free membership solution

[LDB]

Free is better, or at least preferred but that leads to troublemakers or flat out trash like a few of our banned friends. It's actually not a free solution. It's about a fifty cent solution. Anyone can join and set up a username and read all the forums. Nobody can post until they mail a copy of their DL/CDL in to the EO offices to identify the real person behind the screen name. Hopefully the small percentage who are too lazy to do that simple thing are also the small percentage of trash we don't need/want.

 

[OntarioVanMan]

Free is better, or at least preferred but that leads to troublemakers or flat out trash like a few of our banned friends. It's actually not a free solution. It's about a fifty cent solution. Anyone can join and set up a username and read all the forums. Nobody can post until they mail a copy of their DL/CDL in to the EO offices to identify the real person behind the screen name. Hopefully the small percentage who are too lazy to do that simple thing are also the small percentage of trash we don't need/want.

If you noticed the last flurry this weekend...

It escalated as the responses escalated like a real time shouting match....one just has to walk away and viola...it is over.

 

[chefdennis]

its only over till the next time, so far our friends have hit what 3-4 members with "direct" attacks over the past 3-4 months....with this last one escalating to the worse....

 

[greg334]

Leo,

Sorry man but you are starting to sound like Phil and his suggestions to police posts, it seems to be getting insane.

Read what I have posted in other threads and think about what my message is about this subject - take it from someone who knows.


can't type to well, laughing too hard.

 

[LDB]

Saying ignore it is all well and good however it is unlikely to happen. There will always be a few who don't immediately suspect the trash who spam and troll. They'll take things at face value and off we go. You can't blame people for expecting honesty and integrity. Sadly, a few former members have no integrity. I'd think anyone wanting full access would be willing to invest one photocopy, one envelope, one stamp and a few minutes of their time.

 

[jaminjim]

If there is a need to stop the problem that was experienced this weekend, the solution could be as simple as restricting posting privileges of new posters to only one forum until they reach a certain number of posts and time as a member, something along the line of fifty posts and one month as a member. Part of the requirements would be that they cannot defame /flame any member during that time.

 

[piper1]

You can't blame people for expecting honesty and integrity..

It's all well and good to say "just ignore it" but Leo is right. A lot of us are just not that jaded and cynical of our fellow man. Call me naive or wet behind the ears but I for one don't want to get to a point where I assume everything is some BS game. If you have to get to that point, why bother being on here at all.

I guess I just don't get it.

 

[LDB]

One of our worst trolls had plenty of posts and membership time so basing it on post count and time isn't likely to be enough.

 

[cheri1122]

Maybe admin could use one of the unique characteristics of EO to filter out the trolls: we actually get to meet other members out on the road, if not at scheduled events. Members could be assigned to either a known or unknown category [ie: known to admin, or other known member/s].
Labeling a new member as unknown doesn't mean they're untrustworthy, just that they're unknown. And those of us who aren't looking for the trolls [because we don't do it ourselves, the thought doesn't even occur to some of us] can at least be forewarned of an 'unknown quantity', eh?

 

[LDB]

The problem with that is you just get one scumbag vouching for another one as well as the uncertainty of meeting up with folks. It could take too long to meet and many would never meet. Far simpler to mail in a photocopy of DL/CDL and the pertinent info gets entered into a database and the user gets posting priveleges.

 

[transporter]

If somebody is lied about on this web site it is much more than not nice. Your carriers are reading the forums and it is affecting you.
Because of this you can not just ignore it. One it will keep happening. Two his carrier just might believe it if it was ignored.
To just say ignor it is being a inabler and part of the problem.

 

[greg334]

Saying ignore it is all well and good however it is unlikely to happen. There will always be a few who don't immediately suspect the trash who spam and troll.

Leo,
It's not the reader's job to suspect anything, it is the job of the moderator to and their job to bring this to the attention of the admin or do the job themselves limit the impact of OP and what they posted. If the moderators are not doing their job, then this is another issue in itself but overall there is a system setup here to filter the BS which you are part of and you can't get anything easier than that - live person monitoring the forum.

These are all good intended ideas but no one seems to understand the work involved with implementing them and the possible negative impact to the overall site. When you become an owner of a forum, or run one, then you see a lot of cr*p behind the scenes and the work involved. I think Lawrence, Dale and others do a great job here and this is one incident that everyone is making a BFD over but as Witness and a few other people have said - ignore it. If someone posts a follow up to an opener, then it lands right back into the laps of the modarators to deal with it or bring it up to the attention of the admins.

There are a lot of sites out there that do a lot of things because they are either lazy of plain dumb. For exanmple one of these sites I don't like has limits the amount of posts I can read - I think ten a day, that site I don't like because it is forcing me to log in to read, let alone post. It also forces people to sign up which is a bad way to build memberships up to sell ads. Another site if I want posting access, I am to use my full name and email a live person begging for access which causes me avoiding that site as much as I can, even though I can read all I want.

 

[cheri1122]

The problem with that is you just get one scumbag vouching for another one as well as the uncertainty of meeting up with folks. It could take too long to meet and many would never meet. Far simpler to mail in a photocopy of DL/CDL and the pertinent info gets entered into a database and the user gets posting priveleges.

I have no problem with sending a copy of my license, if that's the solution. However, the method I suggested wouldn't depend on folks meeting 'by accident' - there's quite a few scheduled EO events to attend, IMO.
Really, Leo - how many of the known members would you classify as scumbags anyhow?! Never mind - I shouldn't have asked that question. I'll just send the license - but I'm blacking out the photo. [Trust me, you don't want to see it. And neither do I, sigh.]

 

[arkjarhead]

I understand the reason for needing some extra measure. I think if you start make it to difficult for newbies to sign on then it will cost us more good ones than the couple of bad ones. I'll admit I don't know what the answer is.

 

[LDB]

I agree there are a number of events but I doubt that even half the membership has ever made it to an event. A certain percentage has made it to multiple events too I'm sure. There may be a better way to do it but it seems like mailing in a copy of a CDL is about as easy as it gets and would give more certainty than we currently have. Out of the 10k plus members I'd imagine there's a handful of useless bums, maybe even a couple of handfuls but that would only be maybe 8-10 out of 10k plus.

 

[RLENT]

There will always be a few who don't immediately suspect the trash who spam and troll. They'll take things at face value and off we go.

Entirely correct - got sucked in on thread myself in the last week, where something said in a post caught my eye and I responded .... I thought I had seen the screen name before but didn't remember or couldn't really place it. It appears (based on subsequent posts by that screen name) that I swallowed it hook, line, and sinker ....... cute (not).

You can't blame people for expecting honesty and integrity.

No, you really can't - but I'm not really sure what the solution is either.

 

[greg334]

Out of the 10k plus members I'd imagine there's a handful of useless bums, maybe even a couple of handfuls but that would only be maybe 8-10 out of 10k plus.

So why would you go through adding a staff member at EO HQ to receive something like a letter with a copy of a CDL to "qualify" a member when there is only a few "useless bums"?

Sound's like too much emotion going into something too trivial - the troll wins this round.

 

[cheri1122]

Sound's like too much emotion going into something too trivial - the troll wins this round.[/QUOTE]

Trivial? Not to the member who was portrayed as being jailed over a bar brawl, it isn't.
All the troll won is the booby prize, and he/she [that's just pro forma - I believe it was a 'he'] is welcome to it.

 

[highway star]

So, all someone has to do is Photoshop a bunch of "CDLs" and they're good to go with multiple screen names. It would appear the only solution is the status quo.

 

[Darmstadter]

It might not be the best comparison, but I'll do it anyway. It resembles terrorism. Everytime a terrorist group attacks, they draw attention to their cause. They get people to change their daily habits, come up with rules, policies, etc, etc. All the while, hiding in anonymity.

Anything that is put into place can be worked around---these bums will always figure out a way to get in. Restrictions will not keep them out and only serve to discourage decent folks from participating. As several people mentioned---these bums want attention and want to throw a wrench in the works here. The more attention they get, the more they win.