@joethenuts wrote:
to k1ooo this is not for you only,
this is a forum on ebay ,we read things that go on everyday from ebay and using ebay like postage , when we buy on ebay ,we are buying from strange ids genarally ,so we have a seling ids to check and help us on who th buy from , now buyers can have there buying private or not show up what they buy or have it as is. all this info is available on this forum for forum users, just like there posts and other posters posts. many atime different answeres come up, now what comes up on these boards should stay on these boards.
under no way is info gathered from trolling another site or what ever , should be put on these forums ,that arnt about yourself.
its not your business ,its not for everyone to know,know a poster who posts or reads here who has there buying record hidden for what ever reason , should not have another poster getting info from another site ,to then expose it here.
[now we have this op who asked how other posters got info , and was told , then later said the excact thing there words something like there private buying were exposed and thought it was not right , and all i have said i agree. i agree.
thanks for taking the time to explain this again joe, and I appreciate that your post quoted above is not just directed at or to me but all forum posters and non-posting visitors alike. I agree that there needs to be respect shown for member privacy, but there can be a fine line to tread when trying to help a member who is unfamiliar with how these boards work. Many times an OP thinks they are posting to eBay and that the reader of their opening post will know what item they are asking about. Very rarely do members post inappropriate content based on information gleaned from watchcount, and the poster that posted the OPs information has addressed that on this thread by saying his intentions were good and apologising if any offence was taken.
Your main gripe seems to be that members use an outside source to gather information for use on these forums. eBay used to provide bidder information on recent purchases of members through the advanced search feature, but this changed some time back around the same time that eBay decided to increase member privacy through feedback being anonymous (sort of). There are times when knowing what item a poster is posting about is essential as it is necessary in giving appropriate information.
One classic example is Pitney Bowes and the GSP for USA purchases. When a poster posts on these forums and fails to mention crucial details then looking into their purchases can be helpful. How you use the information in a post on the forum is where it can get tricky. Knowing that an item is purchased from a USA or Australian seller will change the advice given. Looking at purchase history to help is okay, to sticky beak and poke fun at is not okay.
Watchcount has been running for quite some time and is not (and has not been) some closely guarded secret on these boards. There have been threads, joe, where members have told you directly about the site, one reference in a reply to a post of yours even had a clickable link to the site and told you what it is used for, both the good and the bad.
As you would see from your time on the boards watchcount is used wisely most of the time. Very rarely do members post inappropriate content based on information gleaned from that site. I have no problem with taking a member to task over the content of their posts, especially if they use information from watchcount in an inappropriate way.
I have no regrets in posting the name of the site in the first reply to the OP. It is not some secret regular poster's business and the site name and web address has been given out on these forums many times before.
