If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.

- George Washington

Wednesday 30 October 2013

Comment policy

Regular readers, both of you, may remember that a while ago I turned on word verification for comments to this blog.  I was getting so much spam it was 'doin my ed in like', and turning WV on stopped it instantly.  However, I know from my own experience that the Blogger WV thing is very irritating and clumsy.  More than once I have written a fairly thoughtful and considered response on another blog, only to give up after six attempts to decipher some random squiggles in a box.  My time has been wasted, the world will miss that particular pearl of wisdom, and the whole thing is unsatisfactory.  I was very reluctant to turn on WV for my own blog, as I know how big a pain it is, and I have had some feedback from readers that it was putting them off commenting.

But when you are writing and managing a blog in your spare time, spam is a real hassle and takes a lot of your attention away from where it should be, so I don't apologise for turning on WV until the tsunami of rubbish abated.  I'm a bit of an innocent when it comes to these things, but the spam was increasing over time, and my guess was that the blog was getting on more and more spam lists as the spam comments were visible for a while until I got round to deleting them, and therefore appeared in some Greatest Hits in a database somewhere.  My hope is that, now the blog has been silent for a few months, whoever does these things will have assumed the blog is no more and will have moved onto more fertile soil.

So, WV is OFF for the time being.  Comment all you like, magnifying glasses not necessary.  If the spam returns, I will have another think.  It has been suggested that I allow comments from registered users only, which would solve the problem, but might bring others in its wake.  We shall see.

If anyone has any bright ideas, let me know - in the comments :)

Here's a poster to make you laugh.



17 comments:

  1. Bummer on the spam. On Wordpress there is "Askimet" that filters comments that are spam. It catches most of them. Also, you need to be approved the first time you comment and then it is automatic for a return visitor.

    P.S. I too have lost a brilliant - at least in my own mind - comment to the squiggles.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I agree, that for users, Capcha is a pain-in-the-butt that not even Specsavers can cure.

    I also appreciate the effort Bloggers put into their work, and their need to eliminate hassle.

    If I recall correctly, many moons ago when you first discussed the spam problem and possible solutions, you referred to a Capcha-alternative that was a simple maths question that would defeat harvesters. (Such as ‘three plus five =‘ and the punter answered ‘8’.)

    I don’t consider it unreasonable that if I was a first-time commenter on a blog, that I should initially jump through the Capcha hoop, to obtain registered-user status.

    I fear your optimism, that temporarily-dormant blogs somehow die off spammers’ databases.

    Whatever, keep up the good work.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I guess I never really found the captcha to be that much of a deterant to commenting. I just hit the reload next to the captcha until one comes up that I can easily figure out.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks for the comments. I suppose the captcha is easy to get around if you do as Richard M suggests, but the problem is many people are put off from commenting before they get to that stage. Wordpress seems to have the answer - first comment moderated, and after that it's straight in. Not sure I need the hassle of moving platform right now, though. Perhaps the 'registered user' option may be the answer. I shall investigate. Thank you for your feedback.

    ReplyDelete
  5. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I enjoyed the captcha

    Some quite rude words emerged....

    ReplyDelete
  7. Naughty Nick. There are websites for people like you. Peepobellybumdrawers.com for starters. Ironically, the first spam comment since I removed the captcha came to this post.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. O-ver your lino ... or is that mixing genres too eclectically?

      Delete
  8. I have no bright ideas, alas I am a dim bulb today.

    I know from my own blog that I don't usually get spam comments posting to the blog even without word verification, just the occasional one. I don't approve each comment unless it is on a post more than 5 days old. I find that is where most of the spam tries to hit when I look in the spam filter at the stuff it catches - it is the older posts.

    It seems to go it waves. Mega spam in the filter and the last week or so has been nothing. Weird.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Dim bulb ... I will remember that one. I've had two spam comments since the 'relaunch', which doesn't bode well. One was less than 24 hours after posting, the other caught by the '14+ days' rule and deleted. You're right - the vast majority seem to come with the older posts. I currently set it at 14 days; perhaps I should tighten it up a bit.

      Delete
  9. I could not have lamented any better. I don't often comment on sites that use the frustrating comment-blockers after experiencing the same troubles. I really thought I was the only one affected as I didn't see it mentioned anywhere else! Thanks for making it oh-so-much easier to share our genius with you! Keep up the great blogging. Dan

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Dan. I absolutely loathe the Blogger captcha, mainly because it is done so much better on other platforms. I will try a lot of alternatives before I go back to that. Hoever, your comment is evidence that WV does reduce the propensity of people to comment, and I thank you for saying so. All feedback is useful.

      Delete
  10. Genuine comments tend to be left in the first couple of weeks after publication. The approach I take is to allow open, unverified commenting for 30 days, after which premoderation is applied automatically -- which has the advantage of being a standard Blogger configuration option. Doesn't stop the spam but it does contain it a bit.

    Plus there is the curiously perverse narcissistic pleasure of checking through the spam folder, and clicking through to reread two- and three-year-old posts I'd forgotten about.

    ReplyDelete
  11. I always copy my posts and if the load goes pear shaped, I start the re-load from the begining, and have my copy ready to paste.

    ReplyDelete
  12. I took the WV off for a while and got so much spam and ads that I went back to using it. People who really want to comment will leave one with the WV on. Using the "approve" comments can help that too if you take the WV off. I've used that too and seemed to work okay. Still got the spam though.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Also I will add that the first time i took the WV off a spammer got ahold of it and hacked 5 years off my blog. WV went on with the new blog.

      Delete

Comment is free, according to C P Scott, so go for it. Word verification is turned off for the time being. Play nicely.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...