We've had at least 3 (that I know of) this week.

Are they evil little spam programs, or are there really people who look for forums to post this crap?

---

Every morning I delete several spam posts and several spam accounts. What they do is create one account, then create another to "hide" the last registered user. They think by doing that, they'll have one in the chamber after the first one gets banned. It's really annoying and now I have it so their links change to "SPAM".

---

But I was REALLY INTERESTED in buying cabinets in Birmingham!

---

SPAM.. the annoying nature of the beast.. out filter here at work compiles the weekly statistics.. we average around 56% of inbound mail that is spam and blocked. Less than .005 % of those are false positives.

That is the reality of what is out on the net.. and about the only reason I would ever consider supporting a fee on email.. to cut down the spammer/blast mailings.. but that really would be just off setting one cost (spam filtering) with another cost in terms of a bill for email traffic at best.

There isn't a good way of controlling it without being intrusive to the members or the admin.. whether it be an entry question to post or join, an approval process for the first x posts, a restriction on the type of posts (no links) for the first x amount of posts. Etc.

No matter what method, there will be some net affect to either the members or the admin. My opinion anyway.. nature of a forum.

---

the difficult part is these spam fools are actually humans. how do you stop a human on a site that wants contributions in form of posts?

---

Hold new members postings in moderation until they reach a certain number of approved posts (like 5). After they have 5 approved posts they can post without it being held in moderation. Then the spam would never reach the site because you didn't approve it.

---

And what about the new actual members that now will be put through a trial phase with held posts. Are the more or less likely to stick around until they pass the trial phase? Maybe that is a benefit though.. it will weed out the hit and run type posters.. lol.


And what about the mod that has to approve them ... is it any less labor intensive than deleting spam and the accounts?

---

I don't run the site. That's for you all to determine. 🙂

---

Ugh! And to make matters worse, I go off on someone like a complete buffoon who was just being generous with a good link. I hate the spammers even more!

---

thanks for your hard work kevin. If you want to let some of us delete the spam just say so.

---