Now that armslist is locked behind a paywall

[RC3]

What is the next best thing? 

[Chucktshoes]

I’d say here, 

 

But it’s also got a paywall for the classifieds.

 

This is one of those moments that I think it’s appropriate to remind folks of an immutable law of the Internet. 
 

If you aren’t paying for a service, you aren’t the customer. You’re the product. 
 

 

[Grayfox54]

Some of the Armslist sellers are figuring out that all you have to do is add a phone number to your ad to sell your stuff. I have bought a gun that way since the pay wall was put up. 

However, I have remarked as how the Memphis page was once 15-20 pages of guns for sale almost every day. I just checked, today its down to 5 pages and many of those ads have been there for months.  Its slowly dying. Maybe the owners will finally figure it out. 

[RC3]

32 minutes ago, Chucktshoes said:

I’d say here, 

 

But it’s also got a paywall for the classifieds.

 

This is one of those moments that I think it’s appropriate to remind folks of an immutable law of the Internet. 
 

If you aren’t paying for a service, you aren’t the customer. You’re the product. 
 

 

Granted, I have payed for tgo membership in the past, Im too sporadic to actually make use of it. The last gun I purchased was in 17 and I am just now looking to thin out the herd and maybe aquire a new pistol. Otherwise, Im far too focused on other things.

[eRay]

I sold one the other day on Gun Owners Club. I have used it several times in the past with good results but it seems most things for sale on there are in West Tennessee. You have to register to see the pictures but it is free.

[Whisper]

I've had an extremely good experience buying and selling right here.  Met a few nice folks, too.  The volume of ads is not such that you'll find every obscure or specialized thing you might be wanting unless you wait a long time, but interesting items show up daily.  And if you're selling a decent quality firearm at a far price, you'll likely find a ready buyer.

Now, one of you go buy that M&P 45 that I have listed. 

Cheers,

Whisper

 

[TGO David]

I mean, if only we knew where to find the consistently best buying/selling experience for private transfers in Tennessee.

[TGO David]

9 hours ago, Grayfox54 said:

Some of the Armslist sellers are figuring out that all you have to do is add a phone number to your ad to sell your stuff. I have bought a gun that way since the pay wall was put up. 

I've said it before and I'm saying it again:  Those people are stealing.   No one is entitled to the fruit of someone else's labor.  Someone spent time and money to provide that service to the gun community.  Whether you like them or their practices or not, they get to set the rules for their service and the rules are that people pay a fee to sell or trade.

It burns me up that people think this sort of petty theft is OK.

I also question the sanity of dealing with a seller who will steal a few dollars from a business.  If they're willing to rob the website of pocket change, are they going to be more willing to rob me of a couple hundred dollars in a parking lot when I go to meet them to buy the gun?  Are they going to be more willing to misrepresent the quality of the item or hide something about it that I will later wish I'd known about in advance?  Probably so!

If a person is willing to steal from someone else, there's no reason to assume they will suddenly be honorable with you.

 

Quote

However, I have remarked as how the Memphis page was once 15-20 pages of guns for sale almost every day. I just checked, today its down to 5 pages and many of those ads have been there for months.  Its slowly dying. Maybe the owners will finally figure it out. 

It's probably dying, at least in part, due to the fact that they don't enforce their policies very well.  As people freeload off of them, it deprives them of operating capital.  Without operating capital, a business eventually shuts down because they can't pay their employees, pay their bills or make a profit.

They aren't running a charity.

 

[OldIronFan]

Or they could set it up like nearly every online marketplace or auction site. You know like just about every newspaper or circular that ever existed in the paper and ink days. 

The seller pays the bills. If you want your ad listed you pay for that service. If it is an auction site you may even pay a fee based on the sales price. 
The entity/service has a responsibility to bring the buyer to the market. If there are no buyers being brought to the marketplace they will soon run out of sellers willing to pay the fees due to not providing a worthwhile service to those vendors. 

If I had to pay a fee to walk into Kroger I would take my business down the street to Publix. That is one of the reasons I don't have a Costco or Sam's membership. I am not paying someone to enter their retail business to pay for merchandise they are making a profit on. 
Places like gun broker and ebay are doing just fine without requiring buyers to pay to shop. I have no issue with having to establish an account or registration, again like pretty much every online marketplace or auction site, but I am not paying a fee to do so. If I wish to sell or list I will certainly pay a fee if I feel the service I am paying for is worthwhile. 

[gregintenn]

How does GOC make money?

[Grayfox54]

The people listing items for sale are paying for that privilege. Armslist is making money off of them. I have no problem with that at all. Some sellers have found that putting in a phone number greatly increases their chance for a sale.  I see nothing wrong with that either. 

What I and many others are pissed about is that Armslist wants us to pay to buy from their ads. As Old Iron pointed out, would you pay to walk into a store to spend your money? Many times I've been curious about an item and just wanted to ask the seller a question or two. But Armslist wants me to pay just to do that? Nope, not me! 

So yeah, if I can buy something I want off Armslist without having to give in to their blackmail, I'll do it in a heartbeat. No problem at all. 

[Defender]

6 hours ago, gregintenn said:

How does GOC make money?

commercial ads on the site, not the listings.

[RC3]

11 hours ago, TGO David said:

I mean, if only we knew where to find the consistently best buying/selling experience for private transfers in Tennessee.

I mean, i have payed for a membership a few times before and met some cool people here. I just dont buy or sell anything frequently enough that actually offsets how much it would cost. I havent bought or sold anything in the past two years.

[Hozzie]

I will say it.  Quit being cheap asses and support a site that you come to in order to get the information you NEED, but yet you aren't willing to spend $35 to be a benefactor?  

Do you smoke, drink, drink coffee, or just have a hobby?  Maybe I am way off base, but I waste $35 on week on stupid ####.  You get a whole year.  

Quit being cheap!  If you value the service, invest a small bit in it so it is here in the future when you need it again.  Or maybe go somewhere else and find it.  It pisses me off to no end to see people bitch about spending $35 but they don't flinch to spend $1000 on a new phone.

Edited April 28, 2021 by Hozzie

[KahrMan]

3 minutes ago, Hozzie said:

I will say it.  Quit being cheap asses and support a site that you come to in order to get the information you NEED, but yet you aren't willing to spend $35 to be a benefactor.  

Do you smoke, drink, drink coffee, or just have a hobby?  Maybe I am way off base, but I waste $35 on week on stupid ####.  You get a whole year.  

Quit being cheap!  If you value the service, invest a small bit in it so it is here in the future when you need it again.

[RC3]

4 hours ago, Hozzie said:

I will say it.  Quit being cheap asses and support a site that you come to in order to get the information you NEED, but yet you aren't willing to spend $35 to be a benefactor?  

Do you smoke, drink, drink coffee, or just have a hobby?  Maybe I am way off base, but I waste $35 on week on stupid ####.  You get a whole year.  

Quit being cheap!  If you value the service, invest a small bit in it so it is here in the future when you need it again.  Or maybe go somewhere else and find it.  It pisses me off to no end to see people bitch about spending $35 but they don't flinch to spend $1000 on a new phone.

 

Im not bitching. I simply asked around. I have payed for the membership a few times, but i just dont visit the forum much. I think i came here a grand total of six or seven times last year and probably twice the year after that.

As far as your phone analogy goes, spending more than $200 on a phone is something that I wont do. I bought my G7 that was a non used display demo for $150. Case and screen protectors made everything around $200. 

[hipower]

You guys make me feel ashamed. lol Value gotten from this site is immeasurable! Money spent at this site is worse than immeasurable!!

So why do I feel ashamed? I bought the Lifetime Benefactor Membership just after David started the program. It was a special rate deal. I really don't even remember what that amount was. But I can tell you that it's been one of the best deals for a cost vs benefit decisions I've ever made. 

Not that I still couldn't have enjoyed, participated, bought and sold here way back then, but it's been a small amount to pay for all I've gotten in return.

Yes the selling restriction has been added since I did the deed, but it still has been worth far, far more than I would ever have dreamed.

[OldIronFan]

So we went from talking about the Armslist pay wall to TGO benefactor memberships and guilt trips...
 

[Ronald_55]

I regret not buying the Lifetime when I first renewed my yearly. 

On the other hand, I do agree that making potential buyers pay just to contact sellers is a bit much on Armslist. Paying to list is pretty much how most places are going to end up since a lot of ad revenue generation streams are seeing lower and lower returns. Ad views has always been the way "free" sites paid the bills. For small sites it was pretty much nothing. I think Google ads requires a $100 balance to withdraw your earnings. I have been running my little low traffic site for 3 1/2 years and have not got to cash any out yet. On top of the low returns, lots of ad systems are not wanting to work with gun related sites, just like YouTube demonetized lots of gun channels. So everyone should be prepared to start seeing fees to list on a lot of previously free sites. Best you can do is pick one that matches your selling plan and intended audience and join. If they keep the fees reasonable it will not cut into profits much. Plus hopefully it will keep some of the spammers and scammers out. 

 

[TNTall]

Didn't Armslist only go to a paid membership because of government pressure or something? I figured they didn't enforce the listing restrictions because they don't even prefer to have them anyway. I'm paying for the monthly membership, but I'm about to discontinue it. I would have to be a dealer for the $7 to be worth it.

[Darrell]

5 hours ago, Ronald_55 said:

I do agree that making potential buyers pay just to contact sellers is a bit much on Armslist

And so do I agree. There's an item on Armslist right now that I'd inquire after, and I was on the verge of paying the $7.00 to be able to. But when I went to the page where you pay I found that I must set up an automatic payment, either with a credit card or a direct bank withdrawal. I won't do either of those, even though the site says either can be cancelled at any time. I know that's convenient for a lot of people, but I won't do it. 

[FUJIMO]

3 hours ago, TNTall said:

Didn't Armslist only go to a paid membership because of government pressure or something? I figured they didn't enforce the listing restrictions because they don't even prefer to have them anyway. I'm paying for the monthly membership, but I'm about to discontinue it. I would have to be a dealer for the $7 to be worth it.

I emailed them when they announced the change in the site and they claim it was because of growing legal cost to keep the site running. Seems like a reasonable answer. 

[RC3]

14 hours ago, OldIronFan said:

So we went from talking about the Armslist pay wall to TGO benefactor memberships and guilt trips...
 

More like people rubbing in a smart choice that someone of us didnt make.

[billyblazes]

Although a pipe dream, I would like to see GunTab.com also become a marketplace.  Kind of the way Ebay and PayPal were joined at the hip when they first started.  I've made purchases off of Armslist and Gun Broker as well as other sites, but if distance precludes me from making the purchase face-to-face, I'll only use a credit card and only with a vendor who has positive history.

[Swamp ash]

16 hours ago, FUJIMO said:

I emailed them when they announced the change in the site and they claim it was because of growing legal cost to keep the site running. Seems like a reasonable answer. 

It may also help reduce their legal liabilities if they can limit gun sales to "members" rather than just providing a fast way for anyone one the web to acquire private-sales arms.