Many readers were enthusiastic about the basic idea of affordable text ads that can be searched by category and region. Not only did IS managers say they’d like to have such ads available when they are looking for a particular service, I heard from a good number of potential advertisers as well. But it was the additional ideas and suggestions that really caught my attention.

Quite a few readers said they would want there to be some way for readers to offer ratings, reviews, or gripes about the advertisers. “I would read and be interested in being able to do regional searches for legal and accounting/tax advice services -- IF I had faith that the services had been vetted in some way,” wrote one reader. “People read you because you have earned your reputation for integrity. Some of that will initially rub off on the classified ads you display or host. But the real value added would be if you had some way of dropping ads when you receive even one valid complaint so that people would have even more confidence in the quality of what they were seeing. Can this be done? There may be legal issues. Does a newspaper have to run ads for all comers? Does a web publisher have to accept an ad from someone he only suspects is a shady character? Could you be sued for dropping someone's ad without ‘due process’? I have no idea but I wish you luck.”

Readers wondered if I should refuse to let Hall of Shame members advertise, assuming they wanted to. Or, for that matter, how could I prevent spammers or porn sites from advertising their “services”? Some questioned whether a site about gripes is the right vehicle for such ads, but others thought it might be turned to an advantage. “Just one question: what would you do if you received a slew of gripes about an advertiser?” wrote one reader. “I suspect I know -- you'd go ahead and publish an article about the gripes. But what would the advertiser do? On the other hand, you could turn that into an advantage: offer a ‘GripeLog Certified’ status (and corresponding logo to be included in advertising here and elsewhere) if an advertiser has fewer-than-average gripes.”

Some readers suggested it might be better to turn the idea around and have those who are looking for a particular service place a free “want ad” that service vendors would then pay to contact in some fashion. “How many times,” wrote one reader, “have you been working on a project and said to yourself ‘There should be an easier way, or some utility, to do this quicker, easier -- wish I could hire a programmer to knock out a cheap, quick-fix for this...’ I've thought or said this dozens of times. You could add an area for letters with ideas/requests for SMALL programs, applets and utilities, describing their need, when and how they'd pay for it.”

Those are all intriguing ideas. It would be wonderful if we could find a way to certify the quality of advertisers’ services. And the Want Ads idea is certainly worth considering, as it has some obvious potential for helping market the site.

On the other hand, I’m not very comfortable with the idea of censoring ads. And I also need to be careful not to build a costly infrastructure that will make it impossible for me to keep the ads affordable. Can I do so while setting up a guerrilla-marketing-proof system to post customer reviews of the advertisers? Can I be the traffic cop for responses to customer Want Ads without that turning into my full-time job?

Over time, I think all these things might be possible. The question though is how do we get there from here? I need your advice. Post your thoughts here or write me at Foster@gripe2ed.com. Thanks for your interest.