Thread: Group Buys

We have a strict privacy policy on WWF and are very protective of members privacy. Unethical behaviour like reading Private Messages of others is not allowed and would result in instant dismissal of anyone found to be doing so. However.......

There are to my knowledge, seven ways Private Messages can be read.

1. Be the recipient of the pm - Only the recipient can read it
   
   
2. Be the sender - Yep you sent it so you can also read it if you saved a copy
3. Be the recipient of a Carbon Copy or Blind Carbon Copy or have a message forwarded to you - That's pretty obvious.
4. Install a hack (unsupported program) in the Administration area - Don't have it and won't have it on these forums!
5. Change a members password and log in as that member - Would be pretty obvious that this had happened and has never happened on these forums. Any admin or mod who did this would be immediately dismissed.
6. If you change your email address without updating email information in User CP This will bounce the notification email back to the admin In Box as an non deliverable email. This inbox is only accessible by me may include the contents of a pm. I get hundreds of bounced emails notifications per day and they are automatically delete before they can be read.
7. Not allowing emails from WWF through to to your In Box (security settings too high, spam filter settings wrong or too high, etc).This will also bounce the notification email back to admin which are automatically deleted.

The top three marked with are the only way anyone can read a pm on these forums.

Everything marked with is either not available on these forums or deleted as part of our privacy policy.

It is possible that an Admin or Mod may be liable for a law suit if they were to be found reading Private Messages or in possession of knowledge that could only have come from the unethical reading of a pm. So........ For that reason alone it is not something that is done on these forums.

Neil Ellis
FORUM OWNER
HEAD ADMINISTRATOR

so although its says in the rules that one cannot use PM's to arrange a group buy, it is in fact possible to do so...thats all I wanted to know....

I was concerned that as it said in the rules that one cant use PM's to arrange a group buy then PM's might/could be monitored for that and other issues.

And thanks for clearing that up Niel.

(psst....we can do it behind their backs guys)

The main reason for not using the pm system is because I do not want the forums to be directly or indirectly involved in a group buy. The reasons for this are outlined in the link put on by Big Shed in the first post of this thread https://www.woodworkforums.com/f12/gr...mation-137571/.

But in short: Woodwork Forums, the owner (me), Administrators and moderators take no responsibility either directly or indirectly for any Group Buy the members may be engaged in. For this reason I have said that the pm system can not be used, besides that most don't have enough space in their pm folder to take the number of pm's that may be generated so the recipient may need to clear out their inbox a number of times a day.

The easiest way is to use the forum email system which is also private and secure (if your email address is up to date on here and you don't have emails blocked) or have participants email you directly via regular email.

Bottom Line: The forums should not be involved in Group Buys other than the initial announcement and anything else that may be approved by admin.

We have come close to law suits in the past via association and have negotiated a number of members out of very hot water and no longer need those sorts costly, time consuming, frustration and down-right annoying problems.

Cheers - Neil

PS Sorry for the delayed responses to this thread. Only just got back from Canberra Timber & Working With Wood Show late last night.