Questions about some of the forums

[Spilchy]

What's the point of the Ask the Manufacturer forum? Does any vendor respond to these threads? Most of the responses come from other Autopians. Look at the number of responses to each thread. Nobody vsists that forum.

The old forums for each sponsoring manufacturer was great. Questions were answered promptly and adequately.

I have a specific question about Meguiar's and its sitting there unanswered. I know not every question can be answered immediately, but there needs to be better exposure or something.

What happened to Vendor Kudos? (or did I miss the answer)Some bad reviews for some business and it gets yanked? It was a nice place to visit to share experiences about vendors and introduce new places to check out supplies.

Why is the chat being advertised in the Hot Tub section when its going on? I have gone in the last couple times and there's like 7 people out of the THOUSANDS on Autopia. Maybe advertising it on the homepage or something up with the other announcements.

I'm just curious about the philosophy behind some of these things.

[DavidB]

Hey Spilchy,

Allow me to enlighten you...

1. Ask the Manufacturer was put in place to so members can have interaction directly with product manufacturers. The idea has not taken off and I'm thinking about scraping it.

2. We will offer sponsor forums again as a paid service. It's a great way for vendors to field questions and interact without having to host their own forum.

3. Can't help you with the Meguiar's question.

4. I removed Vendor Kudos when I learned it was being abused by shills to "put in a good word".

5. I'll think about a better way to advertise chats.

[Spilchy]

Thanks for the answers David I appreciate the feedback.

Always a work in progress I guess The tinkering never ends

[perry]

Originally posted by DavidB
4. I removed Vendor Kudos when I learned it was being abused by shills to "put in a good word".

Now the shills will be running around other parts of the site and not be so obvious about it. ( ) Seems like it'll make more work for the staff and make the site more open to abuse. And any kudos / warnings about vendors will be buried amongst the other forums. Where should we share our thoughts about vendors now?

Originally posted by DavidB
5. I'll think about a better way to advertise chats.

Feedback Forum was a good place I still do not understand why that forum was removed. The chat thread would get bumped during chat time and would show up on the main page. Woulda been a good place for this thread too!