Morris Minor Owners Club

I notice that two moderators have seen fit to reply in the 'cars for sale' section, suggesting to the advertisers that they add their location. Is that not enough reason for a location field to be mandatory, when even officials comment on it? I have posted about this in the 'ideas' section but unfortunately even after a reminder, no one has been able to give me a reply.
Tell me to get lost if you wish, any reply would be nice.

get lost

It's something that's been mentioned before in the 'what do you want from the MMOC website' thread so will be considered when the changes to the website take place. Everything's on hold for the moment though so your guess is as good as mine as to when improvements will be considered - making an input field mandatory isn't something that the mods would be able to do as we don't have the access. In the meantime it's not too arduous for us to remind sellers to include a location if they forget

LouiseM wrote:It's something that's been mentioned before in the 'what do you want from the MMOC website' thread so will be considered when the changes to the website take place. Everything's on hold for the moment though so your guess is as good as mine as to when improvements will be considered - making an input field mandatory isn't something that the mods would be able to do as we don't have the access. In the meantime it's not too arduous for us to remind sellers to include a location if they forget

It's quite simple, delete the threads or at least make their content invisible until people get the hang of it. Location and price should be absolutely necessary. If it's too arduous maybe you need a couple more mods!

Louise, I realize that the mods are not in a position to do this, and hope I was not implying that but the fact that you and Ray had to suggest a location was useful, made me wonder why moderators themselves had not made more of an issue of this, after all they must surely have more influence/clout than ordinary members upon those who can. Thanks for replying to this particular thread and hope that the appropriate people reply to my 'Ideas' post shortly.
Thanks to Dennis too.

I find it strange that people are allowed to come on the forum and their very first post is to sell a car! Are they Minor enthusiasts - or Traders ? I would suggest a minimum of 10,000 posts ( ) - but perhaps 100 is more practical....

aupickup wrote:get lost

Yes, get lost, and don't forget the Cricket Bat!!

There's yet another '1st Post' car on right now ! Grrrr

Calm down Roy

les wrote: the fact that you and Ray had to suggest a location was useful, made me wonder why moderators themselves had not made more of an issue of this

I don't see that it is an issue really, in the scheme of things, to have to remind someone - on average once every 4 weeks - to include their location in their advert. I can appreciate that it might be a bit annoying for someone who is genuinely interested in a car advertised for sale to have to pm the seller to ask them but I'm not sure why anyone else would consider it an issue

Ok fair enough, just can't see the reason for this strong resistance to it, especially as you concede it could be annoying to some people. There is obviously something behind the scenes that I don't know about. Yes it maybe no big deal to ask for a location but it beats me why no one can actually tell me WHY this resistance persists.

Lets face it, it is to the benifit of the buyer and the seller if the location is known. The price I think is a matter of choice and a PM can do that.

les wrote: There is obviously something behind the scenes that I don't know about. Yes it maybe no big deal to ask for a location but it beats me why no one can actually tell me WHY this resistance persists.

I think you're reading too much into things Les. There is no 'strong resistance' to it, it will be considered when the website is updated but we don't know when that will be.

I accept it appears I'm making much of this but without labouring the point, considering something, suggests there may be a downside to the inclusion, can anyone point out a Disadvantage to a County of location being required? I'll wait for the changes to the website to take place then but will be amazed if this is not acted on positively.

considering something, suggests there may be a downside to the inclusion

only that having no idea if it is a small or huge task for webmaster, we don't want to give false hopes.

I share your frustration, but maybe to a lesser level... having modified adverts in car sale section for some time (years) due to missing info in the thread titles, I guess I'm just used to it now!

I have previously suggested that there should be a limit on who can post - I think that a validated membership number should be needed. BUT, this needs to be tempered with perhaps a limit on guest posts as new enquiries are a good way of generating new members; so perhaps 100 posts as a guest before you have to join in order to post. Now, that would still allow first-posters to advertise cars - and why shouldn't they? If someone has come into ownership of a Minor and decides that they don't want it, then surely here is a good place to advertise? It would be better for the Club to provide a service that allows the car to go to an enthusiast than for a seller to pass the car to one of these fabled dealers - and not all dealers/traders are bad, they help keep the cars on the road.

The idea of a limit of guest posts before you're requested/chided/forced to become a fully-fledged MMOC member has come up before, but it suffers from one - pretty insurmountable - hurdle. If Fred@gmail.com doesn't actually WANT to join the club, when he gets his email saying 'time up' what's to stop him registering again as a brand new 'guest member' as Fred2@gmail.com and having another 10/20/50 post limit? And becoming Fred3 at the end of that? Yes, there are ways that can be used behind the scenes to spot this to some degree, but its a law of diminishing returns - if someone is reasonably IT literate, they could pretty easily cast enough doubt that the mods wouldn't be sure enough to delete the account!

I'm not sure the issue is posts before joining the MMOC - there are a lot of people here for whom membership wouldn't add any benefit to them, yet their knowledge is of great help to others.

However 100 posts - I think 20 or so is actually more reasonable - before one can post in For Sale, is both fair and very easy to implement on this type of forum...

So if someone comes across a pile of Minor bits they find or have no use for anymore, and has the forethought to think of us, he can't enter a post. Sounds daft to me. Anyhow lets stick to the location issue for now, apparently there is no disagreement on the need for that, Too much all at once will ensure nowt happens.

les wrote:So if someone comes across a pile of Minor bits they find or have no use for anymore, and has the forethought to think of us, he can't enter a post.

To be honest, I think anyone like this should get in touch through a member or the club email - look at how we've been stung recently by people being malicious. Genuine people won't mind a process.