I wanted to return to this thread and make a few comments.
First of all, I'm sure everyone's noticed that Stephen has
fixed the PM/Classifieds issue, which should make communication a little more clear. Bravo.
Secondly, I thought I'd share some recent experiences with the buying/selling process here at RFF, now that a few sales of my own have concluded (thanks, by the way, to all the interested parties).
I've been a fair supporter of the RFF community and the classifieds as a whole, and I still am. Some of the personal treatment I've seen - and received - around here has been second to none, really. But that isn't to say that there is still some odd behavior to be seen, as many here have anecdotally commented on. As for my experiences, the statistics speak for themselves. In the course of recently selling five items, I encountered two deals that didn't finish correctly. While the details are unimportant, it's significant to note that this represents a 40% failure rate in the course of finishing transactions, which I think is rather high. I should point out that this atypical example doesn't sour the RFF classifieds (or those individual users) for me, but the irony of my recent boosterism was clear, at least given my particular experience. I believe, though, that the power of coincidence was in this case greater than the likelihood of conspiracy. Besides, the great balance of my recent sales concluded with great professionalism and respect. Where else can you get that kind of instant gratification? And I'm not just talking about money - someday, my buyers will probably post images they made with my gear - talk about a turn of events.
Thinking about this, I realized that the issue wasn't one of "
why is this happening here," (since that's merely tantamount to p*ssing into the wind) but rather the following:
1)
what do we (the RFF community)
do about it?
and
2)
how do I
respond to it personally?
In the former case, it may be an issue of how seriously we take the "feedback" system that has been provided, and whether the RFF community will become as back-biting as the eBay community has over this system. I've heard of several individual examples here that suggest the risk of that is real - perhaps it's a consequence of human nature. In short, a real public community feedback system may not be a realizable goal - at least, not a useful one with strong integrity. I'll apologize in advance if this offends anyone's efforts to the contrary - it's just my opinion.
The latter case, however, is a much more practical, actionable challenge. Responding personally to a delinquent or unprofessional buyer is an action each of us can take -
on our own - without any feedback system or public airing of dirty laundry. In fact, it's rather a kind of responsibility in a self-policing community like this one. All of us can take it or leave it, of course; there's no need to be fascist about it. But if we do decide to self-police, it's important to realize the importance of being civil - as was pointed out to me in this very thread, it's of utmost importance to end any argument as proper adults should. To borrow from an aging sentiment using even more archaic parlance: it's the
gentlemanly thing to do. Let's face it: having someone back out of a sale doesn't make the entire selling process meaningless or without value; I mean, many of us wouldn't have any of the nice toys we love without it. So, as long as it's going to happen (and it happens a lot less here than other places, I think) we should take responsibility to stand for our values - both those that represent our own personal maturity and pride in professionalism and those that reflect what we think about the community as a whole.
Okay, that's my piece. Sorry for the long read (thanks for sticking it out if you did), and remember: it's just an opinion.
And it's late, so I'm probably a little punchy.
Cheers,
--joe.
