We had a small “issue” over on NTFSD earlier today, and I wanted to take an opportunity to clarify the list rules around marketing-related posts for all members.
The community has made it clear, from the inception of this list, that they do
not appreciate posts that contain blatant marketing.
You don’t (and will not) see OSR staff trying to sell our products on this list. You don’t see any of the many consultants on this list blatantly posting ads for their services. Doing so would be unpleasant, would interfere with a reasonable technical dialog, and thus would not be tolerated.
I WILL agree that there’s a fine line to be walked. The joining notes read as
follows:
- Commercial postings - This is a technical list, and the only
posts that are allowed are technical in nature. Please don’t post
advertisements or announcements for your products, services, or
activities to the list. Your posting will NOT be considered
technical(and thus legitimate), just because it starts with “I just
wanted all you to know that we’ve released a new version of” some
software. On the other hand, if somebody posts question saying
“Can anybody recommend a good XYZ?”, it’s perfectly fine to answer
“Yeah, we make XYZ’s and we think they’re pretty cool. Please
contact me off-list for more info.”
This rule is intended to mean that in response to a specific request for
information about specific product by a member, you’re not prohibited from
replying that you have a product that might meet that member’s needs.
We do NOT interpret this rule to mean that if somebody asks a question about X,
you can say “Hey, you should buy my product and it’ll make it easy for you to do
X.”
That’d be like somebody from OSR posting “Hey, you should take our WDF Driver Seminar” after every question about KMDF. That would be ridiculous and offensive.
Historically, we have provided some latitude for people who provide FREE
products and utilities, when we believe these are in the best interest of the
community.
Further, the community has tended to be more tolerant of people with long established bona fides… who’ve answered lots of technical questions, and who might occasionally “push the envelope” and offer their services to a member who’s obviously in need.
Because we, here at OSR, try to be sensitive about posts by people with
competing products, I think we sometimes might be TOO hesitant to invoke the rules. But
we’ve started to receive complaints, so… no more.
Keep it technical. We’ll use our judgement, and as ALWAYS don’t hesitate to
send mail to the admins here if you see anything posted that you think doesn’t
belong here.
My thanks to Rod Widdowson for spurring me to action this morning,
Peter
OSR