Some people join just to dump links and nothing more. Other sites don’t allow that, not only that but also moderate new members’ first few posts to see if their contributions are on topic and meaningful.
Or I just go back to ignoring them.
Other sites have paid moderators to do fulltime spam moderation, this one doesn’t. It’s easy enough to mute a thread and never see it again.
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Yeah, good idea.Muting hides the thread(s).
Normally, I don’t open the thread or scroll right pass it.
Even sites that have volunteer mods the forum software has an option to hold a post waiting moderation. When a mod is online they take a look and allow it.
I think that’s what happens here when a post is flagged.
I meant the spam post doesn’t show up until it passes moderation.
@sck can answer that.
I’ve had discussions with him previously, but can’t remember exactly how the flagging system works.
We had so many spammers on Roadfood for a while that they instituted a no links rule for new posters.
Worked very well.
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I looked into the forum software setting, and tweaked the setting such that new user is not allowed to post links. So I think now spammers have to hang around and participate (the horror!) for a few hours before they can post links. let’s see how it goes.
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Thanks so much for this useful thread. Today I woke up to a notification from the “Kitchen Scale Recommendations?” thread leading to a spammy looking post that I found odd. I realized that the post probably fit the pattern of spam after I read this thread.
(Background: A first-time user dropped a product-promoting link in response to a problem/question that I never actually mentioned. They deleted their initial post and made the post I did see a few hours later, perhaps so that the forum software would let them drop a link after they hung around for a bit? Seemed to match the pattern.)
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Yes! I issued a spam warning to that person and asked if he/she wished to modify the post, no reply and the post is deleted.
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Thank you for the confirmation. And for all you do, of course!
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But how else do I cleverly draw attention to my Go Fund Me and Kick Start project? A man has to eat you know.
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Spammers are doing it via PM.
Member name: makeueasy/Muthu
Delayed posting without real moderation is not working. They just fake it in the first post then show their true colours in the second.
Anyway, I’m only a spectator here.
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there’s a number of activities/content that should be blocked for “probationary” members.
posting links is one.
emailing members is another.
the problem is the software is written by people who do not use it.
and they decline to accept suggestions from managers/owners/users who do.
so we get garbage.
Actually I think the website software and moderation is quite good particularly since it’s a free membership.
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The software actually has settings that prohibits positing links and emailing members for new users. The issue was the threshold was set too low. Based on your feedback, I’ve increased the threshold.
I disagree that the software developers don’t use their own software. We use Discourse, an open source forum software. The developers themselves use their own forum software to run their own support/ discussion forum. I have not seen another forum software that’s better written, better managed and better featured than Discourse.
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Had some extra time to read through the forums and found this thread interesting. I think disabling links for the first few posts is a good idea.
However, any restrictions on posting new threads would affect badly if the new comer is genuine. Let me talk about myself. I usually join great communities like this by accident. When I need to know something I search the web and post new threads where I believe experts frequent. So if I cannot ask the question in the first time itself I would just go away in search of another forum.
But every situation has two sides, yes.
I know I’m not an essential part of any forum as my contributions are highly limited(almost none) but still I’m a loyal member. lol 
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does it have a Plan B?
if a member sends more than x PM’s in Y minutes/hours all further PMs are blocked?
spammers can be very patient. and they do their thing with bots - they don’t type or copy/paste the spam to PMs. a bot can rip through the entire member email list in 2-3 minutes.
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I think vbulletin has controls like that. It can restrict the number of posts per minute too. But again it’s expensive.
I think the change spammer doesn’t allow to post external link and has to hang around and participate fails to put them in check. Many of those spammers will post something not interesting in whatever thread, or even start new thread (that has not much interest). Those first posts are more difficult to spot, and I’ve a feeling that members start to suspect newbies. Recently I suspended a serial spammer that succeeded in posting at least 6 times without being seen. Usually he/she wrote a normal post, waited some time, eg. 50 minutes or after somebody replied to his/her post, to modify the posts with external links.
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This seems like an awful lot of trouble for the spammers, since approximately zero people are going to take any action even if they do click through.
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