A thread I started (http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=432130) has disappeared this afternoon. It has been around for months and months - it was the one where I put update info about my Online Shopping comparison resource. It was here a couple of hours ago when I put in the last update but now has vanished? What's going on?

This is the same error message I got when I was trying to post in an existing thread in the United Forum the last couple of days. See the thread in this forum Can't Make A Post In A Thread. (though a day later I was finally able to post in it)

I think something wiggy is going on out there.

Of course the wierd thing is that I posted to the thread fine and when I looked in the forum it was there all normal but within 2 hours when I looked again it had disappeared completely....

No worry, i have found your thread. Apparently what happened is that when you recently started to post more often on the thread about members visiting there to click on the "S" links so that you could earn some operating money from affiliate programs, it raised a red flag - that fine line between operating something for profit vs. the commercial policy that FlyerTalk has. That fine line engaged a volunteer moderator to turn the thread off until he/she could get some clarification as to the extent of asking for donations becoming too commercial. Because of the kind/type of traffic that FlyerTalk receives daily, we unfortunately have been besieged with these things daily, though not as valuable and friendly as yours.

I would hope you understand that you alone are not being singled out, but that's it's becoming more common for us to take a close look at these types of situations. Certainly no harm was intended by our volunteers.

I'll proceed to re-introduce the thread you note and will get together with our TalkBoard to see if they have a possible interest in establishing some sort of formal guidelines which would make it easy for all.

Because there are many such projects spread throughout FT, we have been thinking of creating a virtual frequent flyer marketplace for initiatives such as yours and others like expertflyer, KVS, etc. and allow them a more visible presence with the idea they do bring value to some members of FT.

I hope this explains the situation. Thanks for the question.

Randy,

Thanks for the info and for restoring the thread. I understand the issues with advertising commercial sites although I can assure you that my site in no way could be considered as 'for profit' - of the ~7500 visitors per month I get about 2 using the S links (and the income from this hasn't managed to cover the very economic hosting fees for the site). I have edited the thread to remove the single post that mentioned the S links.

I feel my site is different from the others you mention in that all the information on my site is freely available with no requirement for payment. The 'S' links are clearly labelled as generating a donation for continued development of the tables (my pockets aren't as deep as flyertalks) but there is no requirement to use them and I realize that as the table grows the chance of people actually using them decreases.

Thanks again,

Andrew