https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sho...wpost&t=314468

The guy is promoting a non sponsoring company of CL. I believe a customer of mine just had his thread deleted when he said he got his HIDs from my company, not promoting or anything but yet this guys thread can stay open for days, thats not fair at all. Even if my customer was promoting my company(I really don't think he was but i'm human and could be wrong), this guy is promoting this company in the thread title. I don't get it.

I was almost ban for breaking rules and my boss posted up simple pics of a IS250's fog lights and the thread was closed because our company sticker was on the car visible and our company trailer was in the back ground and you could see it. Thats not the first time a thread mentioning my company has been closed either. No, i'm not talking about the few guys who were trying to start a GB either, when those were closed, thats understandable.

Just to let you know, I will troll around in my free time and continue to make threads like this of members who break the rules but are 'not caught'.

PS. I looked in the sponsor section from the home page and the only HID sponsor I found was Xenondepot, nothing about this company.

Really, whats up guys?

-Richard Bruce

 

It's a very simple difference, Richard and I am happy to describe "why it's allowed" when some of AAP's other threads were not. I'm also going to give you some very specific examples so that hopefully we do not have to keep revisiting this topic... I've already spent a lot of time explaining it to your boss in great detail, so I apologize in advance if I seem testy.

Why that thread is still open?
Because it's simple feedback on a product the member purchased. It's not spammed all over the forums, it's in the right spot and most importantly it is feedback from a member of CL, not a vendor promoting their products. We do not restrict member feedback posts on products and vendors (even non CL vendors and products) unless their posts break our forum rules.

The person who posted that thread does not work for that company, does not have a vested interest in selling the products described or company he posted about... he's simply posting feedback. If, for example, in the future he posts the same feedback over and over in other threads he would receive a warning for being overly promotional of a non-approved vendor and we would suspect some personal interest.

Also, if the owner of that company had started that feedback thread (or had even responded to it 'self identifying') the thread would be removed or closed immediately and administrative action taken.

What's different about the threads we started?
Your personal previous issues were starting a group buy and offering to sell HIDs directly in the forum. Pretty cut and dry issues, I won't go into those. Same with other members who tried to start a GB with your company when you aren't an approved vendor.

The other recent thread you reference was not closed simply because 'we posted pictures of stickers with our logo'. Not at all true:

1. The posts were started BY THE VENDOR PROMOTING THEIR PRODUCT, it isn't simply sharing feedback on an item with other enthusiasts - there is a vested interest and the post was clearly advertising.
2. Vendor intentionally took and posted up pictures with your company logo splattered all over the place (license plate, window decals, beside the company-logo'd trailer.
3. In the post Vendor clearly identified the source of the items described and also prominently listed the name of your company-branded HID lights
4. The company commerce URL WWW was listed in the Vendor's user profile.

Not quite as innocent as you made it sound, Richard.

So why are other posts about our company being removed?
Your company gets exactly the same treatment as other non-approved vendors.... in fact you've received many more 'chances' than other non-approved vendors who have repeatedly broken our rules because I think our members might be interested in them in the future. The kind of rude messages and ongoing challenges I get though (like this thread, PMs from Justin) without apology do not make me feel good that you'll treat our members well. That is a very key factor in approving CL vendors.

Proof of fair treatment? Here are a couple of similar threads to the one you questioned above that aren't closed or deleted I found with 2 minutes of searching:
https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=259393
https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=183130
https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=310503

On the topic of 'I believe a customer of mine just had his thread deleted" please PM his identity to me and I'll look into it. You've made similar accusations in the past without visibility into the details... Honestly, the fact that you're in touch with the customer about the thread raises questions about vendor involvement behind the scenes for me.

That's fine if you choose to do that. I ask that you have a much better understanding of our forum rules before you undertake your trolling duties. If you waste our moderator time with baseless claims that take a lot of explanation I'll ask you to stop. Our moderator team already does a very good job of this without your "help".

 

Not a problem being testy
Yes, My personal Previous issues were understandable, and I said I was not refering to them because like you said, it was a cut and dry case. I broke the rules and you let me know.

Post #6, I did apologize exactly like I said I would if need be.
https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sho...ghlight=answer

Honestly, i'm not sure how you found these because I did do a search of my companies name, of 'halos', of 'headlights, etc.... and I came up with nothing involving my company. I'm the first to admit i'm wrong and I would of never made this thread if I would of found one of those threads.

Of course i'm in touch with my customers, especially ones who keep coming back as in this guy. I'm not sure his user name but he has a white SC430. He said, someone asked what kind of light he had and when he said he had 6k HIDs and 3k fog from AAC the thread was locked or deleted(not sure which one.)

Basically, I was told that you can't promote a company who doesn't sponsor CL. I use to be a pretty active user of this forum and i've learned alot from other members, well since I sold my SC I really haven't been as active but I'm hoping that will change soon since i'm now looking for another SC to 'play' with. What i'm trying to say is that I like this forum but when I keep getting emails and phone calls from people saying, "Yeah I seen something on CL about your product but its not there any more..." or "I posted some pics on CL of my new halos but they were taken down" and that gets really aggravating. As I'm sure threads like this is kinda aggravating to you and your staff too. I'm really not looking to start trouble but just want everything to be fair. Now you posted those 3 threads about my company but once again, I looked for threads just like that with no luck.

I guess if anyone of my other customers tell me about a problem, i'll have them come to you directly or atleast tell them to.

-Richard

 

Sounds like you still have a bit more research to do and get back to me. I hope in the future if you have an accusation to publicly post then you will have very specific detail to provide before you post it (member name, thread post date and title and/or URL), or even better use PM to ask. HID threads get moved sometimes to the lighting forum and perhaps the person does't know how to search for his/her posts.

Your first sentence is correct on two levels. "YOU" (Richard) can not promote the company under any circumstance on our forum because you work for them and have a vested interest in selling products and services. "You" (a generic member) also can not promote a company that isn't an approved vendor either, but they can certainly post a feedback thread about a company or product not sold at a CL vendor as long as that post does not violate our forum rules. There is a grey area between feedback and promotion/advertising that the moderator team must navigate at times. Some keys we look for are multiple posts, old thread bumping, posting across different forums, putting polls on posts to bump threads, vendor involvement etc etc. It's sometimes a judgement call and I feel we do it very fairly... we often discuss it as a moderator team first. The post you called into question here was discussed last week in fact and is considered feedback under our rules unless something changes with the content (or the vendor posts in it, etc).

Where CL members put your (or any company) commerce URL or overtly promotional text in their forum signature because a company sponsors them we ask them to take it off. They may get a discount or free products from that sponsor in exchange for promoting them on forums and at shows, but that doesn't entitle them to freely advertise for them in their signatures on CL - that's not fair to us or the vendors that do sponsor our forum.

Again, need more specifics than 'keep getting emails and calls'. Did you save any of these emails? Were the posts referenced taken down those from your company that violated our rules because your boss made them? Did the halo posts evolve into personal attacks with people saying "they belong only on a BMW" and get closed or removed as happens sometime?

Richard, I've spent an excessive amount of time policing posts or actions that break our rules from representatives of your company and an excessive amount of time explaining it every time I do. I know you want everything to be "fair" but why is it fair that your company can break our rules over and over, but you still come here or PM me to make complaints that have little merit and no details to back them up and complain about "fair"?

That's not fair.