This is an article discussion thread for discussing the Earners Forum article, "Use Forums Wisely, Don’t Be A Sig Pimp"

I'm beginning to think that should be required reading for new members.

I definitely bookmarked to send references.

I think that article should also bring SEO into the picture. People like using forums for backlinks to their websites. Good thing Google places little to no weight on forum signatures. The links for signatures have no link juice in them. Doesn't matter if you have 10,000 posts with signatures on here. Won't effect your PR or SERPs at all. Where's the incentives for sig pimps to post now?

Great post! Thanks for the link! LOL!

Unfortunately, most mods and admins (not here...other places) are still hesitant about deciding whether or not a post is considered spam based on short, generic answers as the ones mentioned in the article.

Personally, as a mod for a support forum of a popular piece of software, I usually take the extra couple of minutes to Google the poster's username, IP address, and/or post they made to see if they have done the same on other forums. Then and there, I decide whether or not to approve a post for public view. (we restrict a person's first post to moderation)

I'm a FIRM believer in disabling sigs in a member's first few posts. If they have a legitimate problem/question that needs to be solved/answered, they shouldn't be offended that their sig isn't enabled. Only spammers would be offended.

Just my 2 cents.

What is successful over at other forums is to restrict signatures until a person has 25 posts, or has been here for a month. Another much stricter policy, to flat out ensure everyone here is here solely for the content on here, and getting help, or helping out others, is to make it so no one logged in can view signatures. This includes robots. Like I said, it is a rather strict and firm policy (Sitepoint had to use this because that site is a spam fest) and is usually only used as a last resort. Both in my experience have been successful at limiting the amount of fluff posters on forums. Hope these help

Cheers

It's a hard job for moderators to be able to clean up all the spams in a forum. A moderator can't really tell if a certain member is a spammer or not unless if the member is too obvious. I hope members will realize the true purpose of forums and that is to provide connections to different people with the same interests and thoughts.

I know everyone has been stalked by one or two in their time spent in forums. You know exactly who I’m referring to. You’ve see them, the guy who joined just 2 months ago and already has 1,000 posts. Have you been so fortunate as to have one follow a thread you started? They rarely start their own threads and their responses to others usually go something like this: “Great post!”, “Sounds good to me”, “Well said, exactly what I thought” and further nonsense. There’s not ever much substance with what they offer.

so much inaccuracy

firstly - genuine activity would generate that level of posts - interested experts sharing info

these simplistic generalisations are dangerous and wrong

also it is far too kind to webmaster talk! it is easy to calculate and prove that more than 80% of posts on this site (not words, but posts, especially if you factor in those of me and any other verbose techies - techies, true ones, ARE verbose) are of the bad kind! I've seen numerous people get away with it. And without dropping any names (but all the other mods know who i mean) one mod in this forum clearly knows very little about technology... in the end, why does it all persist? Why isn't it all cleaned out?

easy: 100,000 pages from webmaster-talk already listed on google

if you're going to criticize the modus operandi, stop profiting from it people! bigotry = to let w-t have as much spam on it as it does, and then post articles saying it should be emphasized as a "rule" - when in reality the ad revenue of webmaster talk DEPENDS on the spam - the growth of the pages is more than 50% spam-driven! that's a fact. it's also the reason why most of the social media world is being destroyed and has no future. it's also why veteran developers, eg someone like me learning development, admin etc since 1999, has never ever ended up doing a forum seriously - the few times I almost did, I threw it away fairly fast - it is just about the least noble way a qualified techie can "cash in" on the web. no offence to any legitimately intelligent and spam-free forums, but in the end, the m.o. is the m.o. - the status quo out here is that most social media are artificially fighting for revenue against legit performance-adsales sites, the latter usually having genuine information and not being a tool for both spammers and lazy entrepreneurs who want to cash in on the spammers' trails - and there's no question about which is a total waste of time.

Originally Posted by hairygunther

...DEPENDS on the spam - the growth of the pages is more than 50% spam-driven! that's a fact. it's also the reason why most of the social media world is being destroyed and has no future...

Now that does make some sense.

and you believe this all depends on Google, eh?

Forums are fun and great for marketing. It works well for forum owners and users both as long as users go by forum rules.

The sooner all forums use nofollow on all external links, the better.

very great post.. very enlightening and informative.

Originally Posted by tayomismo

very great post.. very enlightening and informative.

Really? Did you even read it? Aren't you guilty of doing exactly what the article said not to do?

That's a good know but to be honest I do read the threads and get a lot of information from it.

To be honest, I think it's great that forums allow us to add signatures, but it should be taken away from pointless forum posts which are a blatant attempt to improve site ranking.

If I was to get a forum I would allow people to have signatures. The only time I would prevent someone from the forum was if they were blantantly spamming the forum. I would give a warning first, and not stop them from coming to the forum on the first time they did it.

As long as people keep the advertising in the signature and not spam the forum with links. I don't see a problem with it.

Sounds great


Sorry, couldn't resist.

But seriously, it is good to see that people keep pointing out what is, and what is not good forum conduct. I've had my share of people spamming just to get their links in.

But I still prefer them over the porn spam, anytime. I even got in a fight with my gf once, because she thought I was watching porn, while I was moderating my own forums!

(Luckily, I managed to get her to understand).

Originally Posted by Moxxnixx

Great post! Thanks for the link! LOL!

Unfortunately, most mods and admins (not here...other places) are still hesitant about deciding whether or not a post is considered spam based on short, generic answers as the ones mentioned in the article.

Personally, as a mod for a support forum of a popular piece of software, I usually take the extra couple of minutes to Google the poster's username, IP address, and/or post they made to see if they have done the same on other forums. Then and there, I decide whether or not to approve a post for public view. (we restrict a person's first post to moderation)

I'm a FIRM believer in disabling sigs in a member's first few posts. If they have a legitimate problem/question that needs to be solved/answered, they shouldn't be offended that their sig isn't enabled. Only spammers would be offended.

Just my 2 cents.

I agree. I think there should be a minimum number of posts required before you are allowed to insert a link in your signature. Maybe 20? Make them work for it if they want it.

But I have no problem with people putting links in their signature. Some people like using forums for backlinks and might not visit my forum anymore if I disable links in signatures.

Some people like using forums for backlinks and might not visit my forum anymore if I disable links in signatures.

But would your forum miss them?

I think there should be a minimum number of posts required before you are allowed to insert a link in your signature. Maybe 20? Make them work for it if they want it.

Thing is all they do then is make nn junk posts

gr8 post I am agree wiv u

or

TX fro you geat infromantion

or dredge up two and three year old introduction threads just for padding their post count.

When we had a Spam dumping Link exchange forum, that had a minimum post count and they posted crap all over the place first.

Thats true I guess, Chris.

Not sure if this would be a solution or not but maybe you could add a minimium character count or word count in order to post. Most answers require more than just once sentence.

But I guess if they really wanted to they could just place more junk in the characters or words. That is why I stray away from forums on my websites. Too much time on moderation. I was thinking about adding one at one time but was reminded of my one website that i had a forum on before.

Wow, obviously one hates signature link pimps here, but I mean this is how some people make a living.