[ijusluvit]

This thread probably gives you indigestion. There is a fine line between allowing posters to recommend good service providers and folks using this site for free advertising.

But I think your adopted position is fair to all parties. You've drawn a line which does not prevent us from sharing valuable information about businesses and still protects advertisers investments.

I think you are doing your best to make fair judgements case by case, and I don't think anyone can expect more. Monitoring this situation carefully is the best you can do, short of depriving us of a lot of good information.

But speaking of monitoring, I'd like to see you go one step further with your advertisers. Encourage TOTV posters to give you private message feedback about those advertisers who offer expensive products and services. The "TOTV Best Businesses" stickers on their ad would be those doing large landscape projects, golf carts, and home construction, not ice cream and pizza. Warn businesses that they can lose their stickers and even have their ads pulled if there are complaints. If we knew that your advertisers were subject to "consumer reports" type scrutiny, we would have far more valuable information than we have now. And very reputable businesses would likely continue to advertise in order to stay in the elite company of those businesses which have a track record of customer praise. Posters cannot fake support for businesses. It's would easy to check. Just tell your advertisers they need a certain number of verified happy customers to get their sticker and remain virtually complaint-free to keep it.

Thanks for listening.