Soybean

I saw that SAINTSFAN's thread was locked because he posted some referral GCs. Why? Is it so bad to have the poster benefit when the people using the gift certificate are benefiting too? If anyone wants to email me a referral GC, please do. I won't complain at all.

Every other thread seems to get locked or moved at this forum. Are these trivialities really all that important?

Bushdog

If we allow 1 person to advertise referral GCs then many people will want to do so. We love the idea of DVDTalk members benefitting, but in the long run, all it will do is clutter the forum with SPAM from people trying to make a quick buck.

[Edited by Bushdog on 05-21-01 at 08:26 AM]

TheyCallHimJim

Also, although I may be wrong on this count, Geoff didn;t put his time and money into this site so that other people could weasel a few bucks out of all the traffic. Remember that this is a business at the end of the day, and Geoff is perfectly within his rights to be somewhat less than delighted about other people making money off of the site. After all, how would you like it if you spent a considerable amount of your own time running a site, and people started posting their own referral links and etcetera all over it?

Startide

Soybean, you can see the analogous problem recur on Usenet. Some businesses have their referral/website in their SIG, and they will post a reply to almost anything in the forums just to have an excuse to get their advertisement SIG into the discussion thread. Their cheap response isn't really good for the thread and the SIG just annoys any number of people in the thread (thus distracting people from the real topic of discussion).

By making it rewarding to spam (referrals allowed in the post or SIG), spammers will spam. And they will also do what we all REALLY HATE; they create multiple pseudonyms and post multiple spam in order to get multiple revenue streams.

On Usenet, and this forum, members discourage spam by not buying from a spammer. Allowing this type of referral spam would create confusion in applying this tactic fairly.

matta

Remember, Geoff has referal links at most (if not all) of those sites too. So by someone using their referal link, Geoff is suffering because people aren't using his.

gcribbs

I really think this type of posting should result in suspension outright or banning. most of these members only join to get some free money then leave until they need free money again.

This is an abuse of this website and if they are using amazon referral gc's then they are abusing that website also.

whenever i see these I email amazon the codes and ask them to make sure the referer gets nothing. I also of course email the Mods here and post a request in this forum to close the threads and delete the codes.

I was also told by amazon that they are looking to change the referral program or eliminate it due to abuse. These people only hurt people who use these programs correctly.

Sorry if you disagree with my attitude.

gcribbs

it looks like this problem is solved. they killed the refer a friend program. so no one will need to worry about this anymore.

TheyCallHimJim

W00t w00t... once again, a small group of people taking advantage of a scheme spoils it for everyone who was using it honestly. Thanks, guys!!!

saintsfan

As to stand up for myself on the locked post. I don't make one cent off the referral GC's that can be found on the web. I simply use safeweb.com to check for the referral GC's, so my IP address is not made available and posted them to the board. This is the only time I use safeweb for this.

Anyway all the DVD's I purchase are thru the dvdtalk.com link. I didn't try to do anything knowing wrong at the time. If only I had took the time to read the rules a little closer. I hope no one was offend by my actions and look forward to staying a member of dvdtalk.

Saintsfan

[Edited by SAINTSFAN on 05-29-01 at 09:07 AM]