Forum Objectives - Relevance Postings

[Marineman]

I believe we have seen quite a number of postings with regards to failed transactions in the buy/sell section and threads exposing/flaming or informing others about his/her frustrations on certain matters which is of no concern to any of us here other than the parties involved and all a lot reefers joined in to add salt and pepper basing on the situation.

In my opinion, I find this totally unnecessary as it happens between the parties concerned and we do not have full info to make any fair call or judgement on the matter. What's worse is that this is not a forum for all these. It also shows us thats ome of us are not matured enough to tell what is right or wrong, what is ethical and what is not.

I would like to suggest that the forum should not allow threads of this nature with regards to personal matters like this. Otherwise this forum will lose it's focus with so many squabbles and people taking sides, you will have Team A and Team B and Team C etc. Too much emotions and bad blood are involved and that is bad for all of us who enter this forum for sharing knowledge and learning about the marine hobby.

If you make a sale, you decide how you want to sell it and to whom, you make the call and live with your decision and don't cry out loud in this forum which is not meant for that.

What do you guys think?

[DeepBlue]

Marineman, you are right man(respect)

we should ask ourselves...... why are we here...to learn and to share.....not to find lobang or get rid of things we dun want......

(I noticed some reefers only use this forum to post things to sell, they DONT even contribute at all in any other ways.... worst - some would bad mouth the forum in other forums, then apppear here to sell their things....geez...talk about thick skins)

refrain from all these lah...... keep your flaming off the threads please....

There is no need for rules to be established and ENFORCED if we can all be more considerate as guests here....

[Achilles Tang]

Marineman, you are right man(respect)

we should ask ourselves...... why are we here...to learn and to share.....not to find lobang or get rid of things we dun want......

(I noticed some reefers only use this forum to post things to sell, they dont even contribute at all in any other ways.... worst - some would bad mouth the forum in other forums, then apppear here to sell their things....geez...talk about thick skins)

refrain from all these lah...... keep your flaming off the threads please....

There is no need for rules to be established and ENFORCED if we can all be more considerate as guests here....

Deepblue,

You just said it like it is, bro!

Shows that SRC works. Well, if they can't take the good with the bad, it's sadness and shows a lack of 'Bei yeow zho lang'.

As much as we so-called run this forum with heavy-handedness, we still get people who regularly flout the rules and behave badly. I honestly think we have become too soft in this aspect, to allow such abuses to carry on.

(I haven't said 'Tick Tock!' in a long time already!)

Marineman,

What do you propose we do?

Allow the abuse to carry on to other people by keeping quiet about bad transactions/experiences? Are we doing a public disservice by doing so? How many people will get burnt before the bad guys get stopped?

Or should we bring up awareness that people will not hesitate to reveal your attempts to deceive/cheat others and thus prevent such episodes from being repeated to your fellow hobbyists?

The Code of Conduct applies to everyday life and should not be any different from virtual conversations. Sadly, people can hide behind a nick here. Therefore there is a certain amount of abuse that can occur here. Try cheating someone outside and pray that you don't meet that guy and his friends eating at the same coffee shop!

Hope to hear more feedback on this...

[roidan]

seriously boss.....

this is a general problem as a population matures and develops....

i reckon the early beginnings of SRC to be like a kampung culture...everyone had open doors and it was a very friendly atmosphere....when a reefer had a new coral or fish...it was akin to a fellow kampung mate having a newborn and the whole kampung celebrates and conveys well wishes and goodwill....even trading and selling was done in good standard and ended in good taste...

but as the kampung matures and gains population into a small thriving town, elements like conmen, thiefs and robbers sneaked in together with new immigrants and everyone started becoming wary of each other and closed their doors.....even things like jealousy start to set in to sour the spirit of sharing.....gone are the days when the whole kampung will be happy when someone comes home in a new motobike.....

and as the small town matures further into a bustling city....more and more complicated issues set in and more and more complicated characters start to appear......

as such...i dun believe that we should close an eye on the so-called bad transactions in here and allow such ill-intentioned characters from proliferating in here. Just like there is little need for a police force when SRC was a kampung stage.....there is definitely a need for policing now that SRC is hosting a bustling city population....

to ignore and sweep everything underneath just because the forum is about reefing is akin to saying that we should ignore crimes and sweep everything under just because life is about us, our families and our loved ones and we should ignore the baddies and the things they do out there....

while it hasn't become a major phenomenon, i am starting to see bad deals happening and such elements are weaving in and out, in our midst...and it is not suprising that such elements leave a trail of disgruntled reefers who are helpless.....

remember the octo case? if everyone had kept mum and endured in silence, i am sure more would have been involved.

while many cases are probably misunderstanding and miscommunication, but if there are any cases where there is an intent to take advantage of reefers in here, I would like to see the good majority of reefers in here being protected from such elements.

[Achilles Tang]

Precisely why the League of Justice is needed... we have already Superman.... is Batman volunteering to vanquish evil and uphold justice and peace?

[roidan]

Batman is always there for the Justice League....putting his detective skills to use

while he may shun the public limelight......he will be always there when the Mayor of SRC needs him

[williammuk]

Batman is always there for the Justice League....putting his detective skills to use 

while he may shun the public limelight......he will be always there when the Mayor of SRC needs him 

Mayor sir, I nominate Batman as moderator.

Anybody want to second that?

[DeepBlue]

me lah...but I am already a mod...so not counted.....

We need more cool headed guys here...

To be frank..and keep to the objective...

we definitely need more help ..... but the stand regarding this must be made.....what do we do with the pasar malam, trading section?

are we going to treat everyone like an sensible and gracious adult here or to protect the rest, enforced 'our' will further to minimise bad trade/sales.

[Voltron2000]

Agree with all. Like roidan mentioned, SRC has grown and is still growing and it's about time that there are Polices around now to curb all these unwanted incidences.

As mentioned many times, where are the "old" experienced reefers? As far as most of us knows, these people are still around actively manning their beloved hobby BUT the only difference is that they are no longer active in SRC because (to put it in laymen term), they can no longer keep up with the "younger generation"(newer reefers) here.

We often see threads that gets deviated from the primary objective of the person who started it until the mods or AT interfears.

Like the recent case between kee and halozzz (sorry to mention here again), all of us can see the frustration the Seller is going through, for whaever reasons the buyer has for not paying. DeepBlue (sorry Deepblue to mention you again) joined in diplomatically tried to reduce the tempo of the whole saga, honestly to those who were adding "salt & pepper", eventhough they were sincere in their intentions. They did not even stop, when Deepblue told them to give the Buyer/ Seller to sort out their problems. So, this means only one thing.... So like AT said, "I honestly think we have become too soft in this aspect, to allow such abuses to carry on." No discredit to Deepblue but i think he is trying his best solve issues, comments, disputes professionally and amicably.

Everyone seems wanting to heard and followed of - this is my observation. When another disputes, it becomes another issue.

Though the grading system is not full proof yet. Probably we could give it a thought with an addition of white list and black list. White List who gets compliments and Black List for those who EARNED to be listed there.

Black List could be for those 1) cancel reservation last minute which is not exceptable to the Seller(1 pt) 2) Those who aeroplane (5 pts) 3) Those who collects items but promised to pay but defaulted (10 pts). Anyone exceeding certain amount of pts are suspended for 1 week (5 pts of the Black pts rating) and 2 weeks (10 pts of the Black pts rating)

White List for those who made clean transactions and earns 1 or 2 pts.

Just my thoughts.

Cheers

[DeepBlue]

voltron2000.... no issue for me lah...

I agree...I am just getting nicer these days..... time for me to be the resident bouncer again....haha

[marinebetta]

Batman is always there for the Justice League....putting his detective skills to use

while he may shun the public limelight......he will be always there when the Mayor of SRC needs him

One more Justice League member to the rescue!....Now wondering whether Wonder Woman will show up

[roidan]

personally, i too agree that the reefers here want to be heard, which is why they refuse to solve their disputes via the PM system.

What i suggest is a subforum of COMPLAINTS/COMPLIMENTS

any reefer who has concluded a sour deal recently can post what are his/her grouses and let the other party have a chance to explain...while the admin and mods in here will not judge or declare who is right or wrong, at least it serves as a reference for others who deal with such mentioned reefers in future....

in short again....caveat emptor...even after reading such a database of opinions

because it will soon appear that how come 'this reefer' gets into *misunderstanding/miscommunication* issues with others pretty often.....

similarly, a sweet deal can be praised in accordance as well

[marinebetta]

Actually I quite like the "feedback" system on ebay - it allows buyers and sellers to give positive, negative and neutral feedback on their deals with a percentage calculated based on positive feedback. Subsequent potential bidders can then see the seller's percentage and also read their feedback (and any defence) and then decide if they will trust the seller. Good in that it leaves it to the buyer to decide at the end of the day, and does not put any good/bad tag to the seller......

However I think it will be beyond the capabilities of this forum system to implement one...unless our super AT can figure it out!

[roidan]

yeap...

the emphasis is not to judge or convict anyone.....as i am sure everyone fails expectations at some point in time or another.....

the way ahead is to provide a reference system like marinebetta has suggested via *ebay-style* ratings or a sub-forum system as i have earlier mentioned

why not both...or more?

soon we need more than Justice League...maybe need Prof X and his X-men

[Achilles Tang]

To be honest, how often will a reefer be always selling things? Oh wait... this is Singapore... quite often right?

I need more feedback before we can implement a rating system. (It's possible).

[Marineman]

Batman is always there for the Justice League....putting his detective skills to use

while he may shun the public limelight......he will be always there when the Mayor of SRC needs him

Wahlau, Batman you are a joker Mature for someone your age Time to get married lah and be a daddy, then little Robin can join us here!

Ideally everyone should be given a badge with merit and demerit points so that everybody knows who they are dealing with, in reality this doesn't exist unless we all have a microchip embedded in us and the Police can infraray all the merit and demerit points to us!

As I am aware that quite a number of the reefers here are students who depends on their parents for allowances and this buy/sell section is ideal for them and this also allows them to enjoy the hobby, for all we know that the guy promise to pay but could not get his money from his parents and therefore cannot keep his promises despite his good intentions, maybe his parents also did not keep their promise to give him the money, etc etc just an illustration.

In the Octo guy case, it is good that all of us are aware of the dealings with this person, this helps but then there are also a lot of bad deals, flaming, jealousy, competitors on other matters, so it is not simple to resolve, sometimes over trivial matters, like if you don't pay me I will post it in SRC, like a threat/blackmail, this is abuse of course.

In a buy/sell situation it is a willing buyer and willing seller basis, full disclosure or not should not be an issue to talk about in SRC as it is the right of the buyer to do his own research and ask the right questions and make an informed decision and as a seller he will tries his best to sell even if he has to lie (some people), so you can get conned and learn from there. The conclusion is that it's a two party thing and complaints about one another should not be allowed in this forum ( this happens all the time all over the world and there is no end to it) because we all will get sucked in and spice it up without full facts, being asians, we tend to be emotional and with some young reefers who are not fully matured, will say and do all sorts of irrational things on impulse, once said, you cannot take back, the damage is done. Certainly to me it is a no no for such threads.

With regards to LFS, Suppliers, Shops, Sponsors etc, not individuals, you can have a customer review section for forumers info.

There should also be a Dissatisfied Customers Section for those who wants to voice their grievances here. Even in this case, customers can become unreasonable and demanding, but then the LFS can reply and explain thier position but as observers we cannot bud in except to read their replies and make your own call. All this must be done is a civilised way. Mods can give demerit points to the party who goes a bit too far.

Rating is quite subjective unless you conduct a poll, even then I can vote as may times as I like or can I not, I have not tried to vote twice before!

At the end of the day we as reefers must understand the purpose of this forum, to learn and share knowledge and experience in this hobby and let this be the main topic for our dicussion.

[roidan]

hehe bro...

Batman is getting married with his CatWoman

A lady who can't wait to get her claws on him

Already got robin (DA) around......will have little batgirls and batboys instead..hehe

yeah..every system is subject to abuse...now it's a matter of whether will these new policies do more good than harm or simply not worth the effort in implementing and maintaining...

ok lah...any more feedback from reefers?

[blueheaven]

Yeah I second bro riodan's description as compared to a kampong. I can still remember the time when I had joined SRC and everyone was like brothers and virtually knew each other. But as the Finding Nemo craze hit SRC, it left with it a trail of destruction. With the influx of new members, like what Voltron said, the "original" pioneers of SRC has somehow disbanded due to the rapid improvments of reefing technologies.

With these guys absent, SRC has never been the same old "kampong" again. People begin to exploit this land as they have done so in other forums and that kampong has somehow negatively developed into a complex society. What is really the scary part of it is when I see new reefers come and go in such a short period of time. How often do you guys see "giving up" sales being posted? These people are just like foreigners, they come, do something, pack up, and go. Although there is still a handful which we graciously welcome as PRs.

Therefore, having said all this, I have some suggestions for AT and the mods to look into:

1) Filter out those who joined to sell stuff, have already given up on the hobby or have "moved to the other side

2) Have more frequent meetings to create mutual bonding between reefers

3) Place much stronger emphasis on responsible reefkeeping

4) Be firm in handling repeat offenders

I myself have grown under the guidance of the nice people here. I have started from posting questions to providing answers and now to giving evidence-based answers. I believe that if I can benefit so much from this club (free too!), others can too, if they have the passion to make a difference

[hamannbmw]

i agree with most of the comments here... though i'm still considering myself as a newbie, which i "personally' think so. The old days r gone.... there's more political issues/back stapping/complains/flaming going on nowadays, which i sometimes feels whether is this a home for me. Many oldies had left, however, i believe they r still here to listen and browse thru all threads, but why didnt they comment ???

Its all about pride here, how much pride do u need my friend ??? whats wrong with brown sps ?? wats wrong with someone that is "cash rich" with all good equipments ? wats there to jeolous my friend ??? from jeolousy it becomes enemy ??? i would love to know why ??

Please, this is a reefing forum, we r here to learn, SO refrain from jeously, if u cant take " i have a better skimmer than yours, or rather my sps is more colourful than yours" then i guess , u gotta go library and do research about reefkeeping but not here.

Happy reefing....

[shoelevy]

good point hamannbmw

me and a couple of my buddies who reef have had very bad comments coming from other reefers who look down on us because we have had our tanks crashed before...i mean everyone makes mistakes, is it necessary to deal very harsh words just because someone made a grave mistake that you didn't???

those harsh words from those reefers made me feel very bad and to a certain extent has made it hard to post questions about problems i face because i know that they're watching...gathering evidences of more failures to deal harsh words in the future again...this also makes me lose confidence in keeping things i do not know much about because i know that if i make a mistake, i cannot post online to ask without them watching me...

i hope this trend doesn't continue

[hamannbmw]

good point hamannbmw

me and a couple of my buddies who reef have had very bad comments coming from other reefers who look down on us because we have had our tanks crashed before...i mean everyone makes mistakes, is it necessary to deal very harsh words just because someone made a grave mistake that you didn't???

those harsh words from those reefers made me feel very bad and to a certain extent has made it hard to post questions about problems i face because i know that they're watching...gathering evidences of more failures to deal harsh words in the future again...this also makes me lose confidence in keeping things i do not know much about because i know that if i make a mistake, i cannot post online to ask without them watching me...

i hope this trend doesn't continue

bro,

this is a open forum so only the moderators can step in and help, but i personally feels that since its a open forum they cant help much. Look at the Aquacraft thingy, its ongoing and ongoing..... thought some had tried to stop the flaming and so on... others forums is still active. Look at this thread

http://www.sgreefing.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=236&st=30

I have nv comments on the Seminar thread here or there, but it seems to me its lots of flaming and politics going on....., i didnt know that a reefing forum from the past is such which i really feels uncomfortable.

[Dispar_Anthias]

Some probs of recent days..... reefers are too bias and always have one side opinion... They are not willing to listen to other party and always believe what ever thye use or do is the best..... if two reefers of such kind speak together, end up flaming(especially i notice reefers dis days dun give way one)......

Second, big time ego... despite knowing tat yourself is wrong.. some reefers refuseto admit mistake... Instead keep on arguing and when ppl say abit more buey song, end up flame starts again..... such reefers, mods must watch out

thirdly- too many "plankton" reefers come in stir trouble... Their first post is usually too arrogant and end some reefers buey song.. post back den flame occur again....In the past, first post for newbie reefers is to introduce onself at the forum(the system and tank they have), nowdays, planktons just hack care and post their arrogant comment out of nowhere.....Modsshould watch out of these plankton of course not all planktons are bad )

next im kinda sick of those complains of reefers involve in failure of sales due to wadeva reason.... i always believe sales should be 2 parties involve and not the whole forum... reason being reefers in forum do not actually know what happen and being very naive they just take the story from one side thus start posting bad comments abt the opp party and adding more salt and pepper...... spoiling his reputation(remember first looks is very important so is the first comment abt that person)... best any failure in sales should be settle privately.. unless its very big prob den maybe mod or admin should be alerted

Oh ya i prefer more threads on reefing.. such thread, too many and always ard the same thing feel like joining batman and frens in the cave..

[Dispar_Anthias]

good point hamannbmw

me and a couple of my buddies who reef have had very bad comments coming from other reefers who look down on us because we have had our tanks crashed before...i mean everyone makes mistakes, is it necessary to deal very harsh words just because someone made a grave mistake that you didn't???

those harsh words from those reefers made me feel very bad and to a certain extent has made it hard to post questions about problems i face because i know that they're watching...gathering evidences of more failures to deal harsh words in the future again...this also makes me lose confidence in keeping things i do not know much about because i know that if i make a mistake, i cannot post online to ask without them watching me...

i hope this trend doesn't continue

Again.. harsh comment and look down is a very detail word to use.... thats why so many flaming goes ard these days.... what did they actually do to make you think they are looking down on you...... whats makes them give harsh comment?? Probably they give you many advices den you refuse to take it and end they abit unhappy thats why start giving bad comments.. Once again i dunno.... so only detail story from parties involve will den link the story together

[Melvyn Tan]

Wah lao (pardon me for singlish) a simple hobby can also get so complicated !!!

[Achilles Tang]

Are you guys then all up for true 'heavy-handedness', where mods will simply cut you off for misbehaviour, considering that all reefers who sign up in SRC forum are SUBJECTED to the terms and conditions of use and the Code of Conduct?

When I had more time, I could enforce the rules.

Lately, or rather, for the longest time, I have rather lax and that may have opened the way for a few reefers to 'misbehave'.