Current status regarding Vendors

I'm attempting to help an old friend who as part of his business sells and services older machines that fit into era. Lots of C64's, Apple II's, Macintoshes and pre-Pentium PC's. Right now however his business is suffering because short of a website it has next to no online presence and I know there are people here who would enjoy both their products ranging from kitted machines to repair services such as mac recapping. What is the forum's current policy regarding him registering here on the forum as a vendor? What are his restrictions? Would he be able to create threads to sell parts and services? Can he make threads advertising his auctions? Can he advertise his business in his banner?

It's a company whose name has been mentioned here before and had a bit of a reputation about five years ago. It's The Hackery which is based out of Vancouver Canada.

Here's a good place to start.

It doesn't answer any of my questions.

There have been a few discussions on such matters before, and I believe the general consensus was that as long someone contributes to the discussions and community here, and don't come across as "spamming" they can sell or promote their own items and services as long as they are on-topic for this forum. There are some folks here that have their own businesses, but they do seem fairly reserved about promoting themselves.

I'm fairly sure a simple link in their sig, or an occasional post in the Items For Sale section would be acceptable - again, as long as they "contribute" to the discussions and such. Of course, if there are large numbers of items for sale, they should be batched up in one or a few posts rather than 100 seperate ones and such.

It sounds like you want the approval of someone with authority here, so you might try EvanK and/or mbbrutman if they don't chime in here.

Of course, if he signs up here and there are any problems, there is no shortage of people who will let him know

Here is my semi-official answer:

We don't distinguish between people who are purely vendors vs. hobbyists. While his wares on on-topic, it's still a commercial entity. VCFed is generally not in the business of providing free web hosting for commercial entities.

That being said, if you friend wants to post and introduce himself and his business, participate as a forum member, and not have a 20 line sig, that would be great. His machines sound to be on-topic and he probably has some valuable experience.

Posting a new thread each time an interesting machine comes in might get old after a while. A huge banner in his sig would not be cool. If it gets too spammy we'll let him know in private.

And really, his long term solution should be to get a better web presence. It's not expensive; it's just a matter of effort.


Mike

We're in the process of trying to make that web presence. We could throw stuff on ebay and Craigslist until the cows come home but if the main communities don't know we exist we'll have a lot of merch that's listed but not moving. That why the idea of being a vendor here came up. It would be an account separate from regular forum talk but we could keep people up to date when we have another 5160 kit available or that our stock of Mac Classic kits is back up to 20.

We currently only have one ancient advertisement video but we are also working on that as well but it's not like we have the money to advertise in newspapers, radio or television. The average person no longer has an interest if you buy one parallel sound adapter you get the second one free.