And the first post is literally the admin’s response, so it appears they and many others see the wisdom in that approach.
Alright you got me there. I had just come back from work and sort of skimmed through the thread, not realising that the official mod stance was in the first post, I just sort of assumed it was the usual reminder post to keep things civil and such. Still, not a response to this case as I was hoping for, but now I know for sure there's not gonna be one, and the reasons for not doing so.
The reason I specified that example is that on sfflab there is money being sent to thru that site for direct purchase from a “builder”. In my opinion, while many consumers and “builders” meet here it’s not a storefront like eBay, amazon, sfflab, etc. There is no money sent to sff. A marketplace is different from a conversational/news forum. You did not buy a case on small form factor. You may have met up with someone who could sell you one here though, as I have a few times.
Here's the thing though, isn't that just overly relying on technicalities? By that logic, eBay is not a marketplace either, because all it does is connect you to someone who can sell you a product that you want, and the transactions are handled by PayPal.
I get it, the CC&D sub-forum is not supposed to be a marketplace, it's just supposed to be a place to discuss projects. However, when I started looking for a small form factor case, I came to the small form factor forum, browsed a bunch of projects, and ended up ordering one of them. Sure, the purchase itself was done in another website, but is that really relevant?
If someone asks me "where did you buy that case?", I'll reply "In the Small Form Factor Forum.".
My point being: I used it as a marketplace, and a lot of other people did too, buyers and sellers. I mean, we have a prime example that's very relevant right now - the Steck creator seems to have used this forum almost exclusively as a marketplace. So if people use it as a marketplace, then it is, at least partly, a marketplace, regardless of whether or not the admins ever wanted it to be.
If the administration really wanted to keep the forum from being used as a marketplace, they would need to have some rules in place, such as the project creator not being allowed to link ways to buy their finished product. But they don't, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. It's just that, as the saying goes, "with great power comes great responsibility". Unless you're extremely pessimistic about the future of SFFPCs, we can assume that there will be a more people just like me coming here to shop for their first SFF case.
So the thing that keeps being reiterated about this being simply a place to
discuss all things SFF ends up coming off as a bit of a cop out. Hell, I would certainly not be able to moderate this forum as a hobby, let alone regulate a marketplace. So I understand why you guys keep reiterating that, but to me it just seems like you're lying to yourselves, because (and again, I understand why) no one is willing to assume the greater responsibility that would come from admitting that this forum is not only a place for discussion, but also a marketplace.
The fact is:
- Someone created a project thread here with a design pretty much identical to a popular project nearing its production stage.
- Feedback was offered with ways to differentiate it.
- The creator ignored that feedback and continued on with the prototyping.
- The case's first batch is about to be sold.
To be clear, I don't know him at all. I certainly do not know his intentions. For all I know, he could be an absolutely amazing individual.
However, let's say I am an ill-intentioned individual, who sees the great demand for the LOUQE Ghost S1 as an opportunity to profit off of their inability to produce enough units for everyone, as well as do it on time. I would have gone to the place where it was developed, where I'm sure I would find a lot of people who also wanted one, but missed the train, as well as some LOUQE customers frustrated with the delays. And I would have done the exact same that the Steck creator did. And I would have got away with it.
If I were an original creator, I would like to trust this community to have my back in these matters, but, knowing that such a thing could happen to me, I wouldn't be able to.
Now if you guys don't see this as a big problem, then I don't know what else to say (keep in mind I'm not really talking about a solution, I would just like the problem to be acknowledged), I guess we just don't see eye to eye. I'll just go back to lurking here like I've been doing most of the time, and hopefully this situation will be handled correctly by all these people in charge, who most certainly know better than me, and maybe I'm just overdramatizing the situation.