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Downloads and Help...


Graeme

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I was just thinking that since there are more people on the forum, and some actively posting, perhaps it's worth making the downloads only available to those who we htink deserve them. What I mean by this is simply that instead of there being a 10 post requirement, it's simply a matter of adding the user to the VIP group, for example. This way, a member has to prove that he/she is able to contribute a little bit before getting all the candy. B)

Your thoughts? :P

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Wouldn't a merit system be a bit of a problem in the longer term I guess? You can only monitor a few posters, not every single one.

There's no active way to actually monitor these posters, except maybe, charge for membership? Or maybe you could make it membership by invitation only, or not offer any downloads at all. By offering free downloads, all you will get is ton loads of spammers.

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Wouldn't a merit system be a bit of a problem in the longer term I guess? You can only monitor a few posters, not every single one.

There's no active way to actually monitor these posters, except maybe, charge for membership? Or maybe you could make it membership by invitation only, or not offer any downloads at all. By offering free downloads, all you will get is ton loads of spammers.

How do we distribute the files then? ;)

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Yes I did mean not distributing the files. That's where the whole problem lies, and it's not like you can solve it perfectly.

We could combine a merit based VIP membership AND a post-count membership but the post-count membership would be a pretty high post count such as 50 like right now or even 100 if we need to increase it.

Yes it could work, however, if you do announce that, then you might encounter major spamming issues with people spamming to get to 50 posts. However it would be fewer spammers than now.

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Yes I did mean not distributing the files. That's where the whole problem lies, and it's not like you can solve it perfectly.

Yes it could work, however, if you do announce that, then you might encounter major spamming issues with people spamming to get to 50 posts. However it would be fewer spammers than now.

Or they could just make some really good quality posts and we add them to VIP ourselves before they even reach the required postcount like we did with winter.

I don't know how many people would be crazy enough to sit and spam 100 posts. But then again...I'm not desperate, am I?

But then again, as we said before, people suck.

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I certainly joined because of the files - but I read the anti-spam. And really, no-one likes spam, so I figured they'd be deleted.

I don't know of any *real* way to fix this - it depends on what you want the site to be. If it's meant to be a resource then the files would be there, no post limit at all. I'm guessing that what you want is more a community though.

Ways of dealing with this could be removing members before a certain date with a certain post count.

Or through a scanning process - if they could be flagged at 8 posts, for example (or the search>total posts could be used) and then access could be either given or denied? At the moment there are 138 members with "Posts: 0" of 221 total members. That's about 60% of members who are NOT, and have NEVER been active. This leaves around 40 people who have posts of between three and 18. While it must be said that 40 x 10 = 400 >> a large number of spam posts, I suppose we CAN be thankful that this is not 400 freeloaders x 10 = 4 000 >> one mighty big headache.

I'm not entirely sure (yet) how the admin system here works - in particular weather or not there are moderators with the ability to warn, suspend, or block spammers. If so, this could work in the short term. Otherwise...

Is it possible to remove EVERYTHING (yes, everything and anything) that mentions the "10 Post Count" (or the X Post Count) required to download? Instead, could the "you need x posts to gain access" be replaced with something more similar to "you have not been granted access to this feature" ?

(Not to mention *thanks* for the VIP 'status' ... I didn't notice until now. Oops!)

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I certainly joined because of the files - but I read the anti-spam. And really, no-one likes spam, so I figured they'd be deleted.

Well there's nothing wrong with wanting the files, we put them up because we know there are demand.

But at least you were the smart one. :)

I don't know of any *real* way to fix this - it depends on what you want the site to be. If it's meant to be a resource then the files would be there, no post limit at all. I'm guessing that what you want is more a community though.

Yes, exactly. And if we wanted, for some reason, only to give away our work for free, we wouldn't have bothered with a forum where you can talk, we'd have just made a website, much easier and much less hassle with moderating.

I'm not entirely sure (yet) how the admin system here works - in particular weather or not there are moderators with the ability to warn, suspend, or block spammers. If so, this could work in the short term. Otherwise...

This is what we've been doing actually. And people haven't been too bright about it. They all spam when there are admins online so so far we've been able to delete/suspend most of them before they could download.

We don't have moderators yet, so most of moderation had been done by the 3 admins - Deus, Lc and myself. (Most? What am I talking about? All). As soon as we see spamming tendency in a poster they are immediately warned and banned (for around 3-5 days depending on how bad the spamming is).

Ways of dealing with this could be removing members before a certain date with a certain post count.

Meaning if after X days after registration if you don't have X number of posts, we delete you? It's tempting, let me tell you.

Is it possible to remove EVERYTHING (yes, everything and anything) that mentions the "10 Post Count" (or the X Post Count) required to download? Instead, could the "you need x posts to gain access" be replaced with something more similar to "you have not been granted access to this feature" ?

Then we'd have to come up with a diplomatic explanation of why they can't donwload yet...but it might reduce some spam.

Thanks for the suggestions. :)

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I'm not entirely sure (yet) how the admin system here works - in particular weather or not there are moderators with the ability to warn, suspend, or block spammers. If so, this could work in the short term.

Yes, all those features are available :) . And we do warn and suspend spammers. Hehe.

Is it possible to remove EVERYTHING (yes, everything and anything) that mentions the "10 Post Count" (or the X Post Count) required to download? Instead, could the "you need x posts to gain access" be replaced with something more similar to "you have not been granted access to this feature" ?

This is possible. We simply make it so that normal members are not able to download files at all.

As someone suggested before, one possibility is to remove the files from the forum. That would certainly decrease spam. However, I feel that at the moment, the files are the only thing that make this site "better" than the other IB sites available. Well, obviously we can boast having better admins and smarter people :) but people might not believe me! :) It's not out of the question, but I think that perhaps we would need to let the community grow more before taking action like that. Once we have more posters, there will be other reasons to come here.

Thanks for your post. :)

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Meaning if after X days after registration if you don't have X number of posts, we delete you? It's tempting, let me tell you.

Well just don't go around saying that you have those rules. 140 dormant posters might just be better than 140 posters of 10 posts of spam each?

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Or they could just make some really good quality posts and we add them to VIP ourselves before they even reach the required postcount like we did with winter.

I don't know how many people would be crazy enough to sit and spam 100 posts. But then again...I'm not desperate, am I?

But then again, as we said before, people suck.

:) really I should stayed on TSR till dec to see if I would've won the spammer of the year award :)

Meaning if after X days after registration if you don't have X number of posts' date=' we delete you? It's tempting, let me tell you.[/quote']

mind you, very very VERY tempting form where I'm standing :)

I say we should delete the inactive members, and those who are still validating for ages! I mean if you don't know how to validate your account, I don't think you should post :)

as for the downloads to be moved from the forum, I don't think that we should do that.. I mean we should be a friendly forum with people on it... where other people come to get their advice from other live people rather than just a smelly website with all the info on it :) I mean I know most people don't know that, but well make them want it :diablo:

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At first I was going to say no because I hadn't seen that much spam here actually (you're doing a great job :) ) but now after seeing a couple of spammers I clearly see what you mean.

I think that downloads and such should be kept for the fact that it is a perfect tool for gaining help and advice. I think a lot of people do appriciate them but then there is of course the whole community thing that we all want and love.

I don't really have any concrete advice but I was wondering - perhaps if there was a limit, say 20 non-spams, it could say somewhere that in order for you to have access to the downloads you must have 20 NON-spam (link to spam FAQ) posts. Another option is also to make the members then PM an admin to get access. Although it's a lot of hassle, it would ensure that those who do have access to the files do not spam and if they do, the admin will catch them since they'll have to PM you anyway :)

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... and the admins here are actually *active*. Yanno, doing things and such.

It's unusual, and very appreciated.

Hence the better admins bit. :)

And we have to set an example, don't we? :)

Well just don't go around saying that you have those rules. 140 dormant posters might just be better than 140 posters of 10 posts of spam each?

Point duly noted. :)

I say we should delete the inactive members, and those who are still validating for ages! I mean if you don't know how to validate your account, I don't think you should post :)

They do validate eventually, they just take a long time about it. I say if they haven't validated after a month or something, we delete them.

as for the downloads to be moved from the forum, I don't think that we should do that.. I mean we should be a friendly forum with people on it... where other people come to get their advice from other live people rather than just a smelly website with all the info on it :) I mean I know most people don't know that, but well make them want it :diablo:

And how would removing the downloads decrease the fact that we're a place to get advice from live people? We're still here, aren't we?

I don't really have any concrete advice but I was wondering - perhaps if there was a limit, say 20 non-spams, it could say somewhere that in order for you to have access to the downloads you must have 20 NON-spam (link to spam FAQ) posts. Another option is also to make the members then PM an admin to get access. Although it's a lot of hassle, it would ensure that those who do have access to the files do not spam and if they do, the admin will catch them since they'll have to PM you anyway :)

Not a bad idea...

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I'm thinking we go with the VIP only download thing. And we make VIP attainable solely through promotion through posting. So someone can get VIP access with 10 posts in theory if they post like winter, or 50 posts, or whatever. We do not mention anything about number of posts for downloads. That way, people who spam will not get anything at all, and there will be no incentive to spam.

Who thinks this is okay?

Just to outline what I am saying:

Member group is not allowed to download files.

VIP group is allowed.

Members become VIP when admins/moderators feel they deserve it (not necessarily through postcount?)

Another thought. VIP users can have access to a secret forum for VIPs only with other extra files. Good idea? This could work as not everyone would be VIP, and as the forum would be hidden, not everyone would know about it through google and stuff like that. They would read it here though.. :)

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Hence the better admins bit. :)

aww you actually quoted that instead of editting winter's post :)

And we have to set an example, don't we? :)

They do validate eventually, they just take a long time about it. I say if they haven't validated after a month or something, we delete them.

And how would removing the downloads decrease the fact that we're a place to get advice from live people? We're still here, aren't we?

Not a bad idea...

I meant move the downloads off the forum :) like in a wiki or something... it would seem less personal :) here it's like they're accessing the downloads from our posts, so it's like we're here.. erm dunno how to explain it lol

Members become VIP when admins/moderators feel they deserve it (not necessarily through postcount?)

if we were to decide on doing this, I think finding out the thing for the moderator forum should be our number 1 priority, I mean admins/mods are going to have a very full inbox if this happens :)

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Members become VIP when admins/moderators feel they deserve it (not necessarily through postcount?)

Another thought. VIP users can have access to a secret forum for VIPs only with other extra files. Good idea? This could work as not everyone would be VIP, and as the forum would be hidden, not everyone would know about it through google and stuff like that. They would read it here though.. :)

Sounds good. As for people finding out about the "secret" there are other ways it can leak anyway. Well, that and the fact even if people knew what can they do about it? Hehe.

If we're going to have this secret forum, then, what do you say we move all the notes and essays to that forum instead of having them the individual subject forums? That way we just restrict download there. This might be more efficient because notes and sample essays are not the only thing one can attach to a post. Sometimes there are just normal things like, say, the IB Songs thread. It's kind of pointless to not let people download that. Know what I mean? (Ah this is more admin matters isn't it? Never mind I'll say it here anyway)

if we were to decide on doing this, I think finding out the thing for the moderator forum should be our number 1 priority, I mean admins/mods are going to have a very full inbox if this happens :)

I don't think the private forum idea is feasible with what we have now.

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