That’s the vibe 
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I definitely agree MM should do whatever they can, I also realize that any marketplace is only going to be able to do so much, especially when things like genetics etc are up to trustworthyness etc. They can’t get every genetic/genealogy info, and even if reported or something what could they do exactly? Put a “this has been disputed” brand over someone, when there’s only just that? I feel like it may be used maliciously or something pretty quickly, not to mention lose otherwise good intended sellers who either are just confused or feel their reputation is more important.
Hell many fantastic sellers trusted for decades haven’t joined or waited quite some time to put animals on MM, selling the way they always had instead, because the chance could come with issues not excluding reputation related things.
Like I said, I hope MM does whatever they can and generally like the changes they have been implementing, but also wouldn’t want sellers driven away and firmly believe it’s on us as a community to put as much helpful info out there as possible without rushing to judgment against people either. Look at Facebook - I stay far away from reptile groups there because every post feels like people are just itching to vilify anyone and everyone against their own keeping practices, which presumably are perfect lol. I wouldn’t want MM to end up with something similar where the minority begins ruining things everyone by targeting any breeder they are jealous of or something, reporting them or demanding MM brand them.
All in all this is just my outside-ish perspective as a potential breeder, multiple times buyer via MM.
I love the platform in general, both as a marketplace and as a community board etc. I wouldn’t want over correction to jeopardize that, and also believe in consumer education and responsibility.
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I think that’s all we should expect from you guys - I think it’s a two way street or many-way street, involving the community as a whole, other sellers AND the buyers themselves. Along with an attitude of understanding and benefit of the doubt.
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Here’s the problem with regulating any marketplace to the extent some of you are suggesting, you would need a plethora of experts that cover the range of all items that are listed. And you would need those experts to be accurate 100% of the time. That’s impossible, especially considering the polygenic variance that reptiles express and the fact that this hobby is mostly built around people working to create new expressions day by day. Thousands of people are working to create their own looks in their own rooms at all times with a huge range of species.
Assuming they payed an entire staff of experts, there is still no guaranteeing the genetics of every ball python that’s posted. You all select your breeders based on your personal preferences. Over time, you’re shaping individual morphs in a different direction than other breeders are, creating a wide gap in what two snakes that are the same morph will look like. Now consider that you’re not just doing that to single gene snakes, you can have 2-3-5 genes in there that are all slightly different in phenotype than those same genes would be in another collection with different selection preferences.
With certain species like Carpet Pythons, it’s absolutely impossible to ID them specifically due to the extreme polygenetic variation. Amazon tree boas are another good example of a species that’s impossible to be accurate with, we only learned in recent years that many of the colors we thought were random, are actually morphs. Other colors in the species are completely random and can’t be pinned down. Many phenotypes also don’t have a consistent naming convention throughout the hobby.
Crested geckos are another example of a species that people are rapidly developing new characteristics in. Leopard geckos have so many different morphs that do the exact same thing, they too would be almost impossible to track.
The hobby is literally hard at work making things that can’t be identified accurately by anyone, until they’ve been lined out carefully and people have essentially moved beyond them. And as I mentioned regarding leopard geckos, there are so many morphs in ball pythons that do exactly the same thing, it’s literally impossible to tell them apart without extensive breeding.
To have a perfectly regulated marketplace, you’re literally asking MM to predict which direction a tree branch will grow in. It’s just not possible.
From a purely business standpoint, to generate the revenue to make that even remotely possible, everyone who used the platform would have to pay a sizable subscription fee. The vast majority of people who use the platform don’t pay a solitary dime to MM and aren’t going to. That would mean breeders would have to be charged outrageous subscription fees to shoulder the burden. That in turn would drive animal prices through the roof.
It’s simple to make a demand, it’s much more complex to actually implement a system to satisfy it.
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