YOU MUST POST

Andy Hamilton · Fri Dec 23, 2005 2:08 pm

I notice that we are getting an increasing ammount of people who are spamming the member list with links to poker sites, I could be a dirty spammer, please let one of the moderators know about this post site and counterfit drug sites. I would like to set up some coding to get rid of these pesky people. What it would mean is if you don't post within a few days you will be deleted.

Is this harsh? I don't want to frighten off new users who join then post after weeks or months.

What do you think, or any other suggestions? Otherwise it takes hours going through each new member checking the website, banning the Ip address and user name and deleting them off.

Millymollymandy · Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:35 pm

Andy, nearly all this spam comes from people posting as Guest. I'd change the site to not allow guests to post. Also that way all the members who forget to log on don't have to repost saying 'oops that was me' as well.

Maybe if these spam people had to register they wouldn't bother so much.

Muddypause · Post: # 7941Post **Muddypause** » Sat Dec 24, 2005 1:10 am

This does seem to have become more of a problem recently. I think I'd be with MÃ‚Â³ as a first step. It's a pity in some ways, but it would be a greater pity to see this forum become unreadable and useless.

Registration before posting may reduce things down to manageable levels, and I think would be preferable to removing people if they don't post for a few days - after all, some of the regulars have been AWOL for a while <cough>.

Chickenlady · Sat Dec 24, 2005 4:21 pm

Oh, yes, please don't delete us for not posting for a few weeks! (otherwise you might have to delete yourself....)

Sometimes I am really busy with work, kids, etc, but will look in fairly regularly.

Andy Hamilton · Sun Dec 25, 2005 11:57 am

I kind of meant if people don't post at all, not even one post. Er, yes there are some people who don't post for ages and then come back, can't think of who.

shiney · Post: # 7957Post **shiney** » Sun Dec 25, 2005 10:12 pm

I think you should have to register really as there has been a lot of crud from spammers recently. I go through bouts of posting, depending on my spare time.

Muddypause · Post: # 7965Post **Muddypause** » Mon Dec 26, 2005 1:32 pm

Is it possible to set things up so that new members get sent an email they have to reply to to confirm the registration? That may go some way to prevent the automatic spam-bots.

diver · Post: # 7966Post **diver** » Mon Dec 26, 2005 1:56 pm

Yes, I'm with M3 as well...I am often away and would hate to have to re register each time I come back. I do think people should have to register to post and what about charging a small fee..it would help towards admin costs as well wouldn't it. I suppose it may go against the grain ( no pun intended)for the site to charge ....but I go on a diver's site which encourages people to pay just a few qiud to register..and people do pay to support the site and spammers definitly won't pay

Millymollymandy · Mon Dec 26, 2005 7:03 pm

Trouble is, the spammers are registering now! Just have a look at the members list and see the names of the ones recently joined. It would be easy enough to delete them as they are pretty obvious by their names - however mostly they register, post straight away and that's it.

So I don't see any easy solution.

Chickenlady · Mon Dec 26, 2005 8:42 pm

Hmm...how about allowing people to register and to read posts for, say, a week, before they can post themselves? The really keen ones often read all the posts and hang around for a bit before they decide to post anyway (I did!!).

Muddypause · Tue Dec 27, 2005 12:34 am

I know I'm not a moderator, and don't have to deal with this stuff, but I would suggest you don't get too carried away with ways of restricting access to the forum. We're certainly getting a high ratio of garbage at the moment, but let's try one thing at a time and see how effective it is first. I think we need to do all we can to encourage legitimate users, and not throw the baby out with the bath water.

I think we depend upon new posters here. Most people do seem to only stay around for a few posts, and then we don't see them again. That's often a pity, as many of them seem to have interesting stuff to say. But it's the way of it, and for every twenty new posters, one hangs around and contributes more. Whilst we obviously need to find a way to get on top of all these inappropriate posts, I think we should avoid the temptation to become a closed shop, or a clique.

BTW, Andy, when you pose the question "Shall I make people post?" - how ya gonna do that then?

ina · Post: # 8016Post **ina** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 3:13 pm

I think people should have to register if they want to contribute - even if nowadays the spammers register, too. As we don't have a newsletter or something like that that goes out to all members, there isn't really a need for anybody who doesn't contribute to register - in that way you could "make people post" if they want to be a member, i.e. once you do take the step of registering, you'd have to post at least once (within a certain timespan), or else you get deleted. That would de-clutter the members' list, too. (Last time I looked there were a few jokers on it who never posted...)

Andy, didn't you (or somebody) suggest something like a newsletter before? If that gets sent out to every member, it should go to those spammer members, too. If that address is not valid anymore, it gets deleted from the members' list. Don't know whether that's workable, and of course somebody would have to write the newsletter... But that could be just a kind of reminder of the site, and a list of anything new on it.

I think charging for becoming a member might put off too many short-term contributors. But maybe there could be a more than subtle hint that those who can afford it are welcome to send some dosh across???

Andy Hamilton · Wed Dec 28, 2005 4:59 pm

OK I have manually deleted and banned all the spammers up to the present day. There was one very cheeky one called privatesight. Look out for it on forums and blogs it looks like a personal site then links to pornsites full of viruses.

I have also set up that you have to be sent an email after you join that you reply to.

I have done a few other little tricks that I won't publise as I think the spammers read this. If we still get them then I have some more tricks up my sleve.

As much as mu bank manager would like me to start charging, I think that it would put too many people off comming to the forum and the flow of info on here shold be free. We have always had a donations button on the front page and we have made lots of money out of that (Ã‚Â£5).

Perhaps I should follow by example from that recent case when a bloke got Ã‚Â£250 or so after taking spammers to court.

There is some coding that I can put into the forum that means you will be automatically deleted if you never post and a time can be set, from 1min + that was how I was going to make people post.

For now lets just see how the measures I have put in work, if anyone sees something that should not be there then let me know and we can sort it.

Chickenlady · Wed Dec 28, 2005 10:24 pm

That all sounds very reasonable, Andy. Let's hope it works!

Shirley · Post: # 8039Post **Shirley** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 11:12 pm

I think that your new measures will be a HUGE help... and if all the regular members report any suspicious/spam messages to you then that will be a great way of policing the board. It's what works for us on another forum I use... not perfect... but what is.... it's up to all of us that post on here to keep it the great place that it is.

Shirlz xx