Hi, everyone.

Given a raft of complaints about the constant discussion of the personal history of one of our users, a discussion that continued despite my private requests that it cease, I have decided to create a new user permission group to give me the opportunity to moderate posts before they are published.

I'm not thrilled that this day has arrived. But I did not want to ban or totally suspend the posting privileges of these users (at least not yet) over the controversy.

I felt I needed another tool in between letting things go and removing posting rights. Moderation seemed the best alternative.

I do not intent to moderate posts based on anything but my specific prohibition against any further discussion of the personal history of one of our forum members.

I'm not sure that the users on whom I have placed these restrictions will still want to be members of our forum. I did think this was a better alternative to banning.

My best,

--Craig

Are the users being told that they are on the list? A PM or something? I think it only fair to do that, along with maybe even listing off the things that will get a post of theirs pulled.

Everyone deserves the opportunity to clean their act up to the standards of the community that they want to be a part of.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

Are the users being told that they are on the list? A PM or something? I think it only fair to do that, along with maybe even listing off the things that will get a post of theirs pulled.

Everyone deserves the opportunity to clean their act up to the standards of the community that they want to be a part of.

Yes, indeed. I'm sorry I did not make it clear. I have sent messages notifying the people in question of my response and what I am seeking to avoid.

My best,

--Craig

Ahhh, this explains much.

Hey Craig, it seems likely that another spammer's registered as: Airbrushmakeup. You can tell, because in the siggie, the person links to some website www.palazah.com with both of the different links saying something like "Airbrushmakeup" and "Noelle" or something like that...

Just thought you should know.

~Chas'88

What's with the thread "I like kissing more than sex" or something along those lines. Is that legit?

We have a thoroughly-vicious new poster, apollonian, who posts profusely but uses the topic to hurl collective insults at liberals and personal insults that go so far as accusations of criminal deeds. He has the keyboard equivalent of a potty mouth. He is trying to take over several threads, some of them important before he found them.

He has accused me of illegal deeds. Please, please, please -- expel him! I have always thought these boards family-friendly. If his posts were to be deleted, then we would lose little and regain civility.

pbrower2a I suspect that this forum no longer has active moderation.


I believe that at most there is an automated system to defeat automated spam.

I agree apollonian should be banned. But there does not appear to be a live moderator now.

Hi all,

Apologies for the extended absence. Corena no longer moderates this forum. We're currently trying to decide the best way to move forward and establish a more active moderator presence here, as well as cleaning up spam and old threads that should have been deleted. We may be reaching out to longtime posters here for help, so please expect an update on that soon.

In the meantime, apollonian has been banned for repeated harassment of other users and offensive posts.

Originally Posted by Corenabh

Hi all,

Apologies for the extended absence. Corena no longer moderates this forum. We're currently trying to decide the best way to move forward and establish a more active moderator presence here, as well as cleaning up spam and old threads that should have been deleted. We may be reaching out to longtime posters here for help, so please expect an update on that soon.

In the meantime, apollonian has been banned for repeated harassment of other users and offensive posts.

Thank you very much!

Originally Posted by Corenabh

Hi all,

Apologies for the extended absence. Corena no longer moderates this forum. We're currently trying to decide the best way to move forward and establish a more active moderator presence here, as well as cleaning up spam and old threads that should have been deleted. We may be reaching out to longtime posters here for help, so please expect an update on that soon.

In the meantime, apollonian has been banned for repeated harassment of other users and offensive posts.

In seriousness, If you take a look at the current membership list I'd say 2\3rds of "members" are now spam accounts. On times that I've checked, we about 4-5 of these accounts registering at a time.

I realize that taking care of a major forum is hard work. For that reason I keep pressing the administrator to promote a few of our more respectable and proven members as moderators. Every forum builder website I've dealt with allows for this class of member-Invisionfree, Aimoo, Webs. I imagine that V-Bulletin would have a similar option. This would radically improve things here and take considerable stress off the ownership on issues of regular maintenance.

Finally, as a petty wish, would it be possible to change my name from- Ghost Echo to Time Mage X? (or just Time Mage if possible) This is something I've been hoping for some time. I tried starting another profile under the name Time Mage, but I really miss having those 10 years of seniority. Plus almost everyone who didn't know me thought I was a Millennial who represented everything bad about the generation.(Actually that was kinda cool)

Originally Posted by Corenabh

Hi all,

Apologies for the extended absence. Corena no longer moderates this forum. We're currently trying to decide the best way to move forward and establish a more active moderator presence here, as well as cleaning up spam and old threads that should have been deleted. We may be reaching out to longtime posters here for help, so please expect an update on that soon.

In the meantime, apollonian has been banned for repeated harassment of other users and offensive posts.

Thank you.

I can't believe how prolifically that creep posted. If some of my posts disappear for containing traces of his offensive material... then so be it. I may delete a few of my posts that would not exist except for him. I suggest that others do so themselves.

Originally Posted by Ghost Echo

In seriousness, If you take a look at the current membership list I'd say 2\3rds of "members" are now spam accounts. On times that I've checked, we about 4-5 of these accounts registering at a time.

Yes, there's definitely a spam problem! We're looking into how to best handle this. If you have any suggestions for anti-spam measures, we'd welcome them. This forum hasn't been actively moderated in some time, so there's quite a backlog of spammers to work through, but over the next month we'll be trying our best to clean things up.

I realize that taking care of a major forum is hard work. For that reason I keep pressing the administrator to promote a few of our more respectable and proven members as moderators. Every forum builder website I've dealt with allows for this class of member-Invisionfree, Aimoo, Webs. I imagine that V-Bulletin would have a similar option. This would radically improve things here and take considerable stress off the ownership on issues of regular maintenance.

V-Bulletin does have this option, and we are indeed considering this. Thanks for your input.

Finally, as a petty wish, would it be possible to change my name from- Ghost Echo to Time Mage X? (or just Time Mage if possible) This is something I've been hoping for some time. I tried starting another profile under the name Time Mage, but I really miss having those 10 years of seniority. Plus almost everyone who didn't know me thought I was a Millennial who represented everything bad about the generation.(Actually that was kinda cool)

Sure. I'll change your username to Time Mage in the next few minutes.

Originally Posted by Corenabh

Sure. I'll change your username to Time Mage in the next few minutes.

Unfortunately, that username was already in use by someone with a posting history. I've changed yours instead to Time Mage X.

Originally Posted by Corenabh

Unfortunately, that username was already in use by someone with a posting history. I've changed yours instead to Time Mage X.

That's me- Ghost Echo! I used this profile for a while because I wanted the new name. But I really missed the whole "Join Date: July 2004", and some people forgot that I had transferred to a new profile- so I went back to the GE. But Time Mage X is just as cool and I happy for it to finally be changed.

But to make things official- switching over to Time Mage X in ....3.2.1.

hi - i registered at roughly the same time as the troll, posted for a while, then stopped posting as he began to completely take over the forum with obscenities and hate-speech. i was happy to see he'd finally been banned - i'd requested it myself - but found myself unable to log in tonight and think my account was marked as spam and then deleted. i re-registered, but i wonder if it wouldn't be possible to have my old account restored somehow so i could have ownership of my original posts. would this be possible, or is that beyond your ability as admin?

.....Ghost Echo is now officially (finally) Time Mage X!

Thanks Corenabh! What a great thing to mark my 10year- decade long anniversary here at the forum. Now I won't have to really explain what "Ghost Echo" really means. Thanks again!

Originally Posted by tahara999

hi - i registered at roughly the same time as the troll, posted for a while, then stopped posting as he began to completely take over the forum with obscenities and hate-speech. i was happy to see he'd finally been banned - i'd requested it myself - but found myself unable to log in tonight and think my account was marked as spam and then deleted. i re-registered, but i wonder if it wouldn't be possible to have my old account restored somehow so i could have ownership of my original posts. would this be possible, or is that beyond your ability as admin?

Could you please PM me your original username? Unfortunately, if your account was accidentally deleted, it can't be restored, but if it was banned, I could reenable it. We just cleared out about a thousand recent spam registrations and tried our best to only hit users who haven't ever posted, but it's possible we made a mistake. If this is the case, I apologize!

hi - thanks, i sent a PM, but i'm not sure if it went through or not; my Sent box shows no messages sent. the user name was the same as the one i'm using here: tahara999. thanks!

Originally Posted by Corenabh

Hi all,

Apologies for the extended absence. Corena no longer moderates this forum. We're currently trying to decide the best way to move forward and establish a more active moderator presence here, as well as cleaning up spam and old threads that should have been deleted. We may be reaching out to longtime posters here for help, so please expect an update on that soon.

In the meantime, apollonian has been banned for repeated harassment of other users and offensive posts.

Very good; thank you.

Originally Posted by Time Mage

That's me- Ghost Echo! I used this profile for a while because I wanted the new name. But I really missed the whole "Join Date: July 2004", and some people forgot that I had transferred to a new profile- so I went back to the GE. But Time Mage X is just as cool and I happy for it to finally be changed.

But to make things official- switching over to Time Mage X in ....3.2.1.

Ghost Echo is now Time Mage again. That's cool

Originally Posted by Time Mage X

.....Ghost Echo is now officially (finally) Time Mage X!

Nice!


Prince

PS: Looks pretty cool.
(really cool, actually!)

Prince like-y!

I liked "Ghost Echo". Cool name.

I wonder if it would be possible to have a few threads moderated to prevent flame wars and arguments. Threads that are specifically about members lives, such as hobbies, pets, etc. One topic to be banned-politics. Some forums, I've noticed, ban political discussions from the entire forum, because discussions quickly degenerate into flame wars. Wouldn't be practical for the entire T4T forum, because politics is tied to the cycle.