- I realize there is some concern that if you are a teacher and you need a substitute, then you will miss posting for one for free. At the moment, we have not yet worked out a way to distinguish a teacher looking for a sub from a buxiban looking for a teacher
Forumosa is all about the forums. The classified system that regular posters use should integrate seamlessly with the forum software. This other classified site feels like something separate from the forums, so I never go there.
Why not run something that works with the forums (that something exists now phpca.net/ , there are also other ones with more features that cost money), and run another classified system totally separate from the forums.
That might sound strange, but it’s not. What I feel has happened now is that there is no option that exists for me to run ads (except using my sig, which is a really good option for me, but not for people with 45 posts.)
Tealit’s classified system doesn’t support itself on the forum, it’s just pretty much a separate thing. I think that’s what the forumosafieds should be like. Either use something that fully integrates with the forums, or go back to allowing listings as forum posts.
Note: These may sound like demands, but they’re merely suggestions 
taiWANTads.com
expatbargains.com
I remember a long time ago there was a taiwanclassifieds.com
if you use “free” in the domain name, you will always limit yourself to free ads. I would suggest something more flexible since the branding of the service will be important for future growth.
Is having a login name connected to the database that important? Most adds are only temporary anyway. Perhaps just a common login name/password can be used (swollenmember (?!) Makes the posts un-editable so no one can change it. If a poster want to add/delete something later, they can just make a 2nd post on the thread. Also city location on the page would be useful.
Add: I just took a look at the phpca.net software that miltonkid suggested, it looks very clean/useful plus its free.
FWIW, it is Peter’s integration script that I am using to link the forums to the classifieds 
Peter is the author of phpca.net
Why not? Because as a database-styled classified system, phpClassifieds offers a lot more in the way of ad administration and features. For example - separate ad fields - there are over 100 fields used for the various kinds of classified ads - . And this is a scalable system - if we realize Chinese Name is important for the Pets Category, we can add it in.
When I evaluated phpca, it was still very rudimentary. Maybe it is high time to have another look. But I don’t want to write off phpClassifieds so quickly
Why “no option”? I do not understand.
I have set the forums so that whenever someone pulls it up at the :10 :20 :30 :40 :50 and :00 mark I get an email. Round the clock, 7 days a week, I am alerted that someone has viewed, even in the middle of night on the slow days of the week, I know that for certain that people are viewing the classifieds. Because I use Gmail often (I keep it open most of the time), I see the alerts bump up in my inbox (it’s a cool thing), reminding me that someone is always looking at that website
So, why again do you feel there is NO option? There is a view counter on each ad - does this not move when you post? I am curious to know why you are so certain that people look at your sig more than your Forumosafied Ad, since there isn’t a counter for your posts?
We will have links to the Forumosafied Ads accessible here on the forums sooner than later. This seems to me to be the only critical piece that is missing.
Using phpClassifieds instead of phpBB for Classifieds offers another advantage - links to articles can be presented more clearly there. There are almost none now. This is because we haven’t focussed on producing articles to point to. We will and I expect it to be more flexible than using the forums for directing attention to the right place
I totally agree with you. It is not about how easy it is to post, it is that I just happen glance over classifieds when they are part of the forums, but not since they moved to a different site.
I totally agree with you. It is not about how easy it is to post, it is that I just happen glance over classifieds when they are part of the forums, but not since they moved to a different site.[/quote]
I agree. Forumosa is about the forums. But most of the people using forumosa also need to buy or sell something, find a job, or pursue their next language/bodily fluids exchange at some point. The point of having an associated site is that all the people who use forumosa have THE OPTION of looking at a sister site which caters to those needs.
Personally, I hate looking at ads when I’m not ‘shopping’. I’d rather browse forums and chat without having to filter out other people’s attempts to sell me something. That includes the banner ads. Having advertising in a segregated part of the site gives us, the members of the community, access to advertising without it being in-your-face. It’s all good.
It’s like having a classifieds section in your newspaper. You can look at it if you’re looking for something, or you can ignore it if you’d rather read the articles. Or, put another way, it’s like having tealit there as part of the same internet, but not insinuating itself into every forum you read. Except that everythingyoucouldpossiblywantintaiwan.com is far cooler than tealit.
I enjoyed having the ads in the newposts index. Anytime there was an ad about computer/technology anything, I’d click. A used car, I’d click (even though I didn’t want one), school for sale click. I’ve even made several purchases and sold things through the old ads. This vibrant give and take has come to a complete halt ever since the move.
I’m just telling it like it is. I’m not trying to be mean to the new system. It’s just that it’s in some “far off land” to me now, one I never visit. It doesn’t feel like a part of this site to me anymore (and therefor it isn’t.) I was never interested in looking elsewhere, but since the switched I’ve looked at other classfied sites for Taiwan (Craig’s List, random sites, ekcetra.) This is just what is happening.
I do seem to recal there breifly being a RSS list of new classified post in the new posts index for a while, but that has seemed to go away. Something as simple as that may correct things. The extra three clicks or so it’d take for me to see the new stuff being listed isn’t worth the effort.
Hi Gus,
Would it be possible to make a separate category for subs, and just have a couple of us mod the be-jeebers out of it, immediately killing any ads that are obviously schools and not individuals? I mean, just about anyone who doesn’t write natively or who makes certain requests is going to be a school rather than an individual. We could probably get this right 99% of the time, and we’ve got people just about everywhere. I doubt an offending ad would stay up longer than a few minutes – especialy if there is some sort of function to alert the Ad Rangers about the posting of a new ad to that category.
Just an idea, I have no idea whether the technical stuff is feasible or not.
I hear what you’re saying. It’s down to how you use the site.
Has anybody done any kind of research into how people use the site, how people would use the site given the option, how people who don’t use the site would use the site if they used the site, and so on? Perhaps that would be the best way to start, except that it’s a bit late to start again.
Funny you should mention Craigslist. It’s a good deal less sophisticated in some ways, in terms of content it’s absolutely crap, and he claims to have no real plan either.
Well, I haven’t been to this site in a long time. It looks like content that was once free now needs to be paid for, but there are articles on there about how to design a website to be “usable”. Webdeisgn 101 usually states things like less clicks = good, extra clicks = bad.
I just found a lot of good stuff clicking through this site: usableweb.com/
long pause
OK, I just spent the last 20 minutes or so using the new classifieds and it was a nice experience. I contacted 2 people and looked at more. The two main gripes I have are it’s separateness (I have to go to another site to look) and the fact I had trouble trying to place my own ad twice.
If there was an RSS list of new ads that came up in the newposts listing that would probably fix #1 for me. I’ll try posting another ad this weekend and see what happens with #2.
There is a Taiwan craigslist http://taipei.craigslist.org/ but unfortunately it doesn’t seem to get much traffic.
(At the risk of going :offtopic: )
Craigslist is an interesting phenomena, but its success in the USA has not been matched anywhere else. In part I think that’s because it’s perceived as not being really ‘local’ by the people who use it. I would even go so far as to say that it’s considered to be ‘American’ rather than really international, although I doubt that Craig himself wants that.
Given the degree of internet availability in many countries, you would expect CL to have grown just as fast outside of the USA if it was a truly international site. But it’s not. I think that for many people outside the USA, CL is an unattractive option compared to local alternatives and not just for reasons of language.
Take a look at the personals in London. (Or Paris, Rome, Tokyo, etc.)
The majority of the people posting are Americans looking to hook up with locals. Nothing wrong with that, but how many British people are looking to hook up with locals through the same site? Plenty of people in New York advertise in the New York listings hoping to meet New Yorkers, why don’t Londoners use CL to hook up with Londoners? Could it be because most of the respondents are likely to be non-Londoners? Ditto in Taiwan. There’s a self-reinforcing spiral which discourages true international participation in CL, in terms of building local communities.
In most cases, you have to specifically looking for an international relationship to be using CL, which means CL is trying to take market share from tealit, time out, or whatever - but without making any effort and without the bells and whistles appropriate to the local market.
Going further off-topic, different cultures have different styles. Personals ads posted by Taiwanese on tealit often seem pretty vaccuous, and some of the things westerners write might seem a bit weird to many local people, but it’s where you go to find your foreign friend so we agree to explore our differences in a spirit of friendship.
But if you’re NOT looking for that international connection, the chances are you’re looking for someone you will connect with - someone who shares a similar style. That’s not going to happen until CL gets its critical mass of local participation in each area - by which I mean locals hooking up with locals, which means not being perceived as a place to meet foreigners.
Just for fun, here are two ads posted by women on CL London recently. I think both are fairly typical of their respective countries:
[quote]…(I have a) fantasy in which I am married to a tall, intelligent, charismatic man who puts me in a big house in the country to cook for him on an aga after a busy day at the office and to make babies.
To be surrounded by my perfectly behaved and beautifully dressed children and adoring husband…
The reality is that I spend most of my day applying far too much lipgloss on the off chance I might meet Mr Right and barking on the telephone to broody Parents who think spending money on clothes is an insult to the wine industry.
The moral of the story
DREAM ON
…Unless you can suggest otherwise?? [/quote]
[quote=“I LOVE white boys”]particularly english ones. the sad thing is, i live in america:( but if you’re up for a chat, or your visiting california soon, it could be worth your while. i find that most white boys in america are afriad of me, or disgusted by me, i cant tell which. but i seemed to have mass succes when i was in the uk. i’ve always had an affinity for all things british. i have grown to beleive that every english boy is endowed with the gift of stellar wit and humor. so live up to your name boys…and write me already.
and for petes sake include a pic if you have one:) [/quote]
(Note to American ladies: Do you have any idea how old it gets to have every girl you meet tell you how much they appreciate British humor? It’s an essential element of British humoUr that when people make the same predictable observations about you then they’re NOT FUNNY.)
Loot.com.tw’s usability has went way up since I tried it last time. I had absolutely no trouble posting an add today. Something has changed.
What changed for you in terms of “usability”? I’m very interested to know because nothing has changed on the site in weeks. I guess it’s been a long time since you last tried it.
I am making some major changes today, so I’m curious what you think got better.
[quote=“Goose Egg”] 
What changed for you in terms of “usability”? I’m very interested to know because nothing has changed on the site in weeks. I guess it’s been a long time since you last tried it.
I am making some major changes today, so I’m curious what you think got better.[/quote]
It’s been months since I used it last. Whatever happened last time something didn’t work. Once I remember there being an issue with being able to click submit (maybe that was Firefox only.)
Everything went very smoothly this time and didn’t take any guessing for me to figure out what to do next (I remember things not being intuitive.)
While I wil agree with MTK, the posting of ads is now easy, and quite nice with the picture functions and such. But it still get ass traffic. I have had had little to no response to the adds I posted here, and the adds I posted at other said evil site, which I don;t actually like dealing with, still got me many fast responses. (yes I’m sure they were people contacting me via the tealit ad, not the Formosa ones bc I asked). It’s disappointing giving how many people cruise the forums everyday, I still think some new temp ad forum would be really cool, so you can post your ad and then put a new topic in the temp ad forum title being ‘blah blah blah’ for sale and then the body of the message just be a link to the ad, it could be the rule for that forum. I don;t understand how the programs and stuff work for the forums, but could you make it so anything in that forum can’t be replied to and it junks after 1 week, or 10 days?
If these are stupid suggestions then sorry… but I would think you would want to bump up traffic at the loot.com area…
I posted both places under another login name and my Tealit ads got more responses. I still think the problem is with separating the site into another URL, it should be integrated back into the forums.
The ease of posting is not the problem.
[quote=“Hobart”]I posted both places under another login name and my Tealit ads got more responses. I still think the problem is with separating the site into another URL, it should be integrated back into the forums.
The ease of posting is not the problem.[/quote]
Well, it was for a while. And I fully agree with integration with the forums. That’s the way to go.
[quote=“Hobart”]I posted both places under another login name and my Tealit ads got more responses. I still think the problem is with separating the site into another URL, it should be integrated back into the forums.
The ease of posting is not the problem.[/quote]
I agree with Hobart 100%
What we are missing is having the ads easily accessible on the forums. I’m still trying to figure out how to do with this with the software we have, but frankly, it’s going to be a stretch.
My last attempt to bring the ads into the forums and search results raised all kinds of hell because every so often an ad with an “invalid” character (usually some kind of punctuation mark that is beyond some basic XML character). When an ad with an invalid character was fed to the forums, that page displaying it would crash. Between keeping the forum discussions available and the classified ads on the forums, I chose the former.
I’ve always wondered what people found so “difficult” about posting an ad. I am very aware that there is still a lot to be done to make it user friendly, and there are some major bugs in the classified ads software that absolutely must be addressed. But this is why we stay in BETA and why we don’t charge for ads. Btw, we only plan to charge for teaching ads once we are ready (all other ads will remain free)
But the problem is, even if you do work out the bugs, and makes posting easy like silk. it doesn;t address the real problem which is that of traffic. We need people to look at the ads for them to be of any use at all… … sorry if I’m being a naysayer… I don;t mean to be.