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Post by I Love Melvin on Oct 6, 2023 13:04:43 GMT
Last week I came across a message a few times that a page wasn't accessible at the moment because it was being worked on. Has there been an overhaul like there used to be at TCM occasionally? Now I can come to the site without logging in and there are always guests as well as members listed as viewing, the way it was before the mandatory login was put in place. For instance, right now the readout says 25 members and 541 guests have visited in the last 24 hours. Are we back to square one or is it a glitch? So far I haven't seen any evidence that guests can post, though. Guests being allowed to browse but not post is probably a good middle ground. The anonymous "guest" posts were getting a little out of control, I thought: a lot of hit-and-run and you never knew who you were witnessing doing what.
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Post by topbilled on Oct 6, 2023 14:02:02 GMT
I appreciate the comment. I don't really want to get embroiled in a huge conversation about this, because it becomes too 'meta' and the focus should be on films, television and radio programs.
The previous upgrades had nothing to do with this.
At this time there is still no way to prevent a guest from posting, unless I activate the security login message which requires members to register and login under their registered user names.
The security login message is necessary because some guests are spammers and they will randomly spam across the forums. It takes time each night for me to manually make sure we are clear of spam. I expect the spam will start up again.
I am on vacation for the next few weeks, so I decided to temporarily deactivate the security login message. First, to test how much spam starts coming through again...and second to make the site more accessible to general internet browsers...and see if we attract more registered members that way.
As I said this deactivation of the security login is temporary. Later this month the site will go back to requiring the security login by registered users...because I will no longer be on vacation, won't have as much time to monitor each day...and that will protect the boards from spam and hit-and-run posting.
If the ProBoards software (freeforums.net) ever allows guests to view without posting, then I will let you know. But the spam was becoming a problem and we don't want the spam to start becoming a problem again.
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Post by marysara1 on Oct 6, 2023 19:00:48 GMT
Hopefully there will be more movie lovers.
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Post by I Love Melvin on Oct 6, 2023 22:52:05 GMT
Thank you for elaborating, TopBilled: I should have known you'd be aware and on top of it. And thanks for all that grunt work you do to make this such a nice place for us all to get together. And, most important of all, have a great vacation!
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Post by Swithin on Oct 7, 2023 13:15:23 GMT
I'm glad that the extra login is gone, at least for the moment. No new member is going to be recruited if they have to sign up before surveying whether the board will suit them. I'm on another ProBoard which has never used the mandatory login and doesn't seem to have a spam problem. But I understand that it's kind of boring to have "guest" posters, though that's not a problem for some reason on the other ProBoard, which is very heavily used.
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Post by intrepid37 on Oct 7, 2023 13:31:29 GMT
No new member is going to be recruited if they have to sign up before surveying whether the board will suit them.
How do you explain the 13 new members that joined after the guest designation was recently blocked? |
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Post by Swithin on Oct 7, 2023 13:59:37 GMT
No new member is going to be recruited if they have to sign up before surveying whether the board will suit them.
How do you explain the 13 new members that joined after the guest designation was recently blocked? Probably users who had already been lurking and perhaps even posting here as "guest", since they had ample time to do that, and get acquainted with the site; then they registered when the requirement was added. |
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Post by intrepid37 on Oct 7, 2023 14:34:38 GMT
How do you explain the 13 new members that joined after the guest designation was recently blocked? Probably users who had already been lurking and perhaps even posting here as "guest", since they had ample time to do that, and get acquainted with the site; then they registered when the requirement was added. So we probably won't be getting any new members from now on then. As you said, "NO new member is going to be "recruited" if they have to sign up to read the forum". Unless, of course, your "probably" explanation of the 13 new members is faulty. I think that it costs nothing to register a membership on a movie discussion forum, so with no risk inherent in doing so, there's no reason to believe that anyone HAS to be able to experience it before joining. I know I never have and I've joined quite a number of forums - as a movie lover it just comes naturally to me to do so. Perhaps I'm unusual in that way. In my experience, though, allowing unidentified guests to post will tend to become much more problematic than reserving the privilege for those who are willing to log in. |
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Post by Swithin on Oct 7, 2023 15:12:03 GMT
Probably users who had already been lurking and perhaps even posting here as "guest", since they had ample time to do that, and get acquainted with the site; then they registered when the requirement was added. So we probably won't be getting any new members from now on then. As you said, "NO new member is going to be "recruited" if they have to sign up to read the forum". Unless, of course, your "probably" explanation of the 13 new members is faulty. I think that it costs nothing to register a membership on a movie discussion forum, so with no risk inherent in doing so, there's no reason to believe that anyone HAS to be able to experience it before joining. I know I never have and I've joined quite a number of forums - as a movie lover it just comes naturally to me to do so. Perhaps I'm unusual in that way. In my experience, though, allowing unidentified guests to post will tend to become much more problematic than reserving the privilege for those who are willing to log in. Of course there's no reason why anyone HAS to experience a site before joining, but there are so many movie forums that one can browse through without having to register first. So why bother? I do think it's a safe bet that many who registered during the "lockdown" had already browsed, or posted on this site, before "lockdown." I think many of those new posters were "browsin' around" before they registered. I agree with Hattie McDaniel, who says to Marlene Dietrich:
"He says he ain’t lookin’ for nobody, he’s just browsin’ around. But he can’t fool me, no sir. That white man’s up to something. I know when a white man’s browsing and when he ain’t."
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Post by intrepid37 on Oct 7, 2023 15:21:11 GMT
You agree with that, do ya?
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Post by topbilled on Oct 13, 2023 14:34:45 GMT
So far (of course, this could change LOL) I have only had to remove one spam post in the last week.
I do wonder if some of the 'guests' are more like cookies, where some of our activity is being shadowed or traced by companies who see what people are posting about, in order to present specific ads.
I would like to believe that all guests are classic film, TV and radio fans but when we see 777 guests in a single day and no new registered members, I am a tad skeptical. LOL
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Post by christine on Oct 13, 2023 23:43:56 GMT
I agree with Topbilled. That's why I enjoy this forum so much - because of my love for classic film. 🎬
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Post by jamesjazzguitar on Oct 14, 2023 0:41:47 GMT
So far (of course, this could change LOL) I have only had to remove one spam post in the last week.
I do wonder if some of the 'guests' are more like cookies, where some of our activity is being shadowed or traced by companies who see what people are posting about, in order to present specific ads.
I would like to believe that all guests are classic film, TV and radio fans but when we see 777 guests in a single day and no new registered members, I am a tad skeptical. LOL Yea, most likely bots. The old TCM forum had a few 'users' they were using bots. I assume they got paid for posting content at various forums. I'm glad that it is much more difficult for them to do so at this site. |
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