Site Discussion Thread

[XerX]

I know it sounds like a push, but enable administrative user activation for a while. Have users message an admin to be activated. It would be a temporary solution for now, I would think.

[aero]

I know it sounds like a push, but enable administrative user activation for a while. Have users message an admin to be activated. It would be a temporary solution for now, I would think.

There's two admins, and Valtteri isn't always around so Joey would need to be the one to check the accounts if they're legit and let them in. This isn't exactly the best solution. Right now we're working on blocking as I said before, and not focused on this as it is.

There's now a whole page of new spam in "General", sigh.
I wish I would be a GMod.

No point in that because once you tick the boxes and delete the topics, they'll just come back when you're gone and people will say they want to be mod to take care of the problem again.

So when are these bots gonna be removed?

There's too many for me to send a list to Joey/Valtteri so likely whenever they stop coming in I'll start working on that, or Joey/Valtteri could just prune the users themselves whenever they see it best. To demonstrate just how many bots there are, take a look at http://www.smbxgame.com/forums/m ... memberlist to see how far back the accounts go (Spoiler: 26 pages). It would take an incredibly long time to go through each one and IP ban them, or even copy their names to a list unless one were to make a script which took care of that, but even then it would be hard to do that since you could run into false positives and junk.

EDIT:

They only make one topic before leaving forever, so we could just disable new topic creation by Newly Registered Users and go from there with taking care of the posts until we get blocks working.

[Zeldamaster12]

Maybe create a new usergroup that you must join to receive posting rights?

[aero]

Maybe create a new usergroup that you must join to receive posting rights?

If you have to join manually then it can be scripted. Also, it would just inconvenience new users and more so for people new to how phpbb works. It makes more sense to have new members have restrictions that go away whenever they have a certain post count and have been here for awhile.

[Shadow Yoshi]

The pros of having no mods at night has revealed itself in bright lighting! The light shines brightly throughout the meadow; and it goes to show that there's only 2 active mods in general!!

Your attitude isn't helping anything.

That's a lame excuse that you've recycled a dozen times over.

Also how is it not helping? Did him just by saying that cause so much trouble to the entire staff team that he actually put a stop to the work they should be doing in trying to get rid of and prevent these spambots? It's a lame excuse and using it over and over again for whatever you please is starting to cause it to wear thin, how about you actually do some work instead of search for the people who are saying things against you just so you can tell them their attitude isn't helping, because from what I've seen the only progress that has been made so far is the deletion of some of the spambots and their posts, nothing else has happened, unless you'd care to elaborate on that, and if you do that, please elaborate on how peoples' attitude isn't helping anything, such as your ability to perform tasks such as dealing with spambots and creating measures to prevent the spambots from even setting foot here.

"Not helping" is not the same as "hurting".

[Superiorstar]

If you look to your left you can see that the ENTIRE General Forum is filled with spam, some still there since yesterday, and yet there are no staff in site.
I'm starting to loose faith in the staff at this point, WTF. I have an idea though.
What this forum needs is night-owl staff and early-bird staff, that way the staff won't be as inactive.

[underFlo]

If you look to your left you can see that the ENTIRE General Forum is filled with spam, some still there since yesterday, and yet there are no staff in site.
I'm starting to loose faith in the staff at this point, WTF.

Yeah, it's almost like the staff dare have a life or live in a different time zone!

[Superiorstar]

Yeah, it's almost like the staff dare have a life or live in a different time zone!

I edited the quote, look back up.

[Mable]

Imo we have enough staff members now. Getting another one just bc of the bots, isn't really needed. Ghosthawk, Joey and others daily check here. Just report it and they see it there also.

[SilverDeoxys563]

It always bothers me how half the people commenting in Graphics threads (or maybe just a quarter of the posts, idk but it's still too much. Anyway they) tell OP that it would be "perfect for ...". Like, was that not flagrantly obvious to begin with judging by the title? I feel like those kinds of posts could be considered useless and non-constructive, because they really don't do anything aside from the "good job" they tag along with their snide remarks.

/rant

[underFlo]

It always bothers me how half the people commenting in Graphics threads (or maybe just a quarter of the posts, idk but it's still too much. Anyway they) tell OP that it would be "perfect for ...". Like, was that not flagrantly obvious to begin with judging by the title? I feel like those kinds of posts could be considered useless and non-constructive, because they really don't do anything aside from the "good job" they tag along with their snide remarks.

/rant

wow these rant gfx are perfect for rants!

[SilverDeoxys563]

wow these rant gfx are perfect for rants!

I thought my day couldn't get any more made after dagget10's post, but you sir have delivered.

[Imaynotbehere4long]

Hey, I figured out how we can stop the spammers:

[aero]

Hey, I figured out how we can stop the spammers:

Nice meme, but its author hasn't considered that spammers could just create a bunch of accounts to rate their comments as helpful and constructive when they aren't. Self-moderation, anonymous staff, and decent blocking always works.

[Squishy Rex]

It always bothers me how half the people commenting in Graphics threads (or maybe just a quarter of the posts, idk but it's still too much. Anyway they) tell OP that it would be "perfect for ...". Like, was that not flagrantly obvious to begin with judging by the title? I feel like those kinds of posts could be considered useless and non-constructive, because they really don't do anything aside from the "good job" they tag along with their snide remarks.

/rant

Being somewhat guilty of this myself, I can see where you're coming from. I suppose it's sort of become the normal thing to say. Though some suggestions are blindingly obvious I have seen one or two out of the box ideas for tilesets and stuff. I guess for the Graphics Forum, comments really should be more based around what users like or dislike about the posted graphic(s) and what they might recommend adding/changing/removing. It is always nice to receive a "Great Work" comment from someone, obviously to encourage people to make more graphics and further develop themselves at the art, but I feel for the post to be of use, I guess a little more sustenance would go a long way.

From my perspective, I can make graphics and I'm proud of what I've achieved, but let's face it, I'm not perfect and I'm always looking for advice on what I should add/change/remove to make what I've made better and have more use. Generally getting some sort of encouragement will go a long way with users new to the production of graphics (I thrived on it when I first started and getting a thumbs up from an experienced GFX Designer was an awesome feeling) but if they don't get tips and be pointed in the right direction they can't progress and become better.

[Imaynotbehere4long]

its author hasn't considered that spammers could just create a bunch of accounts to rate their comments as helpful and constructive when they aren't.

I assumed that the rating system would only be part of the sign-up process because it's mentioned as a new system since the Captcha doesn't work (and because it says "slate of comments," "has them reply," etc.). Then, their replies would be sent to the other members (or just the staff) so they can determine if the user is a person or a bot. If the user is determined to be a person, he/she will get an email notifying him/her of a successful registration.

[FanofSMBX]

What's with the "improve your English" stuff, that's so unneeded. If it's in English that's good enough. It's like an OCD thing that's in reality not needed to be concerned about.

[Mable]

Some people need to improve it, bc no one can understand it.
And no.. Writing Like This Isn't Correct Either.

[Shadow Yoshi]

If it's in English that's good enough.

It needs to be readable, proper English free from stupid and fixable mistakes.

[sleepy]

If it's in English that's good enough.

It needs to be readable, proper English free from stupid and fixable mistakes.

That's ridiculous. Everyone makes mistakes.