Non-activated accounts

[JP]

All,

In having a look at our recent spamming problem, I have been doing some checking around.? It would seem starting sometime at the end of 2006, we started attracting a lot of bogus member sign-ups.? This activity really ramped up starting in April of 07, and now we have active attempts to spam the board.

First, do everyone here a favor and do NOT click on the links in those spam posts.

Second, from the look of it, we have about 60 or so shadow "members" who have not activated their accounts.? What this means, as far as I can tell, is someone or some web bot generated an account, but probably being a web bot designed to spam forums, could not answer or click on the link in the activation message.? Accordingly, I will be deleting any non-activated registration more than one month old.? This will clear out the forum list of bogus signups and give us a more accurate picture of who is really a part of this.? I figure one month is more than enough time for someone (a real person) who has attempted to establish an account to activate it.

JP

[John Thompson]

Looks like it might be happening again - I've noticed that about 30 new members have joined in the past two weeks. It would be nice to believe that there's a sudden upswing in interest in the GPW VVS, but somehow I'm doubtful...

John

[JP]

Yes, it would be nice, but I think we all know better.  When I look at the registrations, there are frequently series of three or so in bunches from the same domain, all with gibberish email addresses in front of the @.  The odds of three people from the same domain, all with gibberish email addresses like jhjdfkhsdf@domain.com all signing up on the same day are pretty slim.  In such cases, I am considering not waiting a month to decide about these. 

[John Thompson]

Hmmm - 339 members, with the latest being "JenyLoveXXX". I'd hate to discourage any apparently affectionate new female VVS enthusiasts, but it might be time for another purge... 

John

[John Thompson]

Hmmm - 339 members, with the latest being "JenyLoveXXX". I'd hate to discourage any apparently affectionate new female VVS enthusiasts, but it might be time for another purge...

HAH!!! I *knew* she wasn't interested in seeing my VVS decal collection!!! (Ref. the author of the last post in the "General Discussion" forum)

John

[JP]

Well, being away for a long time has its benefits.  I just got on and cleared out a few hundred bogus registrations that had never posted anything and had never signed on.  The weeding process continues.

By now you will have noticed I have reinstated new member requests.  I hope this will allow us to add new members smartly while continuing to "thin the herd" and end up, hopefully, with a healty member base.

I continue to look for expertise in making over the website and these boards.  Look for more changes, but by now you're used to my geologic time scale.   

[Lend-Lease fan]

What about somebody like me that only visits infrequently? I assure you, I'm a real person.