Uptick in Troll Posts - Can We Please Require Registration to Post?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Registration means less posts, and less visits. Less visits means less ad revenue. Why would Jeff to go through 6 months worth of work to make the site less valuable?

I am not sure that would be true. Reddit requires user ID's, and that site is very popular. If you think what some people post here is personal, go through there (especially personal finance) something. You would be surprised.

But, if what Jeff is doing now is working, then so be it. I do think the politics forum should have user ID's, that forum is beyond off the rails at this point.

The explicit one here went from 50 posts a day to 12 a week. No ads on that one so it does not matter, but registration would kill the number of posts here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We can ask that registration be required, or we can just go do it. Nothing stopping anyone (except that I just tried and received a Site Administrator Error??)

This highlights one of the issues. The registration system doesn't always work correctly. People forget their passwords and usernames. They change their email address and can't get password reminders. Then they demand that we remove all of the posts linked to their username. It is often a resource challenge to manage the few registered users that we have.

This seems like a silly excuse. How much time do you spend deleting posts every day vs. the one-time investment it would take to migrate the site to a platform with a working registration system? If you change your email, just sign up for a new account. People can log in and delete their own posts if they want, just like in any other modern forum software - why would it take admin time?

Obviously you know more about this than I do so please tell me the cost, time requirement, and other ramifications of migrating the site? I've only been doing this for 10 years, so I suspect that you can teach me a lot. I'm all ears.

Oh yeah, also explain the mechanism for migrating a decade's worth of posts to the new system.

Absolutely. We can pull the content and meta data from the database and import it to the new database and set up redirects with existing threads. Generally the hardest part is migrating user passwords because they should be encrypted in a way that they cannot be migrated, but there are so few registered DCUM users that it is less of an issue.

This forum is 10 years old, doesn't have a registration system that works without errors, constantly crashes under high loads, and doesn't have a mobile version. You can do better. I estimate the time cost to be a week full time work from an experienced programmer. The cost depends on if you can find a volunteer or a friendly vendor, I guess.

How many times have you personally undertaken this sort of task? To which software would you suggest that we migrate? I sure wish things were as easy as you seem to believe. Unfortunately, your view from the outside is pretty limited. In general, when people have incentives to do things that look easy and they don't do them, you should consider that they aren't actually that easy. If I could eliminate trolls, registration problems, moderation, and all the other tasks you suggested by hiring a programmer for a week, don't you think I would have done it?

Here is one challenge: a user registers using their Yahoo email address. Posts 1,000 messages over a few years and then their hard drive goes out taking their Excel spreadsheet of passwords with it. In the meantime they've deleted their Yahoo account and use Gmail. Automatic password retrievals don't work because they get bounced by Yahoo (or even worse, Misha from Novosibirsk has opened a new Yahoo account with their old username and he gets the reminders). So, now they want me to help them login. I don't even know of the person emailing me this tale of woe is really the person with that username or someone trying to social engineer their way into the account. Therefore, I'm presented with trying to decide if this is a legitimate request and, if so, helping resolve it. This is not an extreme example but similar to things I face regularly with our limited number of registered users.

On top of that, all I have to do is be wrong once about helping reset a password and inadvertently giving someone access to someone else's account and then nobody would trust registration here again.

We have a long list of improvements that we want to make and are making less noticeable but important changes regularly. The last thing I want to do is devote our time and efforts to managing logins. That is all beside the fact that the majority of our users don't want logins.

Oh please, just because it's hard for you doesn't mean it's hard. It just means you are technologically incompetent. I will force your hand on this issue though, because I can't believe you are allowing this site to be a puppet for fake news. I would advise you start looking into a system that handles registration ASAP. I am giving you a one week head start.

You watch too much Mr. Robot

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Registration means less posts, and less visits. Less visits means less ad revenue. Why would Jeff to go through 6 months worth of work to make the site less valuable?

I am not sure that would be true. Reddit requires user ID's, and that site is very popular. If you think what some people post here is personal, go through there (especially personal finance) something. You would be surprised.

But, if what Jeff is doing now is working, then so be it. I do think the politics forum should have user ID's, that forum is beyond off the rails at this point.

The explicit one here went from 50 posts a day to 12 a week. No ads on that one so it does not matter, but registration would kill the number of posts here.

Notice, I said one particular area of the site, not the entire site for user ID's. I can't believe people would air their sexual lives on a forum, anonymous or not.

With certain topics, people should be talking to their friends to begin with. I would never ask anything on this site (meaning, advice), or any other message board. I have enough friends that truly know me, and can think outside the box.

[Anonymous]

I'll chime in as a typical dcum user. If registration had been required across the board prior to this point people could put together the following, plus more, about me:

Where I grew up
Where I live now, down to the neighborhood
My first name
My age
Ages of my children
My profession
My husband's profession
My kids' preschool, elementary and middle schools, sports and camps
Where I went on vacation last summer
What kind of dog I have, his age and where we go for training classes
The kind of cars we drive

That's just the beginning.
Identifying who I am would be an absolute breeze for those who know me, even slightly. Anything I post that I would like to keep private- family/marriage issues, depression, personal health issues, political opinions, problems with friends and neighbors, problems with teachers, EVERYTHING could lead back to me even if I use an invented username.

That's how it would be for a lot of people. There's no way dcum would be the same creature if registration were required, like it or not.

[PolyesterTroll]

Anonymous wrote:I'll chime in as a typical dcum user. If registration had been required across the board prior to this point people could put together the following, plus more, about me:

Where I grew up
Where I live now, down to the neighborhood
My first name
My age
Ages of my children
My profession
My husband's profession
My kids' preschool, elementary and middle schools, sports and camps
Where I went on vacation last summer
What kind of dog I have, his age and where we go for training classes
The kind of cars we drive

That's just the beginning.
Identifying who I am would be an absolute breeze for those who know me, even slightly. Anything I post that I would like to keep private- family/marriage issues, depression, personal health issues, political opinions, problems with friends and neighbors, problems with teachers, EVERYTHING could lead back to me even if I use an invented username.

That's how it would be for a lot of people. There's no way dcum would be the same creature if registration were required, like it or not.

How about you read the actual suggestions before writing this irrelevant essay? The usernames would be hidden from the public. Registration is only for admin purposes.

[PolyesterTroll]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We can ask that registration be required, or we can just go do it. Nothing stopping anyone (except that I just tried and received a Site Administrator Error??)

This highlights one of the issues. The registration system doesn't always work correctly. People forget their passwords and usernames. They change their email address and can't get password reminders. Then they demand that we remove all of the posts linked to their username. It is often a resource challenge to manage the few registered users that we have.

This seems like a silly excuse. How much time do you spend deleting posts every day vs. the one-time investment it would take to migrate the site to a platform with a working registration system? If you change your email, just sign up for a new account. People can log in and delete their own posts if they want, just like in any other modern forum software - why would it take admin time?

Obviously you know more about this than I do so please tell me the cost, time requirement, and other ramifications of migrating the site? I've only been doing this for 10 years, so I suspect that you can teach me a lot. I'm all ears.

Oh yeah, also explain the mechanism for migrating a decade's worth of posts to the new system.

Absolutely. We can pull the content and meta data from the database and import it to the new database and set up redirects with existing threads. Generally the hardest part is migrating user passwords because they should be encrypted in a way that they cannot be migrated, but there are so few registered DCUM users that it is less of an issue.

This forum is 10 years old, doesn't have a registration system that works without errors, constantly crashes under high loads, and doesn't have a mobile version. You can do better. I estimate the time cost to be a week full time work from an experienced programmer. The cost depends on if you can find a volunteer or a friendly vendor, I guess.

How many times have you personally undertaken this sort of task? To which software would you suggest that we migrate? I sure wish things were as easy as you seem to believe. Unfortunately, your view from the outside is pretty limited. In general, when people have incentives to do things that look easy and they don't do them, you should consider that they aren't actually that easy. If I could eliminate trolls, registration problems, moderation, and all the other tasks you suggested by hiring a programmer for a week, don't you think I would have done it?

Here is one challenge: a user registers using their Yahoo email address. Posts 1,000 messages over a few years and then their hard drive goes out taking their Excel spreadsheet of passwords with it. In the meantime they've deleted their Yahoo account and use Gmail. Automatic password retrievals don't work because they get bounced by Yahoo (or even worse, Misha from Novosibirsk has opened a new Yahoo account with their old username and he gets the reminders). So, now they want me to help them login. I don't even know of the person emailing me this tale of woe is really the person with that username or someone trying to social engineer their way into the account. Therefore, I'm presented with trying to decide if this is a legitimate request and, if so, helping resolve it. This is not an extreme example but similar to things I face regularly with our limited number of registered users.

On top of that, all I have to do is be wrong once about helping reset a password and inadvertently giving someone access to someone else's account and then nobody would trust registration here again.

We have a long list of improvements that we want to make and are making less noticeable but important changes regularly. The last thing I want to do is devote our time and efforts to managing logins. That is all beside the fact that the majority of our users don't want logins.

Oh please, just because it's hard for you doesn't mean it's hard. It just means you are technologically incompetent. I will force your hand on this issue though, because I can't believe you are allowing this site to be a puppet for fake news. I would advise you start looking into a system that handles registration ASAP. I am giving you a one week head start.

You watch too much Mr. Robot

Hehehe

[PolyesterTroll]

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Jeff - do you think you'd get nearly as many hits, thus income, if the site was converted overnight to a registered one? Let's be honest -- The anonymity is what makes it popular, just like twitter. He can talk all day about how "difficult" it is, but my bet would be that this archaic platform is financially beneficial to him. And hey, if he's just giving people what they want?

I think usage would drop and that of course would negatively impact revenue. But, most of those arguing for registration only want it for the Political Forum which would have less impact on revenue. However, the issues I outlined are real. If it was just a matter of flipping a switch, I would flip it and then flip it back again if it didn't work out. But, it's a lot more than flipping a switch.

People who can't solve this simple issue don't deserve to have a web business.

[Anonymous]

I think OP thinks they are funny and clever. Not the case.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Jeff - do you think you'd get nearly as many hits, thus income, if the site was converted overnight to a registered one? Let's be honest -- The anonymity is what makes it popular, just like twitter. He can talk all day about how "difficult" it is, but my bet would be that this archaic platform is financially beneficial to him. And hey, if he's just giving people what they want?

I think usage would drop and that of course would negatively impact revenue. But, most of those arguing for registration only want it for the Political Forum which would have less impact on revenue. However, the issues I outlined are real. If it was just a matter of flipping a switch, I would flip it and then flip it back again if it didn't work out. But, it's a lot more than flipping a switch.

People who can't solve this simple issue don't deserve to have a web business.

You could prove your commitment to registration by registering yourself. Or, I can make things easy by adding a username to the hundreds of posts you've already posted. Just let me know.

[PolyesterTroll]

Anonymous wrote:I think OP thinks they are funny and clever. Not the case.

I think the OP is pointing out real issues with the site that derive from its outdated technological infrastructure. It is a mistake to not take the warning seriously. Modernize or be disrupted.

[Anonymous]

Jeff, at this point, OP seems like the biggest troll of all. Especially given their demands and threats. I absolutely think you should add a username to their posts. Show them how it feels. And please block them from repeatedly using that stupid emoji in all their posts.

[PolyesterTroll]

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Jeff - do you think you'd get nearly as many hits, thus income, if the site was converted overnight to a registered one? Let's be honest -- The anonymity is what makes it popular, just like twitter. He can talk all day about how "difficult" it is, but my bet would be that this archaic platform is financially beneficial to him. And hey, if he's just giving people what they want?

I think usage would drop and that of course would negatively impact revenue. But, most of those arguing for registration only want it for the Political Forum which would have less impact on revenue. However, the issues I outlined are real. If it was just a matter of flipping a switch, I would flip it and then flip it back again if it didn't work out. But, it's a lot more than flipping a switch.

People who can't solve this simple issue don't deserve to have a web business.

You could prove your commitment to registration by registering yourself. Or, I can make things easy by adding a username to the hundreds of posts you've already posted. Just let me know.

Oh yes, definitely add a username to the "hundreds of posts" I've posted. Better yet, block me. But are you really sure it's me? Wouldn't want to out someone innocent, you know?

[PolyesterTroll]

Anonymous wrote:Jeff, at this point, OP seems like the biggest troll of all. Especially given their demands and threats. I absolutely think you should add a username to their posts. Show them how it feels. And please block them from repeatedly using that stupid emoji in all their posts.

A troll? I'm not a troll. I'm just here to point out Jeff's infantile understanding of how IP addresses work. He'll learn not to be so smug.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Jeff, at this point, OP seems like the biggest troll of all. Especially given their demands and threats. I absolutely think you should add a username to their posts. Show them how it feels. And please block them from repeatedly using that stupid emoji in all their posts.

A troll? I'm not a troll. I'm just here to point out Jeff's infantile understanding of how IP addresses work. He'll learn not to be so smug.

I don't think you realize how smug and obnoxious YOU are. Your posts are not only annoying, but your holier / smarter than thou attitude is pretty despicable. If you have such a great understanding of things, why haven't you been able to give Jeff any concrete answers or suggestions? Because you're actually clueless. If you can do better, then we dare you to make a better site. If it is better, all of us will flock to it. But I don't think you have the skills to even register a simple account on here, so I won't hold my breath.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Jeff, at this point, OP seems like the biggest troll of all. Especially given their demands and threats. I absolutely think you should add a username to their posts. Show them how it feels. And please block them from repeatedly using that stupid emoji in all their posts.

+1

Or just block him outright.