how about issuing "yellow cards" like in soccer? or penalty counts to those who simply invades a thread just to post profanities. or some kind of spam counters like i saw on Amazon reviews or was it YouTube. Really like to keep away those who has nothing to contribute but personal attacks and foul language.
Why not start with banning all free email addresses from signing up and only accept traceable emails from ISP's ? (I use a free email address but would have no problems using the one from my ISP)
Chaos had a great idea when he mentioned that users should be rated. And this forum engine actually has an upgrade to allow that functionality to occur. The "Reputation" system that allows users to give reputation points to a good poster and deduct them from a jackass would let users follow and subscribe to threads from good posters and ignore ones from idiots. Also, you cannot add reputation points to someone if you don't have any yourself (prevents people with multiple accounts from giving reputation points to themselves).
THAT was one of the things I suggested. It is a very good filter, and many places require this. If you have an ISP, they provide you with your own email address. It prevents people like Cold from going to the library, and constantly rotating aliases via yahoo/hotmail to keep haunting ET. you can grandfather in everyone who is currently a member.
the problem of this though, is that people can generate a lot of aliases and then target anyone they disagree with or elevate people they agree with. And I disagree that they cannot elevate themselves. Once they make a few comments, and gather just one positive, they can do this anyway. Maybe only allow people with a certain # of posts (250, 500, 1000, 2000, etc.) to rate others. That prevents Johnny 6-post from banging someone. If they are not a regular contributor here, they should not be able to come in and bang others, in the same way as someone like nitro should be able to. Also, if you have someone on ignore, perhaps they should not be allowed to rate you positive or negative. If you are trying to ignore a troll, then giving you a negative rep is a way to exact revenge.
The business model of this site is to sell eyeballs to advertisers. Nothing wrong with that. It works. And anything that interrupts that, such as any kind of a registration process at all, is not good for Baron. However, I do think that some type of rating system is an excellent idea, as it will serve to raise the level of discussion a bit, without turning away users.
The rep system I'm speaking of, and have used, does not allow you to "ding" (give negative rating) or give positive reputation until you gain 15 rep points. Moderators are the exception.
sounds better. When given the opportunity to abuse the system, there will always be a few percent who add nothing, but will hammer anyone who disagrees with them. And set up aliases to assist them. On EBay, a few buyers or sellers will hold others hostage, even implicitly, to get their way. Only well-established, reliable ETers with a sizable number of posts should have the right to commend or hammer others.
although very well meaning, you guys have absolutely no clue what works with this demographic. baron has cracked the code, so to speak, creating this behemouth of a site in an extremely difficult market to break into. he is THE EXPERT in this field, very few can compete. what he says should be analysed very closely by those who care and taken as fact. like it or not, this site lives on page views, it dont matter the quality of the viewee, views are views are views are as far as the advertiser is concerned. sad but true. surf
I liked the idea of rating posters but to having a credit card requirement is a bad idea for his business model. I wouldn't be apart of this site if it required a credit card. As with any other free site that wanted that information. I think that is the general consensus as well. It just makes people uncomfortable.