Looks like you already have been promoted. So that did not take long....

If there is a better way to prevent spammers I've not found it. They get around reCaptcha systems easily enough and even the other human verification options in place.

This way you can easily tell who the spammers are immediately and ban them without too much disruption. It's not as if anyone valid would have to wait long at all to be 'promoted' by one of the moderators.

It's worked well at Free-DC in the last 6 months or so and we even survived a 2 day co-ordinated attack without anyone really noticing except me :)

Just my 2cents anyway

[quote=Mini-Geek;170430]I'm awaiting moderator approval for my account to be allowed to do, well, anything. Is this really necessary for new members? There's got to be better ways to prevent spam bots.[/quote]
Actually, this is the same way it is on mersenneforum. When a user first registers, their posts have to be individually approved by the moderators, or, the next time an admin gets on and sees their registration they'll approve it across the board and all of their posts are accepted. From what I gather this is somewhat standard practice on many forums, and is probably the single most effective anti-spam tool available for forums. Essentially, most spam never gets to the point where regular users have to see it--the admins end up nipping it in the bud while it's still "pending".

The only difference that the NPLB forum has is that a few "extra" privileges are redacted when users first join. These being attachment uploading, use of avatars, the PM boxes are limited to 10 messages, they can't send PMs to more than one user at a time, and can't upload profile images. None of these could be considered highly crucial functions, especially considering that trusted users will probably be upgraded to full users right away at the same time their initial registration is approved; and others will simply have to wait until they produce 10 posts to get those features. Not too big a deal. :smile:

Let me know if you guys think 10 posts is a bit too much for this. I can easily change it to 5 posts.

I'm thinking you should let it be wide open for the first 3-5 days.
It will be awhile before the spammers find it, and by then, it will be locked down tighter.
Even if some were to get through, we can dispatch them quite easily.
That should also allow enough time to let the members get registered with as little hassle as possible.

[quote=IronBits;170440]I'm thinking you should let it be wide open for the first 3-5 days.
It will be awhile before the spammers find it, and by then, it will be locked down tighter.
Even if some were to get through, we can dispatch them quite easily.
That should also allow enough time to let the members get registered with as little hassle as possible.[/quote]
Okay, sounds good. I'll set it so that users are automatically promoted to full Members at a postcount of 0 (I presume that will work, right? Well, I guess I'm about to find out. :smile:)

Max :smile:

Nice.. I like the suck it and see way...LOL

Should new team members add requests be done on this site or the new site?
If the new site, will there be a thread started soon by admin with the Team lists that I can link to for my team?

Edit: by the way will there be a nice URL logo added to the forum URL? Just a pet peeve of mine - hate seeing the IE logo.

[quote]
Should new team members add requests be done on this site or the new site?
If the new site, will there be a thread started soon by admin with the Team lists that I can link to for my team?[/quote]Do it in this forum for now. Still setting the other one up. Many problems to address including an automated user/team registration.

Is the new site down? I keep getting 404 Not Found. It worked for about, but as soon as I click the "register" button after putting in my info, it broke.

[QUOTE]Is the new site down? I keep getting 404 Not Found. It worked for about, but as soon as I click the "register" button after putting in my info, it broke.[/QUOTE]

I just tried it, worked fine. Maybe the guys were upgrading something or the server hiccuped.

[quote=Razor_FX_II;170445]Edit: by the way will there be a nice URL logo added to the forum URL? Just a pet peeve of mine - hate seeing the IE logo.[/quote]
I'll see what I can do. We don't have an official favicon picked out yet (in fact we haven't quite finalized the logo, though the general consensus seems to be that the current one is a favorite). However, I'm sure I'll be able to come up with something. :smile:
[quote=MyDogBuster;170446]Do it in this forum for now. Still setting the other one up. Many problems to address including an automated user/team registration.[/quote]
Agreed. All "official" project business should be conducted in this forum until all the posts are transferred to the new one.

[quote=MyDogBuster;170452]I just tried it, worked fine. Maybe the guys were upgrading something or the server hiccuped.[/quote]
Hmm...must have been a hiccup somewhere along the line. I wasn't aware of any planned hiccups. Gamer007, you might want to give your registration another try since it doesn't appear to have gone through.