New 50 post rule

gary_walsh17

Hey,

Kinda annoyed that I have been blocked from posting links, picture or attachments since I have less than 50 posts. The number 50 is a bit ridiculous to be honest. I've been a lurker before and a member since 27-06-2010 here on boards. My my area of interest was internet and Tech Stuff and as a result I'd often post links related to speeds or news. I have 44 posts at the moment (45 after this), but I don't want to randomly just post 5 times for pure utter bull on random stuff just to get my rights back (which will probably be taken away when the 50 post rule is increased). Boards is a useful sight but as everyone knows it is easier to show someone than to explain...especially when other posters ask for pictures or links and I can't provide them because of some overly draconian rule. Also annoys me that the place I was told to post this was in the Newbie forum here when I am clearly not a noob but just a cautious poster and interactor

gary_walsh17

Scratch that...seriously annoyed, can't even quote others that have links in their posts. Actually raging. Whoever the Pri-Madonna (genuinely not a dig at Mods) is who decided this would want to cope on!

zarquon

Anti spam measure. It actually makes sense

geeksauce

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

Scratch that...seriously f"*"ing annoyed, can't even quote others that have links in their posts. Actually raging. Whoever the Pri-Madonna is who decided this would want to cope on!

On the bright side thats 46 now

SamV

Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.

I was going to quote the clip from youtube but......

Anyhoo, 40 posts to go!

Overheal

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

Hey,

Kinda p***ed off that I have been blocked from posting links, picture or attachments since I have less than 50 posts. The number 50 is a bit ridiculous to be honest. I've been a lurker before and a member since 27-06-2010 here on boards. My my area of interest was internet and Tech Stuff and as a result I'd often post links related to speeds or news. I have 44 posts at the moment (45 after this), but I don't want to randomly just post 5 times for pure utter bull**** on random stuff just to get my rights back (which will probably be taken away when the 50 post rule is increased). Boards is a useful sight but as everyone knows it is easier to show someone than to explain...especially when other posters ask for pictures or links and I can't provide them because of some overly draconian rule. Also annoys me that the place I was told to post this was in the Newbie forum here when I am clearly not a NOOB but just a cautious poster and interactor

This change was implemented very recently as an anti-spam measure.

As to being here since 2010, that is irrelevant. It's actually been seen on multiple occasions because of traditional filtering (cooldown periods) spammers will create accounts and let them incubate without posting. Seen accounts that were several years old with no posts suddenly log in and start spamming.

As to links and images, this one should be obvious. This prevents people with no vested interest in the site posting highly offensive, even illegal content on a thread, and/or stops them from advertising.

If that sends users into a fit of rage, then it's an unfortunate side effect. I suggest branching out onto the boards and reading more diverse things, you'll surely find something that you will enjoy conversating about.

Pat Mustard

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

Scratch that...seriously f"*"ing annoyed, can't even quote others that have links in their posts. Actually raging. Whoever the Pri-Madonna is who decided this would want to cope on!

Considering the offensive and undesirable content that rereg trolls and assorted assh(.)les post, something had to be done.

For example, if you hit a link expecting to see a tennis club website, try to imagine the worst possible content popping up instead.

Now try to imagine the type of person who would deliberately post such content.

Now try to think of ways to make it more difficult for this type of poster to post content, or to ensure that newer posters demonstrate that they are accountable, before they are allowed to post certain types of content.

Consider that a poster who has become a part of an online community will be more likely to observe community rules and less likely to cause trouble amongst peers. Consider that a hit-and-run rereg troll has zero accountability and no sense of community.

Now, come up with a better solution than the new 50 post limit for posting content. Seriously.

I'm not trying to pick on you, I'm genuinely interested to see if you are going to consider the possible issues and come up with a better solution.

Ellie11

I have been reading boards for a long time but have only posted a few times nine to be exact. However they re not clocking up. Under my name it says two?

Penny Tration

Ellie11 wrote: »

I have been reading boards for a long time but have only posted a few times nine to be exact. However they re not clocking up. Under my name it says two?

If you have posted in Personal Issues or Relationship Issues, those posts don't show up on your profile, as a privacy measure. Might be that?

Micky Dolenz

Hi Ellie11,

Just had a look there. As stated, posts on some fora don't count toward overly post count.Some have already been mentioned, The Cuckoo's nest is another as too is Puzzles and quizzes. The posts you have made there don't clock up.

greasepalm

dont be timid chat more as there are many threads to comment on ,still looking for that one hmm

AlanS181824

There are so many unique and interesting threads on Boards that it is very easy to become hooked to a thread conversing with people! I'm sure you'll find something.

gary_walsh17

And now freedom of post 50.

I agree with spamming measures, I just think for the majority of people who don't live on the site 24/7 (like myself), that 50 is a large number to reach...and the fact a user can't engage with pictures or links until the have reached 50 posts is stupid, 10 or 15 would be a reasonable number...if it isn't doing the job the raise it after. Imagine if an email service blocked you from sending attachments until you have sent 50 emails that were including text only....a lot of users would find the act restrictive to general users. I'm over this 50 post thing now so I am no longer affected by the restriction (until the number is raised in future possibly), however, I feel it will harm a lot of users interactions for newbies who are computer and internet savvy but are just new to these fora. Simple example is one of the above users who has been posting a lot in specific forums and still only has a low post count due to how the site operates. It is penalising a potential user (not spammer) for the fact they use boards for a specific forum and are not using other ones that 'count' to the post count.

There are multiple ways to prevent spamming on forums, I'm not IT expert but I think that some of the ones mentioned here;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forum_spam

;on the Spam Prevention section are a bit more reasonable that the 50 post rule. Reasonably I think that these would be better measures, though as I am not a site mod, maybe these are harder to implement or enforce?:

Flood control forces users to wait for a short interval between making posts to the forum.

Making a user confirm account via text, to prevent a number being used multiple times (since most people don't change their phone number), much akin to Whatsapp and Viber and other services do (possibly more expensive form but effective I think)

gary_walsh17

Magically 3 posts I had here have disappeared? I can understand why you deleted the 48/49 post (#13 & #14) stuff but did you really need to delete the rational, reasonable and conversation inducing post 50 (#15) that I posted there?

geeksauce

Just post elsewhere to get ur 50 or dont. If you dont like the rules maybe this is not the place for you.

gary_walsh17

geeksauce wrote: »

Just post elsewhere to get ur 50 or dont. If you dont like the rules maybe this is not the place for you.

Been here a lot longer than yourself mate, a lot longer, please don't lecture me on rules when they were not the ones I originally subscribed to and were just enforced, no notice whatsoever. I know my first 2 posts opening this thread were rather angry, simply because, I was angry that the goalposts had been moved after a number of years. Its a normal reaction from someone affected by an issue that was not an issue before. It didn't come up on your account so it was an issue for you. Not being personal here. I just checked that there were no site notices to people, only a small header at the top of my screen one day. I created this thread to raise awareness and have the issue discussed, so maybe this is the place for me. If no one mentions it then it is not an issue, and clearly from other posts above (certain posts not counting to the post count), then it is a wider issue than just me.

This is number 49 anyway, I had a post up relating to a reply to one of the Mods posts above and now its gone. It was a reasonable post I feel. Plus for some reason a thread I started a few days ago has now magically appeared 4 days later in that forum. I just want to see transparency and consistency in how things are applied and dealt with

Zaph

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

Magically 3 posts I had here have disappeared? I can understand why you deleted the 48/49 post (#13 & #14) stuff but did you really need to delete the rational, reasonable and conversation inducing post 50 (#15) that I posted there?

It wasn't deleted, it was unapproved due to the fact that you didn't have 50 posts after I deleted the other two.

gary_walsh17

Zaph wrote: »

It wasn't deleted, it was unapproved due to the fact that you didn't have 50 posts after I deleted the other two.

Ok. Hopefully the 50 post rules are not increased in future.

cerastes

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

Scratch that...seriously f"*"ing annoyed, can't even quote others that have links in their posts. Actually raging. Whoever the Pri-Madonna is who decided this would want to cope on!

When I read that, I saw Pri Mod donna,
I noticed my posts are starting to decrementing since writing this.

50 posts doesn't seem like much though all the same OP, someone could easily troll and spam there way through 50 posts in no time.

gary_walsh17

cerastes wrote: »

When I read that, I saw Pri Mod donna,
I noticed my posts are starting to decrementing since writing this.

50 posts doesn't seem like much though all the same OP, someone could easily troll and spam there way through 50 posts in no time.

I certainly didn't mean it as an attack at the mods, didn't think of that meaning that you picked up on, otherwise I would not have posted it in those words.

Zaph

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

Ok. Hopefully the 50 post rules are not increased in future.

Why should it? It's a significant enough number that will serve the purpose for which it was designed. Seriously, you're making a much bigger deal of this than it really is, especially considering you were only a handful of posts away from 50 when you started this thread.

I've also now approved your other post as you're past the 50 mark. Regarding the countermeasures you propose, well there's already a form of flood control in place but it won't stop a poster posting a single post containing something we'd rather they didn't, and unfortunately the way boards is set up doesn't allow for account verification by text. While it may inconvenience some people for a short while, given the technical limitations of vBulletin, this method is actually the best for what we're trying to achieve.

geeksauce

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

Been here a lot longer than yourself mate, a lot longer, please don't lecture me on rules when they were not the ones I originally subscribed to and were just enforced, no notice whatsoever. I know my first 2 posts opening this thread were rather angry, simply because, I was angry that the goalposts had been moved after a number of years. Its a normal reaction from someone affected by an issue that was not an issue before. It didn't come up on your account so it was an issue for you. Not being personal here. I just checked that there were no site notices to people, only a small header at the top of my screen one day. I created this thread to raise awareness and have the issue discussed, so maybe this is the place for me. If no one mentions it then it is not an issue, and clearly from other posts above (certain posts not counting to the post count), then it is a wider issue than just me.

This is number 49 anyway, I had a post up relating to a reply to one of the Mods posts above and now its gone. It was a reasonable post I feel. Plus for some reason a thread I started a few days ago has now magically appeared 4 days later in that forum. I just want to see transparency and consistency in how things are applied and dealt with

Pretty pointless starting this thread to give out when you could just post in any other thread on the site to get your 50 up. whats the point in being here if you dont want to post, kinda like going to a party and standing in the corner on your own all night talking to nobody.

cerastes

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

I certainly didn't mean it as an attack at the mods, didn't think of that meaning that you picked up on, otherwise I would not have posted it in those words.

Ive probably been lurking in AH too much.

edit, an attack on the mods you say, mod forbid.

marienbad

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

Ok. Hopefully the 50 post rules are not increased in future.

See how quickly you passed the 50 mark when you found a subject that interested you !:)

gary_walsh17

marienbad wrote: »

See how quickly you passed the 50 mark when you found a subject that interested you !:)

Pat Mustard

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

I agree with spamming measures, I just think for the majority of people who don't live on the site 24/7 (like myself), that 50 is a large number to reach...and the fact a user can't engage with pictures or links until the have reached 50 posts is stupid, 10 or 15 would be a reasonable number...if it isn't doing the job the raise it after. Imagine if an email service blocked you from sending attachments until you have sent 50 emails that were including text only....a lot of users would find the act restrictive to general users.

In fairness, you are putting thought into your posts, so it's going to take you a lot longer to reach any post count.

Some trolls just post nonsensical one-liners. It would take a considerable number like 50 to create an obstacle for them.

Overheal

gary_walsh17 wrote: »

This man knows my taste in image posting.

Mr Reese

I tried to post a Thread about the Blood Moon there on the 14th in After Hours so people could have a look at it...no Thread about it anywhere at the time I could see.

It never got approved.