OK, what's with the idiot spammer(s)?

[BLANDCorporatio]

Oh wow, I get cause to ressurect this thread! I'm very happy to have found:

Arnel Milan

The best bastard, fool, fraudster and also ass programmer. You need to Beware!

Make sure you Be wary This specific Bastard! He's a new Scam! Arnel Milan.

He doesn't determine what he has been declaring. He said of which he is a person maker and hubby sometimes won't understand Word press!

Arnel Milan is actually a Rip Off!

Imagine this in a deep trailer voice: "Arnel Milan - Ass Programmer. He doesn't determine what he has been declaring."

He's also a person maker, apparently. Presumably the ass programmer bit is a subset of that, which takes care of boot loaders and/or compiler back ends.

My lame puns aside, "He doesn't determine what he has been declaring" oddly enough makes sense in the context of bashing a programmer, but the numerous versions of this message that have, as of this writing, popped up everywhere, make it clear that what was meant is that the person is not reliable.

And yeah, what to make of this. It's like rev-psych spam.

[drachefly]

That is truly excellent. You need to Beware!

[BLANDCorporatio]

Stealing boegiboe's find:

During from we own different wishes. Thoughts tangle about matters sleep, dreaming about blissful remainder. And a little less desirable, the continuous us going for social networking sites. Yes, yes! Scientists realize that Tweets and Facebook or myspace make tougher than bet365 tobacco smoking and drink.

[BLANDCorporatio]

Jesus tapdancing Christ, we're invaded by chanel bags as I write this. If only they'd be funny.

[Selexor]

I find the advertisments for Chanel bags to be presumptuous. I come here for my shopping and there are only ladies' accessories? Not good enough. Let's see some spam advertising men's wallets and coats so I can find something for myself.

[drachefly]

Spaminators, please?

Is there a super-secret moderator hangout that you can't figure out how to keep spaminators out of?
Do you fear the consequences of handing out dangerous weapons?
Is there no mechanism for logging moderator actions?

[BLANDCorporatio]

Alas, there's similar grumbling in the Suggestions forum.

In particular, SteveMB (presently a mod ... I think) has suggested that adding another mod/spaminator is like adding a bucket to try and stop the tides. Some other spam catching solutions (like forbidding posts with links in them until a certain number is reached) have been proposed.

For reasons unknown to me (I hasten to add, this doesn't make them non-existent) no such suggestions were yet implemented.

I hope that with the site redesign such issues will be addressed, and adding such requirements to the spec doc over at the kickstarter.

It has also been opined (by SteveMB or 0beron, I forgot) that waiting for site redesign in the hopes it will bring something to address the spam issue is a bit stupid, like waiting for a full house renovation to fix a leaky roof. I'm stupid like that, but I see a point there.

[Balerion]

It's hard to think of an excuse for those measure not being implemented honestly. It is literally a two hour project (maybe four if things go terribly). The installation is designed with non-coders in mind. If we are going to talk about uses of time, given the crappy spam removal methods available to the mods, they probably spend at least double-triple that in a week dealing with spam. And if he can't figure out how to do it himself, ask for a volunteer. Or find someone to pay the $50 it would take to get it done.

Especially since it is the kind of detail that really hurts the comic's image, even more so as Rob is trying to monetize it. It is one of the reasons I have never even really considered donating to the kickstarter or becoming a tool. If you want money from people, a lack of spambots is one of the things that is expected of you first, one of the basic seals of quality. It would be like a restaurant saying that if you tip well, they can afford to install screens so you stop getting flies in your soup. Instead, if they take the hit to just install the screens, people will start tipping better. Cause no matter how awesome the soup is, eventually you just stop eating there.

I guess the simplest summary is that it hurts the Erfworld brand to have the forums constantly spammed, so he should fix it before that damage escalates.

[Mrtyuh]

I took the liberty of contacting Rob today, and he responded. He told me I was the fourth person to inform him of it this week, and he has someone looking into installing a filter. Hopefully, it will be dealt with, and we can all wave goodbye while this thread sinks beneath the waves of time.

[Namegduf]

Hey everyone.

Rob asked me to take a look at the problem, and I've configured a question-asking system that makes new people signing up to the forum answer an Erfworld-related question, which should impede new spam accounts being created. It'll take a while to see how effective it is, but with some luck, and maybe a little adjustment, it could provide an effective barrier to the flood.

[drachefly]

Awesome!

[mortissimus]

Might be to soon to tell for certain, but it appears to be working. Instead of the bunch of spam it usually is this time, its only one in this part of the forum and that from an account that registered before Namegduf posted that shields had been raised.

So awesome indeed!

[SteveMB]

We had three spam posts this morning, all apparently from bots that registered on 3/1 (before the new measures). So far, so good....

[BLANDCorporatio]

I will add to the choir of hurrahs. Took ya long enough, but if it works then it's cool.

[mortissimus]

Before this thread goes to sleep, I would like to give a cheer not only to Namegduf but to our valiant mods who have deleted all those spams and everybody who have reported them in.

May you never have to do it again!

[Oberon]

What? No more spam? How the hell am I supposed to find a vendor for Ce alI s? Or a list of words ending in 'ing'? This is a needed service you're cutting off here!!!!1!!!One!!!!!1!!

[BLANDCorporatio]

Well, there was one spammer just before I logged in, advertising chanel bags. The message contained one link.

Anyway, it's gone. It was gone before I could get to the message list to see what the first few messages were. I wanted to study its ... psychology.

[Mrtyuh]

Thank you, Namegduf.

[SteveMB]

The new system seems to be working -- we get occasional flurries of spam from old bot accounts, but at a much reduced level I can handle by deleting the posts individually. As the old sleeper spammers get banhammered, the remaining flow should trickle off.

Thanks!

[Muzzafar]

What about the Wiki? Recent changes page is pretty much unusable because of all the spambots registering new user accounts, creating pages with spam and then admins clearing the pages.
How about putting the new user registration on hold until there are measures in place to stop the spambots from creating user accounts?