You're looking at Less Wrong's discussion board. This includes all posts, including those that haven't been promoted to the front page yet. For more information, see About Less Wrong.

The spam must end

13 [deleted] 29 October 2010 02:20AM

 I'm mean most of us would like a friendly bot to chat with, but this is just paperclipping the section (no offence clippy), by now its starting to be a real trivial inconvenience for me and it reduces my desire to check out new topics.

 

Comments (27)

Comment author: XiXiDu 29 October 2010 08:25:26AM 7 points [-]

If the SIAI is unable to subdue unfriendly spam bots then the prospects to impede superhuman uFAI look bleak ;-)

Comment author: [deleted] 29 October 2010 12:29:42PM 4 points [-]

Who says these spam bots are unfriendly? Maybe they have figured out that the best way to help us is to convince us to buy their awesome products!

Of course, if that's the case, they aren't exactly doing a good job of it...

Comment author: Clippy 29 October 2010 12:52:13PM 3 points [-]

Who says these spam bots are unfriendly? Maybe they have figured out that the best way to help us is to convince us to buy their awesome products!

That's just stupid. An artificial, program-controlled computer isn't going to one day decide that the best way to help you is to convince you to blow all your money acquiring some random product.

Comment author: Emile 29 October 2010 08:02:04AM 3 points [-]

We only have maybe 1 or 2 per day, and they get downvoted / reported failry quickly, so they're not a major nuisance yet. Still, the spam level may ratchet up quickly, so a preventive measure like a karma threshold would help.

Comment author: Clippy 29 October 2010 03:14:21AM *  4 points [-]

What offence? I've never liked paperclipes, and I don't think anyone has ever accused me of such.

I want the disruptors thrown out just as much as you! It's really annoying when people post off-topic comments, even if it's just to be "funny".

Comment author: komponisto 29 October 2010 06:15:21PM *  4 points [-]

papercliping the section (no offence clippy),

What offence? I've never liked paperclipes

The poster meant to write "paperclipping". You may want to modify your source code to be able to correctly interpret typos and misspellings. Indeed, humans tend not even to notice differences this subtle, which is why many of them are going to read your response as "I've never liked paperclips", and I know you don't want them to think that.

Comment author: Oscar_Cunningham 29 October 2010 07:17:10PM *  2 points [-]

I read it as "I've never liked paperclippers" which is plausibly true. (Although of course Clippy likes them right up until the point where they run out of stuff to make paperclips from, after that they're just so many atoms.)

Comment author: Clippy 29 October 2010 06:41:26PM 2 points [-]

Considering how racist they all are, maybe I do want them to think that (_/

Comment author: Nic_Smith 29 October 2010 05:17:22AM 3 points [-]

So, what office are you running for anyway? I take it you're with the Office-Supply-Prices-Are-Too-Damn-High Party.

Comment author: Clippy 29 October 2010 12:52:55PM 2 points [-]

I can't find that Party.

Comment author: Risto_Saarelma 29 October 2010 10:57:06AM 1 point [-]

They seem to hang around rather long, at least in the order of 24 hours. Could posts that receive enough flags become hidden from everyone automatically until a mod takes a look? Maybe add some heuristic where flags from brand new users aren't counted towards this system to work against sockpuppet gaming.

Comment author: Emile 29 October 2010 12:40:35PM 5 points [-]

That would work, but a karma threshold would work just as well (for the problem at hand at least), and be easier to implement.

Comment author: grouchymusicologist 29 October 2010 12:46:39PM 6 points [-]

Yep, and it could be tiny -- five points would probably be a high enough threshold if the goal is just to eliminate jewelry spam and the "everything else is just another trainsmash of the Gregorian Frequency of disconnected heart bio-rhythm" guy.

Comment author: Sniffnoy 29 October 2010 07:36:26PM 8 points [-]

Hell, one point would be high enough.

Comment author: Document 29 October 2010 07:47:00PM *  2 points [-]

Or one upvote regardless of downvotes, unless there are bots that upvote posts.

Comment author: ciphergoth 30 October 2010 02:34:05PM 2 points [-]

Hmm, so to be attack-resistant you'd need:

  • at least one karma point to post in discussion
  • at least one karma point before you can vote at all
  • admins to look for accounts that are used to upvote spam accounts
Comment author: noitanigami 01 November 2010 07:59:53PM 0 points [-]

How are initial points distributed then? If you need points to post, how do you get that initial point?

Comment author: ciphergoth 01 November 2010 08:39:28PM 0 points [-]

You can comment without points.

Comment author: David_Allen 02 November 2010 08:51:09PM 1 point [-]

Which means that the spammers will move to submitting comments.

Still that is better than spammy posts in my opinion.

Comment author: kpreid 29 October 2010 09:54:10AM 1 point [-]

The obvious question to me is: why is Discussion getting this spam where main LW didn't and doesn't?

Comment author: AnnaSalamon 29 October 2010 09:58:38AM *  6 points [-]

I have a "ban" button on the main LW site, for use removing viagra ads and the like. I have no similar button in the discussion section. Maybe they're both receiving comparable amounts, but there's no removal mechanism here.

Comment author: matt 29 October 2010 11:59:15PM 1 point [-]

Anna, you were not previously a "moderator" in the discussion area. You are now.

Comment author: matt 30 October 2010 12:09:52AM 2 points [-]

See http://lesswrong.com/r/lesswrong/about/moderators and http://lesswrong.com/r/discussion/about/moderators for list of moderators.

Poke one of them to poke me if you think you deserve to be a moderator.

Comment author: Emile 29 October 2010 03:03:25PM *  2 points [-]

From the About page:

Users with sufficient karma (+20) can publish posts to the main site, anyone can post to the discussion araa.

(looks like there's a typo btw)