Since the chain starts at the staff giving them out, trolls should find it more difficult to get the required ratings to be added to the user group.

Revoking privileges to this would be as simple as removing someone from the established usergroup chain permanently, so there would be something to lose and very easily with abuse. No bans needed, nothing like that. Just remove someone from the group, lose a lot of privileges.

This stops spam, makes users contribute to the site itself, amongst other things.

No, I don't seriously expect this system not to be abused, but similar to how the Gestapo worked in WW2, only 1-5 were in a town with lots of people, but people thought they were everywhere. This kept fear and people shut themselves up. The risk of losing all privileges to ratings, amongst others, should be big enough to stop people trolling as much, I think.

• You can Like content (Liking dumb things to try and help someone become established will get you banned).
• You can create threads in the Buy, Sell or Trade area.***
• You can participate in areas that are problematic at times (for example Politics & Religion, Affiliate programs, etc.).
• You can post links (links are nofollow).
• You can have a signature (links are nofollow).
• You can set your home page (links are nofollow).

That's what digitalpoint does for established users, this site could adopt a similar system. Those above are the benefits.

You're added to the group by the following, for example:

• 5 positive ratings received
• 48 hours registered
• 5 posts

Make it a requirement to post marketplace threads too.

Should increase the level of professionalism and encourage a controlled market around here.

Best of all, you can do all this with no development. All of it is in the core of XenForo!

Food for thought, just an idea. It'd need adjustment to fit this community, and unfortunately my highest level of logical understanding still cannot comprehend some people here, so you'd need to decide yourselves how you want to adjust the system to work. But hopefully the concept interests some.

 

[nara~kavi]

this sounds like a good idea

 

[Justis]

I would not mind changing the current system around to adopt something similar to this.

I know change is scary to some people...
But it could potentially be very beneficial to how the site, and community functions.

A simple problem I have with this though, is that users would not be allowed to sell items as soon as they join?
What brings a lot of users to the forums is them realizing they have something to sell, and they want to sell it.
After they sell it, they stick around, and that's how we get a new member.
That or they're looking to buy something...

People don't walk into a sales forum looking to chat.
So locking new users out of the buying and selling forums seems a bit counterproductive.

People are impatient.
If they can't sell it here, they'll sell it elsewhere.

Anyways, great idea overall.
I'd like to hear what the rest of the community thinks.
Perhaps there are some faults I have overlooked.

 

[Overlord]

A simple problem I have with this though, is that users would not be allowed to sell items as soon as they join?
What brings a lot of users to the forums is them realizing they have something to sell, and they want to sell it.
After they sell it, they stick around, and that's how we get a new member.
That or they're looking to buy something...

Honestly, my idea is the concept of the established users system and less to describe the benefits from the system. You guys (the maturer end of the community) are going to need to finish off the blueprint of the idea and describe how it should be done, what exactly should be limited to established users.

I do think you're right, though. Minecraft has been dominated by kids, which is a fact I accept. Kids are known to lack patience. Quick sellers will not want to pass the system's requirements and become established, and wish to sell immediately. DigitalPoint is also a marketplace, but users are more mature and older. So in light of the hastiness and lack of patience regarding children, marketplace limitations such as not being able to sell would not be appropriate, yeah.

The ratings system would be an appropriate limitation, with high levels of abuse and also only community members would want to use the system mostly, compared to quick sellers who really wouldn't care.

Thanks for your insight

 

[Shattered]

Spigot has something like this.

 

[Ajdin]

This is definitely something interesting. I'd like to hear more from the community on this suggestion.

 

[Overlord]

Ajdin Sure, why not. Maybe not the 48 hours part though
I'm curious about the security of the site though. What do you use against protection against brute force attacks?
What encryption do you use to hash the passwords of users? Because it looks like some users have been brute forcing accounts on here.

A bit irrelevant to my thread, but for brute forcing specifically, XenForo has timeouts enabled. The account will become restricted and unaccessible after X amount of failed login attempts. And for hashing passwords... that has nothing to do with brute forcing but depending on the server's extensions, SHA-256 or SHA-1.

 

[Overlord]

I know, sorry for the off topicness I'm not really experienced with Xenforo and I'm considering using it soon.

Ask on XenForo Community.

Anyway the encryption type was a question because I wanted to know how easy it would be for an attacker to crack passwords if they some how got access to the DB (IE: Staff members getting mad & raging/leaking DB).

Well... I'd hate to be a user on your site if that's actually your main concern. Plus, why do staff members have access to the database?

It's rhetorical, don't answer it, save the discussion for later (or take it to where it's appropriate, www.xenforo.com/community)

 

[Overlord]

We could have a trusted user system as described, but instead of blocking new users out from buying and selling, simply have a badge (like the premium one) saying trusted. It could be that, once they get 5 positive ratings 30 messages they can ask a trusted user to put them forward for the trusted user bagde. This means a trusted person has either bought or sold with this user and shows evidence to staff who then descide if this new person should be trusted. I know it would be more work for staff, but u could also have a voting system where trusted users vote on whether a new user should be given the trusted rank.
Im not sure how well i have explained this so if u have questions i can try to explain it better.

It doesn't really make them trusted, just means they passed minimum requirements to be considered not spam and not idiotic (at least, it'd take longer for idiots to get it, try and pass it on and lose their privileges permanently in the process). An established badge, perhaps.

The point of this system is not some kind of marketplace management with some exclusive trusted group for those popular on the site. The point is to reduce spam and trolling.

 

[Overlord]

But if you don't allow people to post/reply/buy/sell in the first place, then how can we determine if they are trusted. I personally don't think there is spam as such. And staff and other sensible people put spammers out quite well. I think a trusted user badge would be more to show that they are not a scammer and that they are responsible.

This doesn't 'vouch' for a user by any means. And post ratings are meant to enlighten communities and increase their communication standards. Here, it's simply abused. The ratings system is just one thing to limit. You can't show someone is trusted by this mean, and if someone deals with them and is 'scammed', who takes responsibility? I don't think the site will be refunding the victim.

This has nothing to do with scammers. If I made a suggestion on that, it'd be to change this entire marketplace from its fundamentals. The scamming here is nothing but your own problem, and to be honest it'd take too long to fix. Correctional officers isn't a fix, they add to the problem.

The intention of this is established users, the limitation of easily abused and more prestigious privileges to users that meet certain criteria.[DOUBLEPOST=1451558966,1451558920][/DOUBLEPOST]

Stopping spam is quite hard to do without, stopping all new people from posting in the first place. which would result in the community not growing.

Stopping posts is not a benefit, cause or modification by this suggestion. The ability to post or not post is not affected by this system, at least as proposed it isn't.

 

[Overlord]

Then i don't understand your idea, if it is not to show they are trustworthy. and not to stop spam, then what is it?

Read my original post and replies again, I answered that exact question.