Pantsing and Stripping Forums

Themarble wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 2:13 am Could just make it so users with less than 10 or so posts can't send links as a message.

Or users with less than 5 thumbs up can't message.

Things like this that would make it harder for a bot to just spam straight away. Could even have both of these.

As long as you make it harder for the botter to do what they want, while not really impacting the actual users, then we in a sense just win.

I went through this already, multiple times.

That functionality is very shoddy and it barely works, in fact, it's been on this entire time.

Clearly you can see how well it (doesn't) work.

Girlspns wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 2:34 am

Themarble wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 2:13 am Could just make it so users with less than 10 or so posts can't send links as a message.

Or users with less than 5 thumbs up can't message.

Things like this that would make it harder for a bot to just spam straight away. Could even have both of these.

As long as you make it harder for the botter to do what they want, while not really impacting the actual users, then we in a sense just win.

I went through this already, multiple times.

That functionality is very shoddy and it barely works, in fact, it's been on this entire time.

Clearly you can see how well it (doesn't) work.

Are there other types of forums that the functionality is better on?

It's incredible that someone would have this kind of patience and motivation to use sleeper accounts on a forum. I wonder if these are related to the same people who did this on NationStates.

Somebody wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 7:42 pm It's incredible that someone would have this kind of patience and motivation to use sleeper accounts on a forum. I wonder if these are related to the same people who did this on NationStates.

Never ceases to amaze me how pathetic some people can be.

Imagine wasting your life setting up sleeper accounts to spam an incredibly niche forum.

dublinjohn wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 9:47 am

Girlspns wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 2:34 am

Themarble wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 2:13 am Could just make it so users with less than 10 or so posts can't send links as a message.

Or users with less than 5 thumbs up can't message.

Things like this that would make it harder for a bot to just spam straight away. Could even have both of these.

As long as you make it harder for the botter to do what they want, while not really impacting the actual users, then we in a sense just win.

I went through this already, multiple times.

That functionality is very shoddy and it barely works, in fact, it's been on this entire time.

Clearly you can see how well it (doesn't) work.

Are there other types of forums that the functionality is better on?

Sadly, this is probably the most popular and robust open source systems, but if no one has a better system, it's unlikely to exist out there.

That said, I don't want to jinx it, but I'm hopeful the spammer lost interest at this point because they haven't made an attempt to register this past day.

Trundle wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 9:27 pm

Somebody wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 7:42 pm It's incredible that someone would have this kind of patience and motivation to use sleeper accounts on a forum. I wonder if these are related to the same people who did this on NationStates.

Never ceases to amaze me how pathetic some people can be.

Imagine wasting your life setting up sleeper accounts to spam an incredibly niche forum.

If I didn't know this same MO happened in other forums, I'd suspect this dude has a personal vendetta against the forum itself, but that's just me being paranoid.

Girlspns wrote: Tue Mar 04, 2025 12:18 am

If I didn't know this same MO happened in other forums, I'd suspect this dude has a personal vendetta against the forum itself, but that's just me being paranoid.

Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get you

dublinjohn wrote: Tue Mar 04, 2025 9:39 am
Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get you

"It’s not paranoia when it’s real." — Colonel Walsh, Doctor Who: The Zygon Invasion (Peter Harness, 2015)

DrWhoFanJ wrote: Tue Mar 04, 2025 10:06 am

dublinjohn wrote: Tue Mar 04, 2025 9:39 am
Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get you

"It’s not paranoia when it’s real." — Colonel Walsh, Doctor Who: The Zygon Invasion (Peter Harness, 2015)

I misquoted

“Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you.”
― Joseph Heller, Catch-22 First published November 10, 1961 Pre Doctor Who (all doctors)

"Most users ever online was 7142 on Sun Jan 19, 2025 9:07 pm"

Something tells me we missed something. Like we got linked on reddit or something, or this was when the spammers started.

Seems like the changes have finally helped thwart the spammers... kudos to the Admins!