The Spam Problem Here

actually, since joining I've been receiveing a ridiculous amount of SPAM in my email, the email I used to register to this forum. Prior to that I have never been hit with SPAM to that account. groan

trixieNYC wrote: actually, since joining I've been receiveing a ridiculous amount of SPAM in my email, the email I used to register to this forum. Prior to that I have never been hit with SPAM to that account. groan

have you ever posted your email address? if you post it like this:
[email protected]
that account will get hit with tons of spam. if you ever need to post an email addy, post it like this:
blah (at) stupidserver (dot) com
or something like that so a bot can't grab it and use it.

Carnivore wrote: There's always the concern that we'll lose the perspective of the unregistered guests (like the one on the other thread who thinks we're all "terrible"). I think it's obvious where I stand on the issue.

Thanks to Carnivore and some of the other regulars for their unending patience on this issue, despite their disagreement with my decision to keep the boards open to unregistered guests.

We DO get a very minor amount of comment spam these days, but we, the moderators, have been pretty quick to clean it up.

As Carnivore alludes to, locking down the boards creates a "small barrier" to participation that will inevitably exclude some potentially interesting views and comments--along with some annoying, obscene or otherwise inappropriate ones). However, some of our all-time-best posts have been from passing visitors who are inspired to post maybe once or twice and move on.

Interestingly, the "original" Prospect Heights board is now verging on being eclipsed by the Park Slope board. When I log on--despite my roots and allegiance to the PH--my first thought is, "I wonder what's happening on the PS board today??" I won't say that the PS board is more interesting solely because it's open to unregistered users, but I think that's a very big factor.

We could lock it all down and just sit here and talk to each other... or we could open it up to unpredictability. If I wanted predictability, I would move to Disneyland!

and i thought this thread was about me . everything is a bout me jk.

seriously though i think it should follow ph on the spam policy.

EmilyM wrote: [quote=trixieNYC]actually, since joining I've been receiveing a ridiculous amount of SPAM in my email, the email I used to register to this forum. Prior to that I have never been hit with SPAM to that account. groan

I have no particular evidence of this, but I think there has been a slight veering over to the spammers' side in the spammers vs. email servers war recently. I get very little spam but I've gotten a few in the past month including in accounts that I basically never give to anyone. My hypothesis would be that your joining the site happened to coincide with a slight increase in the smartness of spammers that ISPs haven't quite caught up with yet.

That sounds plausible. I've noticed the uptick too, particularly with the Nigerian investment/inheritance scam spams.

dailyheights wrote: We could lock it all down and just sit here and talk to each other... or we could open it up to unpredictability. If I wanted predictability, I would move to Disneyland!

I totally agree with this. Then again, when I've expressed this opinion before, I've basically been told I should shut my piehole unless I want to become a moderator and deal with the spam. (OK, in nicer terms than that. I think.) I don't want to be a moderator, but if you're honestly asking, I think open is better.

linusvanpelt wrote: One more thing I'd add is, in my limited experience, sites that don't require registration are more anarchic but more interesting. Brownstoner's threads have gotten much more boring since he required registration. They got rid of the spam, and a lot of inflammatory trolls, but I think they lost some interesting discussions in the process and made it more clubby and homogeneous.

i thought it was cause they havent had any nice intresting homes to post about. thats why i havent posted in a long time there. not cause of the registration. i was registred along time ago.

Livetotravel wrote: I vote for unpredictable, anarchic and interesting. Locked-down boards become notoriously incestuous.

Hey - what's wrong with that?

Carnivore wrote: That sounds plausible. I've noticed the uptick too, particularly with the Nigerian investment/inheritance scam spams.

Check this out: http://www.419eater.com/

These guys have way too much time on their hands - in an effort to waste the scammer's time, it seems to me that they waste just as much of their own if nothing gets solved - but the results can be pretty hilarious.

I seriously don't see the need for "Guest" postings. At least making up an email address might (and I say "might") make it more of a hassle for spammers and hate-mongers and discourage them.