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Underground > Policy & Help >

Potential spam/mer

14:37 / 28.04.05

Here

There's no request for critique there and the guy/girl clearly spells out with his final sentences that it's purely for selfish, commercial gizzain.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

17:38 / 28.04.05

I think it should really be deleted, but less be kind to him and just shove it into the creation instead. Perhaps lock it too, so it just slips away?

22:57 / 29.04.05

But, Lady! Throat punching!

That sounds fine, really whichever way gets rid of that bloody thread the quickest. One of the (many) raisins I come to Barbelith is the complete lack of ads. Would it be hypocritical of me to say I wouldn't mind half as much if those t-shirts weren't really shit?

07:06 / 02.05.05

Potentially opening a can of worms here, but how is this thread different from the one highlighted above? Granted, the language is a lot less arsey and in your face than that used by spidervirus, but in the end it's an invitation to purchase something too.

So does it come down to what sort of language one uses to promote/sell one's products? Or the quality or motivational background of the products being offered? For instance, cop killer's thread where he sold t-shirts to finance his cancer treatment met with general approval (rightly so).

Goodness Gracious Meme

13:20 / 02.05.05

It's different, imo, because CK was a long-standing, if sporadic, poster by the time ze posted that thread, rather than popping up once to plug t-shirts and disappearing again.

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:41 / 03.05.05

That's part of it, certainly - if you know who the person is, it's going to make for a kinder reception. And, let's face it, who was going to be the first to say "Sorry about the cancer, CK, but get your soulless mercantilism off Barbelith"?

Ah. It's me, isn't it?

More generally, the difference between spidervirus and, say, Queer Granny is that spidervirus made no effort to make his pitch in any way relevant to Barbelith - he just cut and pasted a standard pitch. That kind of mercantilism I think is pretty much cruising for deletion. Something like this is trickier. After all, he is offering us something free (and something else paid for, admittedly), and it's not beyond the bounds of possibility that somebody on Barbelith would enjoy the stories. However, the lack of any recognition of where he is or to whome he is talking suggests again that he's only interested in us as a potential market/audience... that for me is the defining feature of spam - it's pure broadcast.

22:41 / 04.05.05

*Raises hand* Sorry about that. I was the "Queer Granny" who couldn't figure out how to mess with/read through the FAQ. (Grant knows what I'm talking about.)

It's just sort of hard to know what's been legislated as "okay" and what has not been, especially when it seems that there is more of a rhizomatic structure than a hierarchical structure when it comes to decisions regarding promotion.

Can one promote a book? An idea? A zine? A band? There's a lot of grey area, here. It might have to stay grey for the place to keep dynamic, though.

19:42 / 05.05.05

Now, see, I’d say that this thread isn’t at all appropriate.

To my eyes, it looks pretty much exactly like spam. jhw is now using this site to promote his project, and there's a little invitation to keep posting, like, 'any chat about the series,' in order to 'keep the post at the top of the page for a few days,' which seems kinda off. We’ve already got threads *discussing* promethea. As readers, not as consumers.

There are commercial sites out there where this’d be okay. Is it okay on barbelith, though? Thoughts, anyone?

Tryphena Absent

19:45 / 05.05.05

I had a brief exchange with Vincennes last week before I went away about this thread (I went on holiday the following morning) and suggested to her that the general strategy we employ should be that we wait and see if spidervirus or anyone else who starts a thread like that posts in it again. That's the obvious response, it's the one I always use, I think a 48 hour period between appearance and deletion should be kept for a thread specifically like that one. It's not language, it's interest in the board, I have no problem with people touting their wares here within reason and happy connection but a presence on the board and a wider interest is required.

20:06 / 05.05.05

Okay, so that’s that. But nobody even knows who spidervirus is. Can we treat the jhw thread any differently? I feel the presence of a real live artist posting ‘hey there (poster’s name)’ messages will probably turn a few heads: that thread probably will get bumped and bumped. So, is that enough, does that make it okay for professional artists to turn up to promote their projects and contribute nothing else besides? That’s kinda what millarworld is for.

Tryphena Absent

23:55 / 05.05.05

I'd stick that thread straight into Conversation, it definitely doesn't belong in that forum and it's not a ghetto, you can move more general threads. Someone might be interested in the thread and they're not trying to use barbelith as a market exactly so I probably wouldn't delete it... I would write in the thread instructing people to put things in the right forum though.

ONLY NICE THINGS

07:56 / 06.05.05

I would suggest that jhw3 is now starting to spam. Question being whether the value he adds by being around to answer questions on his own work outweighs the "buy my stuff" threads he starts. Personally, I'd say not - unlike Cameron Stewart or Sax, f'rexample, he doesn't seem to be enormously interested in Barbelith as anything other than a collection of potential buyers. Of course, some members will maintain that having jhw3 contributing at all is sufficiently important that what he actually posts is irrelevant. I would disagree, but we should probably take the time to explain to him why this kind of thing is a bit shonky.

d. furioso is frankly old enough to know better. I've moved his double post in Books for deletion.

ONLY NICE THINGS

08:27 / 06.05.05

Just to correct a misunderstanding, tho - Bed Head, d. furioso isn't jhw3. There are two separate posters currently plugging in Comic Books - jhw3 is plugging his upcoming stuff, and d.furioso is plugging his online petition to get a prestige edition of Promethea published. I'm finding both a bit troubling, but that's not because they are looking to sell/plug stuff, so much as that they both seem to be interested in Barbelith as nothing more than a place to sell/plug stuff in the threads - at a guess, both are copied and pasted to a number of different message boards...

09:24 / 06.05.05

Well, I think I just made the assumption that jhw3 knew what dfurioso was doing to some extent; that they were working together, however informally. There’s no real evidence for this - I just looked at the posting times, and leapt to conclusions. Which was a bit unfair and cynical of me, but hey, middle of election night. I suppose it’s possible that jhw3 sits around hitting refresh every 5 minutes, just in case someone ever starts a thread about one of his comics on barbelith. It just feels more likely that they went ‘round a bunch of message boards together last night, and that jhw3's post to dfurioso’s thread is the equivalent of a ‘this message has been approved by,’ sharing the platform, joint ticket kinda thing.

jhw3's own spammy thread was started straight after that. So, I‘m quite sure they are indeed two separate posters, but I’d tend to think that jhw3 either turned up in book-plugging mode, arm in arm with dfurioso, or else was moved to plug after seeing that dfurioso has already done something similar here, and assuming it must therefore be a-okay.

There’s yet another of those petitions in the Temple, by the way. Because it’s a book about magick!!, natch.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

10:20 / 06.05.05

So we know that 'jhw' is 'jhw' and not some weird fan of 'jhw'? I must say that I don't see anything particularly wrong with the comics thread, as long as people don't keep bumping it for ever and a day to try and keep it at the top. The Temple one should be deleted, it's not truly relevent to the forum and we shouldn't have duplicate threads hither and thither.

Tryphena Absent

18:30 / 06.05.05

Has anyone pm'd the guy and asked him to keep it all in one thread instead of starting new ones? That would contain the plugging...