Anti-spam Process Change Request

BLF Site-related Issues
21

I would be interested in seeing some information on that homeless community idea? Do you have any links to it Ima4wheelr?

There would need to be a conspiracy and/or a concerted effort for unwarranted SPAM marking to be real issue. It takes more than one person to mark something as SPAM, thus a conspiracy is required to pull it off when its completely unwarranted and an act of vandalism just to make up the number of reports required, or a member has numerous alts and logs in and out to mark as SPAM, or the possibility that something was wrong enough with the thread to elicit the same response independently by enough members to trigger the SPAM delete threshold. I know theres a threshold number as Ive marked SPAM as SPAM, and the thread is still there in the list of threads afterwards. Other times, I hit SPAM, then confirm and the page I get states the page Im reporting is no longer available. The lowest number of reads Ive noticed where the thread is removed after hitting confirm, is 7 reads. I cant say how many people of the 7 reads marked it as SPAM though but it is clearly more than 1 required as I get different actions when I hit the button.

If you get one thread marked as SPAM, Im fairly sure you arent banned to prevent further posting of threads, it has to be multiple threads marked as SPAM to go so far as to ban a member.

Making them public clicks is a reasonable response, but only if it doesnt create work for SB beyond what he has time to undertake.

Remember the alternative. When the forum gets SPAMMED properly and people mark them as SPAM, the threads are deleted, or posts removed from a thread, but members discuss in heated terms the notion the SPAMMER is free to keep spamming the forums, ie: why arent they banned? Damned if you do, damned if you dont.

The system works pretty well even if not flawless, but I dont expect something involving hundreds or thousands of people, freely accessible by the planet will run flawlessly. Life has hiccups, no point taking it personally.

Edit: I took too long to type this post, and second guessed even responding…

22

Hey EF. I can't seem to find the article I was reading at my current location, but I think this is about the same homeless facility. Internet access is filtered here and I can't watch videos from this location. So I'm not 100% certain. It seemed the place was located in the Northeast Northwest of CONUS.

I agree the BLF anti-spam process is pretty good as is. I also trust SB and admire what he has created here and how he administers it. I think it's the best I have ever seen. Obviously, no system can be perfect, but that's not a good enough excuse to not try to be better.

I know of a few veteran members that were auto banned a points in their memberships. They are still active here today. There are a couple new members that quickly disappeared that I think might not have deserved it. One was fairly recent that I brought up in a thread that was discussing the anti-spam process a few days ago. I don't think they were conspiracies. To me they seemed like knee jerk reactions of a crowd. I doubt those new people will bother trying to get reinstituted here and will forever have hard feelings towards BLF. Even if rare, I think it's sad and that we can do better.

The log that has recorded clicks could just be available for download by interested members. Seems like less work than modifying the algorithms that SB has discussed trying to do. His concern with that being that there are some spammers that hiding in long standing accounts.

Anyway, thank you all for your responses. They provide SB some input from the member level. I'll respect whatever his decision is in this matter.

23

I rarely click the SPAM button but when I do it's for blatant spamming. No single begrudged user can get a post or thread banned. As stated by others it takes 7 DIFFERENT users to get a post put into limbo until SB can look at it. Once you mark a thread as SPAM you can't do it a second time. Only other people can do it. This makes SPAM transparency for the marking of SPAM unnecessary and silly.

The only purpose it would serve would be to show "User A" constantly marking "User G's" post as SPAM and trying to cause trouble for User G. SB sees all of this and is solely responsible for banning a post or user as SPAM. No user or group of users can get another user banned for SPAM. At worse all they can do is to team up with at least 6 other conspirators and have the thread go invisible until SB reviews it and either approves it as SPAM or makes the post active.

All I can see happening from making SPAM reporting visible is people not reporting legitimate abuse due to fear of retribution. If it's not broken don't fix it. The system isn't broken.

24

+1 JohnnyMac

25

+2

I think the system works and I trust SB’s judgement completely. 7 clicks from 7 different users to remove a topic to me says that something posted shouldn’t have been. If one feels differently then take it up with SB, this is his baby and we are all just visiting.

I personally have hit the spam button around 5-6 times if memory serves me correctly and every single time it was for a new user with <5 posts trying to sell something that is completely unrelated to anything on this forum. I will and would also hit the spam button if I ever read anything that was a personal attack on a member here as I feel that is completely unacceptable and ruins communities like this is left unchecked. Luckily I think everyone on here knows this and wouldn’t do such a thing. :slight_smile:

26

I'm certainly not above proposing a silly idea, but I don't believe this is one of them.

The main purpose for transparency would be to influence people to use the spam button more wisely. If the click is legitimate, why should it need to be secret?

What is worse, a new member being banned inappropriately or us members being held accountable for our actions.

I've heard that a few clicks are required, 5, and now 7 in this thread. Maybe the threshold has shifted. Either way, I've seen crowds do some pretty bad things like destroying property. There have been people unjustifiably lynched in our country's history. I just don't put a lot of faith in crowd mentality and I don't think people will magically behave better because they are on the internet.

Members can most definitely cause an auto ban on another member. No if, ands, or buts about that. I've been told by several that special requests had to be made to bring their bans to SB's attention.

27

I think “show spam clicks” is a great idea; this forum was kinda clique-y (tho the head of the clique seems to found a better forum to spend all his money on to gain status.)

I think you would quickly notice the same 7 people clicking spam on the same few peoples’ posts… Especially when “the great one” says he’s clickin spam in your thread… Yer done.

I got ran out of here for “spam” last year and tried to delete all my posts and leave… In fact all of my flashlight reviews I spent hours on taking photos and measurements are now just a “d”. Wasn’t Till I noticed the great one left that I started posting again.

Eventually I came to the realization that it’s inappropriate to point out to a man that his house is on fire here @ BLF; Many (or 7) will claim politics and click spam.

But let’s be real - it ain’t happening.

28

^

This .

29

I patently avoid the SPAM button, never liked the stuff as a kid and dang sure don't eat it now! If Mark want's to eat it, that's his business.

30

JTC wrote:

travis wrote:
Seems like complete overkill to me. Maybe I am ignorant of past abuses--but I'd say either you trust SB to do his job ( and keep the system in check)-- or you don't........

^

This .

How about trust SB and try to improve the process if a potentially good idea comes to mind?

31

I think the system is fine as it is now.

32

Unless I’m completely unaware of how this works (possible, I’m not on here all that often), nobody can “ban” anything. If I’m correct, it takes 7 individual marks as spam and this “hides” not bans or deletes a post, not a user. Then sb later gets around to reviewing what was “hidden” and approves or not. As I remember, sb asked that we not use this as a censor, but only for real spam, so it seems he would correct all the non-spam.

If so, how can any situation like you are stating apply? In fact, if anyone got together and did get a post of mine marked ‘spam’ ever, I’d probably never even notice a post of mine was “hidden” unless it was pretty quickly or if it was an entire thread, is there a way to even know this unless you happen to go back and re-read? I’m really trying to clarify here, as I never noticed anything of the sort you seem to be alluding to, but sometimes I don’t even come back for weeks or months, so I could be completely unaware/wrong.

So maybe this is about the whole Kriesler type thing? I was also gone and came back and he was banned, I thought he was amusing and would agree he shouldn’t be banned. If so, I don’t think visible spam clicks is going to help. Maybe if its possible, ideas like voting up/down posts to “hide” them in full view so that you need specifically to click them to see them, or if a certain number of spam clicks register it gets sent to a “spam” sub forum where its still visible if you go there? Those are two solutions to people over-censoring all kinds of stuff.

I just don’t think your idea of visible spam clicks will have the effect you are looking for: there may be some people with “delicate sensibilities” here who mark anything as spam that is a little bit offending to them or even just “off topic”, there may be some who do abuse it and mark things they don’t agree with as spam, and some who like to troll various people and mark posts as spam. All of these groups are not likely to want to be revealed, and since this is the internet, if they know they would be revealed, they would be likely to just make a bunch of alt accounts and really abuse this. So I’m not clear how this helps anything, and in fact it would probably hide the info you are looking for. Also, if its rather easy to tell who clicked spam, your suggestion also would encourage people to use it as an “up/down” vote, and would allow some people to use it to show disapproval of someone by clicking spam too.

All in all I don’t really care much, I hardly use “spam” function, I’m just digging for what the real core issue is. Also, I appreciate your sentiments on the other topics you brought up ImA4Wheeler, but, I don’t think they apply here. Those are serious situations and nobody is being made homeless or actually beaten or abused with spam clicks. :wink: I’d tend to agree about the “poor homeless kriesler squirrel” banning was unnecessary, but I don’t know the entire situation and he wasn’t banned by spam clicks so…I’m confused and probably just unaware of the social politics of this site…

33

B42,

I was in no way making fun of that homeless program (It sounds interesting and positive to me. That's why I was interested in it). My ramble was just a poor attempt show thoughts which spurred this thread. Homeless being like someone booted out of the BLF home. Attacks like people getting auto banned by those inappropriate spam button clicks. That is abuse and it has happened more than a few times that I know of.

34

If people actually are banned because of spam clicks, then yes I think thats a BIG problem, I thought it only hid the one post from view??

35

They arent. You cant be banned automatically for one post marked as SPAM, or one thread marked as SPAM. It takes multiple threads reported, and I think the ban must be a temp measure to stop someone flooding the forum while SB is not available to deal with it. He cant be here 24/7 so one would assume he has something in place to deal with it. Most of this is speculation on how the system works but it appears that after one successful report of SPAM (ie: a thread or post removed from the forums view), the poster is still active. I know that because Ive seen the same person posting more items after watching a thread get removed. Ive been online while the forum got SPAMMED by a new member who posted one thread after another. Sometimes its posts within a thread selling say FIFA coins, or new threads linking to something or other. The thread regarding SPAM nuking gets traffic while this is happening from members saying how is this person still able to post, their thread is removed, but they create a new one. But sooner or later, the marking as SPAM has an effect, the person is stopped from making threads at least. If that was removed, imagine the situation then. Whats more common, genuine SPAM, or the odd thread being removed temporarily while its looked over by SB?

Ima4wheelr was banned which was unfortunate, but IIRC he had several barely started threads going, for work later on. There has been or was a habit to start a thread, reserve the space and work on the thread as time permits in full view of the forum. I seem to recall a discussion on that topic too in I THINK the thread Ima4wheelr started after he was banned on that topic, it was suggested other methods of making thread were probably better. If you had very little written there, its likely these might be interpreted as SPAM, especially if its read by people who struggle with English, even if you ramble and try to explain yourself. So its possible that 7 or whatever is actually required reports might occur. But its not like these were threads started, finished and then posted. I mean, this thread is still here, that says something. Seems to me it requires some pretty peculiar circumstances before a thread is successfully marked, SPAM. I might be confusing Ima4wheelr with something else, but I think that was the circumstances of his threads. Also worth noting that with people who struggle with English, the threads that are seemingly on topic, any topic as they are generic posts designed to fit in anywhere, hide links that are SPAM. An example is the posts of ‘hi, nice to hear from you, I think this topic is very interesting and helpful to me’ or similar such generic garbage, with links hidden in the text to sell you ugg boots or something similar. Its not a matter of how it effects us directly in that one post, they do it to boost google search hit results but we have to read the tripe, if you ignore it and leave it alone you will just encourage it. Theres money to made from the links, and I dont mean simply getting you to click them. There are armies of people doing this stuff.

36

You probably know more than me about this stuff EF, but I don't think that is the case. Maybe its any more than just one post even if in one thread. I know of two veteran members that had bans and I don't think met that criteria you speak of. Recently there was czech_guy that asked questions in that one thread no one likes to talk about. I don't know if it was auto ban, but he disappeared. Then there was that wedding dress lady that had lighting questions for her shop.

That's what I'm more concerned about is new members. SB will find out (if he does) after the damage is done. People like me that have connections here and a vested interest in staying here will try to work it out.

37

Maybe its time for a new forum if this one is not up to spec?

38

Or maybe I care enough about BLF to stick around and risk getting ostracized to help improve it?

Several times, SB has indicated a desire to improve this aspect of spam control. He has made it clear that he does not want valid members hurt by this process. This is just one example of how great a leader he is.

So, can we not try to be like him and turn the light on ourselves? Is our truth so fragile that we dare not allow questions to be asked?

None of us are perfect, especially me. We will never be so. It's OK for us to make mistakes. It's how we respond to them after the fact that is where the real difference lies.

One of my sins has been to sit quietly with the silent majority. Sadly, it took being the target to make me face up to how cowardly I was behaving in the past. I can't undo that, but I can try to be better.

39

There's no way for anyone but SB to ban anyone or disable any accounts, and it has to be done manually. I have seen obvious spammer accounts with every single one of 30+ posts marked as 'not published' (meaning they were flagged as spam and hidden/removed), and the account still exists and the user is still active.

None of what gets done by whoever is secret - SB knows who's clicking what and can decide to leave a flagged post as 'not published', or can override it and reinstate the post/thread. Just because you don't know doesn't mean nobody does. The guy in charge knows.

SB can also remove either temporarily or permanently any thread or individual posts in a thread that gets out of hand or that he gets complaints about, even if nobody clicks the 'mark as spam' button.

If you don't understand how it works, it's easy to think it's broken. It's not broken. It's working exactly as SB wants it to. Chill out.

40

Bygones be bygones, please, and move on with life.