I must have hit "Mark as SPAM" about 200 times tonight. Not only is the nasty paisley annoying, but it makes a mess of BLF even after the spam is long gone.
Maybe there could be some kind of CAPTCHA. They have gotten better, not just blurry words. The one I have on Flashlight Wiki makes you pick out pictures of cats (from pictures of dogs or cats). It isn't foolproof, because a real person can authorize the account and then put the spambot to work, but it is a step. So a second step is they have to email me or send a PM. It is such a strong system that hardly anyone ever signs up, however. That may not be what we're after either.
Could also be that you have to do a CAPTCHA for the first few posts or days, giving members a chance to determine if the person is a spammer.
Why not just have the users account suspended (for review once the admin is available) once five posts are marked as spam (or 5 people mark the same post as spam)? I don't see why anybody should have to mark 100 posts as spam.
Adding mods, account activation, or other stuff would be unnecessary, and they add more issues.
+1 Good Idea. I just hope we don't overreact and make new users go through confusing hoops like over at CPF. I am not in favor of adding a bunch of moderators. I like the open environment here and the fact that it is pretty much self-moderated by users.