About a year or more ago we had bumped the minimum post requirement to 25 posts. About the same time we had moved everyone who was at least a year old on the forum to the Disciple tier even if they did not have 25 posts as we didn't want to inconvenience the old members. The expectation was that they will get their post count to cross 25 in that one year period.
Now we have demoted all such users back to Recruit who still do not have more than 25 posts. I can see OP has just 21 posts, hence the reduced permissions.
What’s the objective behind this 25 posts requirement?
If it is to reduce scams in marketplace then two things make it arbitrary:
1. Patron recruits can make sale with even one day account, If I am remembering correctly. That means, they can pull of massive scam with peanuts to pay for patron membership. That doesn’t safeguard against scams.
2. Old reputed members who have proven their credibility in the marketplace face punishment because of this 25 posts limit. The community only loses credible people’s participation in the marketplace.
Singular “posts“ criteria to determine eligibility for marketplace and even ability to post in general section is absurd. This is what I am getting for posting anything anywhere, including this reply.
Moreover, it raises the entry barriers for new members and demotivates them as every post even in general section now requires mod approval. But I won’t digress to defend rights of everyone at this juncture.
I understand that a plural criteria should be effected to ensure that everyone is able to participate, including comprehensive parameters like posts contribution, marketplace reputation, years on forum, etc. You seem to agree too, if that’s not so then Patron membership enabling new members to become full members wouldn’t be there.
Lastly, retrograde measures like demoting old members is arbitrary. Any new measure should have post facto implementation. Making it retrospective is regressive. Tomorrow this post requirement can be changed to 50 and then to 100. We old members will be playing catchup with new rules everyday.