Commercial advertising is not allowed on Thorn Tree
Replies: 38 - Last Post: Apr 5, 2013 9:20 AM Last Post By: kiwibabe
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15
Hello, I am new here and am afraid of posting here of my most amazing experience I had with certain guide in certain country I was travelilng in, because I would get labeled as a fake. Is raving about a great guide forbidden even if I have no commercial interest? I genuinely want to help him out and let others know about his business, because my experience was so good! Is it possible to do this without getting banned from the forum?16
MiruK - yes we do get "possible fake" posts from people who have genuinely great experiences with a particular guide or safari company. The best way to overcome the usual problems are to include some of the details: such as number in group; cost per person/per day; number of days; how you contacted or found your guide or safari company; where you went; type of vehicle; type of accommodation - especially how the accommodation compared to what you had been advised you would be getting. I appreciated that there are limits on business advertising but you are allowed to include a phone number; email address; web site.So go ahead and prepare your post and tell everyone about the truly great experience you had - some of us might even want to book with them in the future. cheers. O_M
17
For #15Hi MiruK,
It’s highly unlikely that anyone would label you as a fake straight off – for a start you have a posting record which shows you to be a genuine traveller.
Typical of many fake posts are that the poster is newly registered on the forum on the day of the hymn of praise and also that s/he uses language containing many of the mistakes or other features typical of the country the highly praised guide etc is working in, while the poster claims to be based elsewhere.
None of that would apply to you, so go ahead and rave about your guy.
19
Miru, if we looked at your 'profile' & found all your 13 posts are 'suspect' - you are talking about the same person many times over (as touts do!) - but your posts talk about many different things so you're just another poster who is trying to help someone out.If you go to Ghana or Cote d'Ivoire - let me know - I have people there who are brilliant too :)
Kira
20
Great, I'm chasing deserts at the moment, when I go back to Africa I'd love to see different parts.The reason I put up good things about this particular person... is because that was the motivation to sign up for this forum in the first place, but I don't want to get banned from posting too much, so I think I'll just do a proper traveler article or something later on. I owe this guy a lot of thanks, this trip can be said to be life-changing for me in a way.
Will continue to use the forum for different places I have to go next and think about how I can help this guy out in the proper way.
Thanks!
21
Classic example, almost 8 hours ago I reported the last post on this thread: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/thread.jspa?threadID=2264318&messageID=20447837#20447837Which is 'commercial advertising'
If it's one rule for some & another rule for others blinded ignored by the mods - where do we stand?
Kira
22
5hrs later and still no word ............Hence I've not posted since
Where do you draw the line - mods???
This is getting a little farcical ... particulary when you have the 'right' to pick up on our threads - particularly in Cote d'Ivoire where your author PM'd me for information despite being told not to leave Abidjan in the short time she had
So ... advertising or NO advertising .. it's your call ...
Kira (over & almost OUT)
23
Hi Kira,
The rules apply to everyone as I'm sure you can imagine. We have a team of moderators around the world that goes through every single report as quickly as possible but sometimes there might be a delay in processing them due to time zone differences or availability. We're only human after all.
Zabba
24
Not to belabor the point, but......A while ago I asked why new posters (assigned some arbitrary measure like number of posts or date signed up) can't have links blocked from being posted until approved by a mod. If it's legitimate it goes through, if not, it and the whole post are deleted. Again, new posters can post all they want to, it's only any links that would be blocked.
Let's face it, how often does a new poster have a legitimate need to post a link? I realize this would not eliminate touts, but a whole lot of the crap we see have links associated with them and this would eliminate that.
Thank you.
26
Why does Kira have 4 blogs links on a signature? Why does anyone have one?The reason I asked is because the travel blog link in my signature was just removed today by a moderator and I really don't understand why. I would like you to look at my posts and tell me if any of them were directed toward selling something. I just got back from Hawaii so I posted about that in a few posts in response to some forum questions, and I posted about a trip I took with my nephew this summer for his high school graduation in response to a woman taking her 18-year-old son on a trip.
In one of the Hawaii posts I put a link to a post in my own blog about Hawaii. Is that not allow? Of course, just by having a link in a signature or post, you are encouraging people to go there so maybe that is the prohibited aspect of it.
I would like more clarity.
27
BohemianaWhere in my blogs & my NGO do I 'advertise'??
How many touts have been on this forum over the last 2 weeks or so?
This isn't about signature lines but the touts who are on here, of which I've noticed more than 3 in the last 24h
Clarity is obvious, look at the touts messages, no where in my own blogs am I promoting a company. If you read a little more you would understand this
LP Mods, I'm refraining from posting as your answers are not adequate ............ we post on here for free, LP pays you, sells books & uses our information but doesn't get up to speed with the amount of touts on here
Kira
28
If commercial advertising is not allowed on TT then what are those boxes doing at the top and to the right of the screen currently promoting (obviously not advertising) hotels in China and Japan?29
I dont understand why my post was removed - I am a traveller who used certain company in Rwanda that I was very happy with and I would highly recommend. Its locally owned business who does not have thousands of dollars to spend on marketing campignes. Is this forum not designed to do exactly that , help local people as well as travellers? share info on good/bad service received ? If this is not allowed please make it clear - I will save time NOT posting anything on lonleyplanet - I will take my comments elsewere
