New Anti Spam measures on the forum
 

So I have come up with an idea, stolen off of another site I have read a few times, but its very solid and helps everyone.

1. New members cant post on the forums for 48 hours UNLESS
2. They pay a 1$ subscription (lifetime) cost on the forums via the forums subscription service. This not only brings some money into the site, but gives people serious about posting something the option to bypass the 2 day wait.

This should effectively remove SPAM from the forums since the stupid kiddies who post it probably dont want to wait to post it in the forums down the road.

feedback on this?

You won't see any complaints about that approach posted before Saturday...

more than likely true. I am not going to try and enforce something like this for a bit, its just something to help the issue of every day constant spam from those freaks.

The $1 subscription is an interesting idea. I wonder if anyone will opt to pay it.

sounds like a plan to me.
seems to work on other forums (like SomethingAwful).

probably no one.

You could maybe have a thing where someone who wants to join has to send one of the Powers that Be (you, pHaestus) an email requesting that their new account be activated and why they like geek-cooling. It would clean out the bots, and you get to see every account coming in.

Yeh see this is a way to do it WITHOUT the 2 slackers who run this place getting involved :)

Sounds good to me.

Sounds like a plan.


Maybe you could do a security deposit like thing. Charge $5, and $4 of it gets refunded after a week if they don't spam. Just an idea.

I agree. While it will keep the undesirables out, I believe that it will also keep newbs out, especially the young ones. Is it a bad thing?

Where do I send my $1.00 ?

hehe no its $1.00 to anyone who registers. Not the people already here.

if you look at how these people post, they register, post and then never come back... or come back under a new account. So now they either would need to register, come back in 2 days, post, then do the same thing all over again. or pay the $1.00 and have us delete any spam they post right away and make $1.00 off it.

But if someone really needs to participate in a conversation they can pay the $1.00 which will go to keeping the site online, and can post away.

also the young newbies? if you notice the demographic here is a bit higher end for the people who are posting. There are many young folks who read the threads but few young folks get into posting much here.

souns like a pretty good idea.

How will you impliment the billing process? Just pay pal?

I think this is a bad idea.

Is spam that big a problem that you would discourage any new/young people from joining up?

There is a built in newbie filter here that ensures sensible behaviour (namely an unmerciful flaming of anything stupid) Anyone joining who has read the forums is generally careful, if they haven't they get hounded into the ground, change their tune or leave.

You will lose those careful people I think. The ability to pay is not universal (esp outside the US) from a purely logistical pov.

A better spam killer would be a voting system of some sort where longtime registrants could vote a given post off, say 3 votes it goes. The rule would need to be that it ONLY applies to spam, not a thread someone doesn't like because he disagrees with what it says, perhaps a thead saviour option where if 1 member realises it's not spam having the power to retain the post. In case of misunderstandings which happen sometimes.

Charging for forum access, it doesn't matter how much, in fact a small amount like $1.00 is so annoying that I know I would not join the forum on principle. Better to make it proportional to the worth received if you do it at all. In this case I don't think that there should be a charge at all because the value in these forums is mostly provided by the members themselves..

or an even simpler solution, just add another moderator. spam post comes up, pm them and they'll delete it. or you might not need even that; there are enough staff that come on often enough to take care of that aren't there?

spam is not that big of a problem here (unless i'm not seeing all of it); just because someone makes a couple of spam posts doesn't mean you have to get your panties in a wad and make legit users jump through hoops to post. :p

Why not just implement one of those schemes I see all over the web where you have to interpret some semi-garbled text in order to register? Would keep the bots out, at least.
I know nothing about coding, so I don't understand the logistics of such a thing but I see it a lot. You could probably just borrow some code from a friendly web site.

If you get too much kiddie spam, I like the vote idea, minus the vote. You wouldn't even need "moderators". This is sort of an unusual community, there are plenty of posters here that could be entrusted with the "Button" hehe. Hell, I'd do it, I come here at least two or three times/day. Again, I don't understand the logistics of implementing a "Button", take it as such.
I could think of about 20 peeps right off the top of my head that could be entrusted with this, just for starters...BB2K, PH, you, Cathar, Bill, Incoherent, Les, Jaydee, on and on and on (I don't mean to leave people out, but there are too many to list). If you give the button to enough people, none of them would feel burdoned with any real responsibility. There are plenty responsible adults who post here regularly.

Now, if the real thing is to generate some income, say so straight out. Procooling members have always stepped up. We've donated to the test bench, to families of deceased, and I'm sure we could scare up a little dough to help out the site.

Not bad. Would the $1.00 activation fee be processed automatically?

Incoherent, they would probably just opt to wait the 2 days. Also, this would encourage skulkers to go and register so if they ever need to post, they can without paying a dollar.

If you guys want a place to send the newbs, send them over to the Virtual-Hideout.net forums. They (cough...I) can handle basic stuff over there, plus those forums need some traffic. :)

Newbs are not the problem. It is those dumb shits posting the "free product here" scam. I do not know why they bother doing it to this site as it really is not that big and their posts get killed pretty quick. You don't see it because I and hopefully others report the posts as soon as we see them and who ever has the power deletes them.

The main problem I have with it is if someone is naive enough to fall for it they will get screwed and blame ProCooling for it.

Sounds decent to me.

More moderation could work also. Please dont use one of those "type the letters to make sure your not a bot" deals. Those are tiresome to legit members and irk me.

the garbled text thing doesnt make any difference, since these arent bots These are real people posting this crap.

So that wouldnt stop them. I mean I could also just have it as a 24 hour wait that alone would work I think to discourage the lazy spammers, or if they are serious they pay the $1.00

Anyone want to be a mod to keep that stuff clean? if so let me know. We have had a few mods but they all come and go.

what happened to the guy in Canada ?