This just happened a couple of hours ago. I sent an email to webmaster@straightdope.com as the notification requested. Also sent an email to one of the mods but it was in the form of a reply to something else so it may not have been perceived as urgent or even read.
Anyway, hours later, the IP remains banned and I am online only by virtue of having reconfigured some stuff to use a different IP temporarily. I don’t want to broadcast either IP publicly, my question is (and I did look at most of that long 3-page thread “what to do if you IP is banned thread”, which has conflicting different emails to send stuff to) who can I best contact with the pertinent information to get this resolved fast? There is an astounding lack of response to any of my emails.
I do know the webmaster email is checked regularly but I think you would get a quicker response either PMing a mod or emailing, especially on a weekend. Since the mods are volunteers with no set shifts sending a PM to several would not be a bad idea.
Thanks, Loach, I’ve PM’d two mods in addition to my earlier emails.
Yes, there is major suckage going on. I also had my main computer fail, and though I have others for different purposes I brought my laptop up here to replace it at least temporarily. And then when this IP banning happened, I tried logging into the Gmail account known to SDMB as my registration account, and Google went: “Oh, yeah? New device, eh? And who are you again?” Fortunately I had sufficient account recovery options to bootstrap myself back up again!
There have not been any changes to the IP ban list discussed amongst the mods lately. If there was a change, it didn’t come from any of us, but there are also techies at whatever-the-heck our parent company is now who might also have done this. The most tech-savvy mod is engineer_comp_geek; he’s the one most likely to be able to figure out where the problem came from. I’m less likely to be able to figure it out, but I have the benefit of being online right this moment; if you e-mail me, I’ll see what I can do. Let me know what the IP address or range of addresses is that’s causing the problem, and what your ISP is.
EDIT: Oh, and a screenshot of the error message you get when you try to access the board might also help, and if you can think of any other relevant information, go ahead and include it. Meanwhile, my preliminary investigation reveals no reason this would have happened.
I can’t see any reason for the IP in question to be banned. It’s not in a range that is typically used by spammers. As a moderator I don’t have any control over IP bans, but I have contacted our admins and hopefully we’ll get this sorted out for you quickly.
ECG - yes, I can see this, via my backup IP, the main IP is still banned as per my check a few minutes ago.
Chronos, the message is just the standard vBulletin message that says: “Sorry. The administrator has banned your IP address. To contact the administrator click here.”
Thanks to all the mods for their help so far, including Bone who also responded via email.
I just want to note that, though I have made a number of posts today, the problem remains unresolved and I still cannot access the SDMB from the primary IP on my LAN as that IP remains banned. I don’t want to make a nuisance of myself and perhaps it’s because it’s the weekend that no action has been taken, so just a note in case anyone might think the problem has gone away. Again I thank the mods who have assisted in escalating this, but it appears that TBTB have not yet awoken from their slumber and dealt with this.
Fortunately I had sufficient account recovery options to bootstrap myself back up again!