Quote from: bones261 on June 28, 2019, 06:49:51 PM

Quote from: TECSHARE on June 28, 2019, 06:21:37 PM

It is irrelevant if bob123 is a rival account seller or not. He still used deception to destroy the property of another. The point of the analogy is you can cause financial damage to others without direct financial (or any financial) incentive. It is in fact equivalent to burning his product because it is now valueless as a result. The fact that account sellers need to keep their products from being revealed is 100% the result of the fact there are dozens of people on this forum who feel it is their right to go around policing the forum by whatever arbitrary metrics they deem valid rather than the forum rules. It is circular logic. We need to destroy his product because we run around destroying his products.

No, they need to keep the exact product a secret or it loses it's value to sport a reputation and credentials that were not properly earned by the buyer. Whether that be a rank, post history, merit history, or trust ratings. Most people buy them so that they can get into a signature campaign that they would otherwise not qualify for. There is the potential someone could use the bought account to do a whole lot worse. Can you imagine the damage that could be done if either you or I sold our account in secret?

Edit: Since it appears everyone wants to use analogies, let me use this one. Suppose it came to my attention that a particular individual was selling birth certificates and social security cards. This individual acquired them from the rightful owner's, willingly, by purchasing it from them. I decide to take it upon myself to pose as an illegal alien and pretend that I am interested in buying one of these documents. I request that the individual let me see one of the documents and I memorize some of the details. I then make some kind of excuse to back out of the deal and then promptly report what I know to everyone that I can think of as well as the authorities. By this act, I have not only destroyed the value of the product in question, but I have likely destroyed the person's entire enterprise as well. Would that make me a "scammer?" I think not.

So they didn't earn the money they paid to acquire it? Who gets to determine what is and is not acceptable? There is by far no universal agreement on account sales, and the need to keep the sales secret is a direct result of this arbitrary enforcement done by vigilantes seeking people to point fingers at preemptively. There are plenty of legitimate reasons to buy or sell an account regardless of whether you or I personally endorse it. The difference between you and me is I don't think it is my job to run around preventing people from trading because I don't like what they are trading in. If some one is actively engaged in fraud this is completely a different issue. The problem with what bob123 did is he engaged in fraud to preemptively attempt to stop a fraud he suspected MIGHT happen. This is not ok, and even if he was correct in his assumption one act does not justify the other. Your analogy is useless because that is all criminal activity. No one is alleging account sales are a crime.

Quote from: suchmoon on June 28, 2019, 08:07:56 PM

Quote from: TECSHARE on June 28, 2019, 06:21:37 PM

The fact that account sellers need to keep their products from being revealed is 100% the result of the fact there are dozens of people on this forum who feel it is their right to go around policing the forum by whatever arbitrary metrics they deem valid rather than the forum rules.

Scams are not against the rules either. Actually most if not all use cases for the trust system don't have anything to do with forum rules, which are enforced by moderators. Untrustworthy actions are often done in secret or otherwise obfuscated. Exposing them is not a red-flag offence.

Quote from: bones261 on June 28, 2019, 06:49:51 PM

Edit: Since it appears everyone wants to use analogies, let me use this one.

Don't even need to go that far... as I mentioned above, just selling green trust appears to be fine in this newfangled interpretation of what is considered a legitimate "business" or "property".

No, but most scams are criminal activity, and criminal activity is against the rules. Furthermore the trust system LITERALLY EXISTS to help prevent fraud, not this subversion of its original intent you prefer to push where it exists to enforce pre-crime or to punish people for doing things you do not personally endorse. The entire purpose of the flag system being put in place was to offer some semblance of due process so that people can't just arbitrarily negative rate people for anything they please. Yet here you are arguing that fraud is ok, the trust system shouldn't be used to punish it, and you should have the ability to meter out arbitrary preventative enforcement of personally held beliefs using fraud.