It sure looks that way. Our automatic filters get the EZ to spot ones. But it’s hard to protect against intelligent actors attempting to get around them. At least without severely limiting new poster’s ability to create threads.
Right. They actually post first without the links, then edit the post to include the links. Even at Bangladesh pay scales, it seems like a lot of work for something that usually gets deleted within minutes.
They’ve actually altered their behavior from time to time. They were originally posting nonsense titles. Then they partially copied the titles of existing threads. Then they exactly copied the titles of existing threads. Now they’ve gone back to mostly nonsense again with a few partial copies. But it’s all pointless since their threads are immediately recognizable whatever strategy they use.
Yes, but since the spammers get paid a lot more than our moderators and posters combined, it’s only a matter of time before they outsmart all of us.
Doom!
Oh dear.
Poof.
Consider: there probably are a lot of members (and guests, we count, too!) who do care, but just don’t feel like IMing. People that don’t feel comfortable wasting the time of mods. Polite but curious people. People who don’t want to be put in The File with the troublemakers. Frankly, I don’t trust I’d get a good answer. Do mods actually answer, “yes, poster XX was a sock of poster YY, who also was AA, BB, BB1968…”? Or is the answer “poster was a sock (go away now)”?
We are here. And we’d like to know.
Why would asking such a question privately be more likely to put you into this “File” than asking it in a thread, when it has already been stated that they prefer it be done via PM?
I don’t consider it to be a waste of my time. I’m more than happy to answer any PM on just about any question.
If the reason is socking I usually say that they are a sock, but I don’t usually list all of the sock names unless someone asks. If you are curious, ask.
Sometimes I’m a bit terse, but that’s not intentional and I hope I don’t give a “go away now” vibe. Like I said, I’m more than happy to answer questions.
Then you don’t care that much.
As I’ve pointed out, posting a question in ATMB “wastes” even more of the mods time. But as we’ve said, we don’t consider questions by PM to be wasting our time.
First, we don’t consider people who ask about these things troublemakers and I don’t know why you would imagine that would be so. But second, why would following the rules and asking by PM make you more of a troublemaker than breaking the rules by asking in ATMB? I’m always glad when people follow the rules by asking privately.
Why? And if you don’t trust us, why do you think we would give a good answer in ATMB but not by PM?
I will usually just say the poster was a sock. If relevant or the poster specifically asks, I may say who it was a sock of. Why exactly would you care about all the previous names of serial returnee? (And of course I’m not going to tell anyone to “go away now”).
It’s very very easy to find out. PM a mod. If you care so much, have you ever done so? From what you say, it appears you haven’t.
For what it’s worth, the couple of times I’ve PM’d mods about closed threads or whatever I’ve received quick and courteous replies, with no hint that it was a burden on them.
Also, FWIW, and speaking from personal experience, as a rank newbie here, and I didn’t know where the PM-the-mod button was, I posted requests here in ATMB for little fixes, and after the first gentle reminder to PM, the response to two different requests I later posted here were less gently reminded/told.
Until someone pointed out the damn button, which the mods thought I knew about. I didn’t, I swear!
Which reminds me, I later learned about looking up individual mods per forum, and sending one a PM, which actually a) seems less efficient in getting things done by anyone who’s got a moment, and b) not “fair” to the addressee, who may be off duty but gets a mailbox ding when his or her mind is on Other Things.
So tell me again (I think you answered this in another thread, on a traveling mod): I hit the clickie, it goes into a “mod loop” basket? Or does it check which mods are assigned to that thread, and then shoots it over to someone specific?
When you PM a mod, it goes directly to that mod and no one else.
When you report a post, an e-mail gets sent to all moderators of that forum (and only the moderators of that forum), and a post gets generated in a mod-only forum where we keep track of that stuff. Even though we don’t get post reports for other forums, we can view all post reports in that mod only forum.
The mod loop is a private e-mail list type of thing. It’s just for us to discuss things amongst our selves. No post reports or messages from users go directly to the mod loop.
The main page for each forum lists the moderators of that forum down near the bottom of the page. If you go to the SDMB main page, down near the bottom is a link for “View Forum Leaders” which will get you a list of all moderators and what forums they are assigned to.
Nm
Helps to read post you think you’re replying to intelligently…