I realize that the moderators are already spending an incredible amount of time keeping these forums running well, and there may be some software restrictions that won't allow this, but I just thought I'd throw it out as a possibility.

 

Thanks for the suggestion but unfortunately this one will HB will have to pass on implementing. 

 

The HairTalk boards are no charge...they have always been and will always been as long as I own Hairboutique.com.  With that said, it is very costly to operate HairTalk.  To make sure that the forum is fast and efficient we spend money on customized software enhancements, constant performance tuning and other operational matters to make the forums as operationally safe and sound as possible.  HairTalk has its own dedicated server (which we just upgraded to the latest technology) and a full time dedicated admin guy (Andrew). We also have mods that work for HB.com. All of that adds up and can be expensive. 

 

By itself (without the rest of the site & the HB Marketplace) HairTalk would be a financial loss.  However, it does provide our many visitors with an outlet for discussion related to other parts of the site and to build community which I feel is necessary for a number of reasons but I won't go into here.  While we do try to get some ad revenues from the boards to help defray the cost of HairTalk, for the most part, forums are not considered ideal advertising pages by many advertisers.  The ad dollars we receive are limited on HairTalk.

 

To hold the posts as you suggest, while a good suggestion in principle, would require that HB add additional overhead in the form of Andrew doing additional custom modifications to the forum software as well as having other HB team members assigned to read the posts on a timely basis that are held back. Of course HairTalk is open 24/7 which could pose a problem for new members. for example, who post on a Friday night at 10:00 pm. and not have their posts cleared until Monday morning because the HB person might not be available to read their posts.  There are a few other issues that would need to be addressed to implement such a plan.

 

While that might help prevent the people that feel the need to use HairTalk as their own private free advertising forum, the added expense of the modification for holding posts, even just a few for new people, is a cost that HB can't justify at this time.

 

Howeve we do constantly try to find ways to block spam.  As a result, Andrew has been working on some new monitoring and tracking on certain words that have a high probability of being ad related. We will also soon have a new registration form for new members that we believe will deter new advertising on HairTalk. 

 

In the meantime, I hope everyone reading this response will continue to select the Report button and report any inappropriate posts whether it be advertising or spam or trolls, troublemakers or porn.

 

Thanks for taking the time to post.

 

Best wishes,

Karen