  
| Author: | LMAinFLA  | | Posted: | Jan 10, 2024 21:43 | | Subject: | Re: Important proposal regarding catalog variants | | Viewed: | 79 times | | Topic: | Catalog | |
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| Sorry if all this has been addressed already, but there were over 200 responses
when I found this thread and I didn't have the energy to plow through all
of them. So here are my questions and comments.
Was a focus group of buyers and/or sellers brought in on the decision making
process? If not, why? It would seem to me, as a former database engineer and
programmer, that any database loses a good part--if not all of--it's
usefulness if it doesn't serve the purposes of the end user. Also, adding
information about the item's attributes (as opposed to condition, completeness,
etc.) into a long text/memo field is not only additional work put on the sellers,
it slows downs queries and increases the amount of resources necessary to run
those queries, which in turn, slows down overall server response time. I really
don't see this as a win for anybody. Input should have been asked of sellers
and buyers to help determine at least a short list of variants that buyers find
are the most important.
While I can see that some of the variants might no longer need to be distinguished
from one another, there are going to be certain ones that AFoLs and sellers will
always want to be able to find easily in order to produce an accurate recreation
of classic sets. Plus the value of vintage pieces can vary widely in value from
their modern counterparts. Lumping such parts together would make the 6 mo average
sales data nearly (if not completely) useless.
Another point for consideration: how many buyers and sellers do you think might
abandon the platform for other venues where those distinctions are still available?
In Catalog, Admin_Russell writes:
| | Hello everyone,
As a platform, we have decided to take a hard look at some of the mold variants
that we are currently asking you to recognize. For sellers, more variants means
extra sorting and extra work while pulling orders, plus the issues that arise
from variant misunderstandings.
For buyers, excess variants mean that it's harder to assemble a wanted list,
find stores, and ultimately obtain the parts you are looking for.
I have put together a quick Help page to outline these proposed changes:
https://www.bricklink.com/help.asp?helpID=2625
Notice the date on this is coming up quickly (Feb 1), so I'm not giving a
lot of time for discussion. I'm aiming for about 1 week of discussion and
then we'll give sellers 2 weeks to adjust the descriptions on affected items
if they wish to retain the distinctions.
I plan to construct a full FAQ page with answers to all your questions. This
will serve to inform users about what was done here in February 2024, and also
help point the catalog in the right direction in the future.
To get started, I'll list a few here:
1. This sounds like you're dumbing down the BrickLink catalog to make
it easier for new users. Is that what is going on?
Not really. There are many, many other variants we expect people to sort and
care about. These ones don't really seem to matter much, and some of them
(e.g., the minifigure heads) actually cause problems for the catalog that cannot
be corrected otherwise.
2. What if I really care about a certain variant that is going away? Can I
still buy and sell that variant?
Absolutely! You can add notes to your listings to make them as "determined"
as you wish. Buyers can still search within notes for extra details, or they
can simply observe them as they browse listings.
3. How do I know which exact variants will be merged? I only see one example
in each category.
Please ask in this thread and I can be very specific. Usually we are talking
about a handful of parts and the printed versions.
4. Has a merge like this ever been done before?
Yes, there was a precedent - the Headlight Brick with Slot:
https://www.bricklink.com/message.asp?ID=1016584
It was marked for deletion a few years ago and was finally merged last August.
5. Are these the only parts up for consideration, or are there other variants
that will be merged as well?
This is all for now. Based on how well this goes, we may elect to remove other
entries later. However, we will keep all functional variants and important cosmetic
variants.
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Message is in Reply To:  Important proposal regarding catalog variants - Admin_Russell | Hello everyone, As a platform, we have decided to take a hard look at some of the mold variants that we are currently asking you to recognize. For sellers, more variants means [...]
(5 months ago, Jan 9, 2024, to Catalog) |
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