Dealing with few-move spammers

Surely there is some easier solution regarding the number of posts made by a person in a certain period of time?

I know that some folk are going to use the boards more than others but, say, once a person goes over 20 (or some arbitrary number of) posts in x minutes / hours / per day the liklihood of that person being a spammer goes up exponentially.

So whack a limit on that. If you post over the limit then you have to wait [some time] until you can post again.

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It's not all plain sailing, but it's easier then you might think to stop a spammer in his tracks.
Also, they usually bore of the process and leave, except the likes of Philodor, 7ate9 etc. Some of them are very persistant, but they are in the minority.

catfoodtim, Ragnorak and a few other forum regulars have proven to be better than a bloodhound at sniffing them out.

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Sorry, but to be honest, I haven't a clue what you're trying to say because of the inconsistencies of your statements.

A) "My solution is over-elaborate" which says to me that it is over complicated. There is no complication in my solution. I alert a few posts of a troll, and instead of relying on a mod being present or n-1 others alerting each post, I just need 9 (arbitrary number) others to alert 5 (arbitrary number) posts and the user is gone forever, if the mods decide.

b) Philodor and Cartan fall outside the bracket because racism and bigotry are welcomed in the debates forum. If you have a solution which resolves the problem of the likes of them, I'd love to hear it.

c)The flaw in my solution being that "I rely on well-meaning forum users to draw attention to spam"?
At the moment n users need to alert each post to have that individual post removed. If a spammer makes 100 posts in 2 minutes, this is quite tiresome for an alerter, especially if no post is disappearing. The fact that no post is diappearing means that n users aren't alerting each post and/or that no mods are online. My solution is a way around these two limitations of the current self moderating system, which, as it happens, "relies on well-meaning forum users to draw attention to spam"

d)"The trouble today was that there was no Forum Moderator for about two hours after the spamming started. "
And yet, for whatever reason, you oppose a solution which requires no forum moderator to be about to sort out the spammer.

How about you think about things for a while and get back to us then?

D

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Period? No. Drunk? YES!!! =)

Read 'elaborate' in an English dictionary.
Ok, I've read the word 'elaborate' in the dictionary. DO you also want me to read the definition. 😉

Philodor and Cartan fall out of your bracket because both had made over 50 moves and both had constant posts alerted.
50 was a number I made up "(say, for example, under 50) ". If implemented, I'd expect 50 to be replaced by x, and only known by Russ. While Philodor and Cartan are vile pieces of work, I've never known them to fill the first couple of pages of general with shyte, as now. My solution is to prevent the damage done by this type of spamming troller.

You rely on users to alert threads.
Are you drunk too? I clearly stated twice that my solution needs users to alert posts, which is required now. Currently, with no mod around, for me to help clean up a full page of shyte, I'd have to alert 30 odd posts, AND hope n-1 others do this as well. With my proposed solution, I'd only have to alert a few posts (much less work for me), and hope that there are a couple of other people out there who are willing to alert a couple as well.

Rags, I think you're being ridiculous. Your system still requires a mod present to remove posts and users.
Let me explain very v e r y s l o w l y. . . . 😉
"gets some number of posts alerted by 5 different people in 1 day, then all that user's posts are removed pending moderation by a mod, and his posting rights are revoked. "

'Pending' being the key word. "Read" it in a dictionary, if you must. 😉 I assumed that people would understand that the posting rights would also be revoked pending a moderator taking a look.

BTW: I've looked up elaborate on wiktionary.
'"My solution is over-elaborate" which says to me that it is over complicated. '.
elaborate : Highly complex

complex : Complicated

I'm not sure why you want me to look up a word which I interpreted correctly.

D

Come on girls, play nice! No more pony-tail pulling, PLEASE!

Rags, I think your solution is good and I hope Russ has a look at it.

Originally posted by Crowley
Come on girls, play nice! No more pony-tail pulling, PLEASE!

I wasn't pulling hair! I was throwing kebabs!!!

D

Originally posted by mrmist
Surely there is some easier solution regarding the number of posts made by a person in a certain period of time?

I know that some folk are going to use the boards more than others but, say, once a person goes over 20 (or some arbitrary number of) posts in x minutes / hours / per day the liklihood of that person being a spammer goes up exponentially.

S ...[text shortened]... on that. If you post over the limit then you have to wait [some time] until you can post again.

I don't think that's very fair, because if you have a couple of people having a jolly good chinwag, it'd dry up... Or if someone's replying to a number of other posts, or just adding comments (that's what the forums are for, isn't it? ) in various other forums and threads... Or if someone has a debate going, etc.

However, I do think that the number of alerts idea is a good one.

I also think that the number of new threads a new person can start should be limited during a probationary period.

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I see where you're going with this, but you must not forget, this will only happen for people with less than X amount of moves.

Originally posted by Crowley
I see where you're going with this, but you must not forget, this will only happen for [b]people with less than X amount of moves.[/b]

And who get y amount of alerts on p amount of posts from z amount of people in less than t amount of time.

D

Originally posted by Ragnorak
And who get y amount of alerts on p amount of posts from z amount of people in less than t amount of time.

D

Errr... Exactly.