The overall point I took from the AA post is that audiogon promotes a false sense of security, which given that audiogon deletes negative feedback and the perception that the dispute forum/process is meaningful is an arguable point. Audiogon has a minor role in transaction satisfaction. They have no real control, so to blame or praise audiogon for deals gone well or poorly is a mistake, imo. And we all have our own experiences, but they don't really mean much to other people.
Posters are not in a position to calculate satisfaction much better, but there are problems with Elizabeth's calculation. Primarily, as already stated, there are more buyers and sellers than posters, so not everyone who is unhappy is going to make a post about it. I think the number of problems is higher from looking at the dispute forum. Audiogon opened more disputes to the forum and it went up pretty quick, and I am confident in suspecting that even then audiogon handles the majority of disputes privately.
There have been notes of negative feedback deletions and complaints of dispute forum. The message is to buy and sell as if the dispute forum doesn't exist and that feedback to some degree is unreliable.
Posters are not in a position to calculate satisfaction much better, but there are problems with Elizabeth's calculation. Primarily, as already stated, there are more buyers and sellers than posters, so not everyone who is unhappy is going to make a post about it. I think the number of problems is higher from looking at the dispute forum. Audiogon opened more disputes to the forum and it went up pretty quick, and I am confident in suspecting that even then audiogon handles the majority of disputes privately.
There have been notes of negative feedback deletions and complaints of dispute forum. The message is to buy and sell as if the dispute forum doesn't exist and that feedback to some degree is unreliable.

