Merging posts

[RichM]

1 hour ago, Willonaboat said:

This issue seems to be a case of techies knowing what's best for us. Or to be more accurate, thinking they know what's best for us. And, from one of the posts above, trying to solve one problem (spam) by creating another. I came to this thread after just having two of my posts merged. The problem is, my two posts were in response to two different things entirely. One was purely in jest. The other, not. So to my mind it is not appropriate to merge them, and, as someone else said, if I wanted to merge them I would have done it myself.

 

On a different note, having been Admin on a forum (no longer online) I found that by trying to implement 'features' that people didn't want, just because I could and I thought from a technical point of view was the best thing to do, I ended up alienating some of the members and I think (I don't know for sure) it resulting in fewer posts and forum activity. For what it's worth, if people complain, you can bet your bottom dollar that the complainants are representative of the problem and not the sum total - most people don't complain. The lesson (for me) was to listen to what people wanted and take heed of what they didn't and change things accordingly.

 

Sermon over.

 

Here is my (inappropriately merged) post(s).

 

 

Actually, we were targeted by spam attacks in recent weeks. I'm sure some of our mods & members can attest to this while for many, it would have gone unnoticed. - Fortunately it was dealt with promptly thanks to the members submitting post reports and for the great work by the Moderators who took swift action. That said, ideally we need to prevent spam attacks in the first place and as such measures have been (and continue to be) put in place. I'm pleased to report the recent spam attacks have since tapered off, but that's not to say they won't try again.

 

What spammers often do is send PMs knowing it will send an email to the recipient in addition to the PM itself. However, in order to send a PM, users have to meet a minimum post count requirement. (this has been the case for some time) With this in mind, if we were to make it so consecutive posts could be submitted in a very short time-frame, it will be very easy for spammers to circumvent some of the anti-spam measures in place.

 

Some years ago, a spammer managed to send out hundreds of emails via the PM system. As a result, our mail server got blacklisted meaning that legitimate members were unable to receive emails from us for a short period (days), which is a problem if they need to reset their password or contact us for any reason + They won't be notified about any new replies to their content and this too will likely result in reduction in forum activity!

 

Appreciate 24 hours was too long and as mentioned, we dropped the consecutive post threshold down to 1 hour as a result of member feedback. When taking into account the above, I hope it can be seen as a reasonable compromise. This is of course not the only measure to prevent spam attacks. As a former forum admin yourself, you will know that spammers constantly advance their methods. - it's a constant battle for us to keep on top of it. 
 

I had a look at your post in question and with all due respect; I see no reason why using multi-quote in a single post would not suffice. I can only apologise if you see otherwise. That aside and contrary to your post; We're not doing this "just because we can". - We're doing this to help keep the forum running in a responsible manner while also ensuring it's a safe & secure environment for all.

[Willonaboat]

6 minutes ago, RichM said:

 

Actually, we were targeted by spam attacks in recent weeks. I'm sure some of our mods & members can attest to this while for many, it would have gone unnoticed. - Fortunately it was dealt with promptly thanks to the members submitting post reports and for great work by the Moderators who take swift action. That said, ideally we need to prevent spam attacks in the first place and as such measures have been (and continue to be) put in place to prevent this. I'm pleased to report that the recent spam attacks have since tapered off. 

 

What spammers often do is send PMs because and in doing so, it will send an email to the recipient in addition to the PM itself. In order to send a PM, users have to meet a minimum post count requirement. (this has been the case for some time) However, If we make it so they could post multiple posts consecutively within a short time-frame, it will be very easy for spammers to circumvent some of the anti-spam measures in place.

 

Some years ago, a spammer managed to send out hundreds of emails via the PM system. As a result, our mail server got blacklisted meaning that legitimate members were unable to receive emails from us for a short period, which is a bit of a problem if they need to reset their password etc or contact us for any reason + They won't be notified of any new replies to their content and this too will result in reduction of forum activity!

 

Appreciate 24 hours was too long and as mentioned, we dropped this down to 1 hour. When taking into account the above, it seems like a reasonable compromise. I should point out that this is not the only measure to prevent spam attacks. As a former forum admin yourself, you should know that spammers contantly advance their methods and therefore it's a constant battle to keep up in order to keep them at bay. 
 

I had a look at your post and with all due respect; I see no reason why using multi-quote in a single post would not suffice. That aside, and contrary to your post - I'm not doing this "just because I can". We're doing this to help keep the forum running while ensuring it's safe & secure for all of our members and guests alike. 

 

Fightng spam was/is a cat and mouse game. No one solution will solve the spam or bot problem as you already know. I'm not familiar with this forum's software but I assume you can block ranges of IP addresses not just individual ones - it's easy to block Russia, China, etc at the registration stage and posting stage. We also used a forum addon (can't recall the name now) which regularly automatically updated a list of known email addresses used by spammers and bots and blocked all access to the main URL and forum. Also, if you use a long list of 'prove you're human' questions/answers that are automatically rotated a failed answer database query will reveal the bots inputting the right answers to the wrong questions. I digress, and I'm providing advice when it wasn't asked for...

 

But restricting functionality for bone fide members isn't, in my opinion, the right path. But you're the Admin not me...  I've said my piece. From experience I know I'm not wrong, but whatever. Good luck - it's a thankless task at times, I know. I wouldn't want to do it again. Anyone reading this that hasn't been an Admin or Mod, you'll probably have no idea how much time running a busy forum can at times take. Muchas gracias.

 

[RichM]

23 minutes ago, Willonaboat said:

 

Fightng spam was/is a cat and mouse game. No one solution will solve the spam or bot problem as you already know. I'm not familiar with this forum's software but I assume you can block ranges of IP addresses not just individual ones - it's easy to block Russia, China, etc at the registration stage and posting stage. We also used a forum addon (can't recall the name now) which regularly automatically updated a list of known email addresses used by spammers and bots and blocked all access to the main URL and forum. Also, if you use a long list of 'prove you're human' questions/answers that are automatically rotated a failed answer database query will reveal the bots inputting the right answers to the wrong questions. I digress, and I'm providing advice when it wasn't asked for...

 

But restricting functionality for bone fide members isn't, in my opinion, the right path. But you're the Admin not me...  I've said my piece. From experience I know I'm not wrong, but whatever. Good luck - it's a thankless task at times, I know. I wouldn't want to do it again. Anyone reading this that hasn't been an Admin or Mod, you'll probably have no idea how much time running a busy forum can at times take. Muchas gracias.

 

 

You're spot on in that it is a cat & mouse game but that's not to say we shouldn't do anything about it. If we're targeted by a spam attack, we take time to look at how they circumvented the existing measures in place. Naturally we will make necessary changes to prevent a recurrence but unfortunately it's always a compromise in one form or another. 

 

You mention "Restricting functionality for bone fide members isn't the right path" but also suggest we could block entire countries such as Russia or China. - What about the legitimate individuals in China who may wish to visit Canal World to research information about a possible boating holiday? (or whatever it may be) We'd definitely be restricting their their functionality in doing that! You could argue that they are few and far between but the point remains. - Pretty much any anti-spam measures put in place involve some form of compromise to user functionality and of course it's about finding a balance. Unfortunately we don't always get that right first time. 

 

We can block IP blocks for entire countries or chunk it down into smaller subnets but we find in current times, spammers tend to either spoof their source address or use compromised servers and/or botnets to achieve their objective. The most recent attacks originated from the USA but I suspect indirectly through one of the methods mentioned. 

 

We appreciate your feedback though. When making any changes of this nature we do evaluate the impact it may have on members/guests and do review member feedback and make adjustments wherever feasible. - as we have done as a result of this very topic. 

 

 

[Tony Brooks]

I have had a couple of posts on technical topics merged and don't like it because the merge does not put a blank line between the original post and the one posted after more thought, it all runs into one paragraph.

 

It seems OK if you put a quote in the second post but then it is pointless because the original quote is in place.

 

It seems it is a feature we have to accept. I don't find it a big deal.

[MtB]

41 minutes ago, Tony Brooks said:

I have had a couple of posts on technical topics merged and don't like it because the merge does not put a blank line between the original post and the one posted after more thought, it all runs into one paragraph.

 

It seems OK if you put a quote in the second post but then it is pointless because the original quote is in place.

 

It seems it is a feature we have to accept. I don't find it a big deal.

 

I wonder if know we are more aware of it happening, we can format our posts to show they were separate by starting the second post with a manually typed line. I'll try it now.

 

----------------------------------------------

 

 

 

And this is my second post with a line inserted at the top.

 

How does it look?

 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

New post.

 

And this is a third, separate post, with a heading to show its a new post.

 

And I've inserted a few line breaks too. 

[David Mack]

44 minutes ago, Tony Brooks said:

I have had a couple of posts on technical topics merged and don't like it because the merge does not put a blank line between the original post and the one posted after more thought, it all runs into one paragraph.

In that situation, when I know posts are going to be merged I start the second post with a blank line. Otherwise it's pretty easy to go back and edit one in.

[Guest]

3 hours ago, David Mack said:

In that situation, when I know posts are going to be merged I start the second post with a blank line. Otherwise it's pretty easy to go back and edit one in.

 

Ditto.

[RichM]

13 hours ago, MtB said:

 

I wonder if know we are more aware of it happening, we can format our posts to show they were separate by starting the second post with a manually typed line. I'll try it now.

 

----------------------------------------------

 

 

 

And this is my second post with a line inserted at the top.

 

How does it look?

 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

New post.

 

And this is a third, separate post, with a heading to show its a new post.

 

And I've inserted a few line breaks too. 

 

 

Or like this

______________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

Nice

 

______________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

Lines

 

______________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

 

 

[DHutch]

On 01/03/2023 at 18:43, RichM said:

Following the feedback, we have reduced the automatic merging of concurrent posts from 24 hours to a 1 hour threshold. I hope this is seen to be a reasonable compromise while also allowing us to prevent circumvention of some of the anti-spam measures we have in place.

 

Additionally, the edit window is set to 24 hours. (it was previously set at 1 hour until recently)

 

Seems a reasonable compromise to me for now.

 

Two posts made in quick succession have automatically merged on this site for a every long time. I don't know what the previous (original) time spacing was, maybe 10-20minutes at a guess?

 

As said, avoiding spam etc is a constant moving target, and there are a wide range of ways of stopping and or greatly reducing it, at which point its a case of balancing stopping spam, with allowing legitimate use with the least resistance.

 

 

Daniel