I'm voting in favor of being a registered board. It will definately help with problems like we had the other day of guest users coming on and flaming/disrupting the boards. Now I know some people like the "anonymity" provided by guest posting, but honestly, would it really be that hard for you to give out a fake name or something if it meant that the board as a whole didn't have to deal with some of the one-post wonders we get?
Keep Anon I'd vote no for reasons I've mentioned before. The anon is a draw. If you had to be reg'ed, then you would lose some people who value that. -hl718
Re: Keep Anon You do realize that people that think they're truly anonymous are dreaming, right? Anonymous to other users, but not to mods, and basically everyone that posts in this forum is a mod. :smt040
Vote made. I belive that there are problems with becoming a members only board because we could lose people such as chaz or hl178 who are both great "Guest" members who provide loads of information and interesting reads. On the other had if we do become a members only board then we stop most of the one time spammers or flamers but also make ourselves look like a bunch of "important, better than everyone else" arses. The Guest posts aren't that much of a big deal really. Anyway, we have many Mods here so why should it be a problem? Think about it before you vote. Yakumo
You do have a point Yakumo, however, I'm not sure I like the idea of a handful of people who don't want to register making it so that we have to deal with and clean up after irritating guest posters. As I've said before, what is the problem with registering a phony name? Other people have also brought up the point that even the guests aren't truely anonymous, as assembler at least, if not the mods as well, has access to IP details, so if something bad were to go down, they would just be a little less naked than the rest of us. And there's all this talk of anonymity, which makes me wonder, what do people have to hide? I mean, almost every regular poster on this board has in their possession something that technically isn't theirs, from those of us with copies of PA and HalfLife to people with dev equipment from different companies. Plus, it seems to me that if anyone should be worried right now, it's Service Games over the PA thing. I guess my point is, I don't see the need for such high levels of secrecy. The people you mentioned are excellent contributors to the board, but aside from a little info and such it hardly seems like they need any reason to hide. I just don't like having to deal with unproven guest posters, and I think a lot of people agree. Again, if privacy is such an issue, it takes all of five minutes to register with some phony name, and there is the option in the profile controls to hide your e-mail address if it's required for registration (can't remember). Chaz, hl178, and others who post anonymously: I'm sorry if this sounds like I'm having a go at you, I'm really not, I'm just not too keen on picking up after incidents like the other day where guest posters decided to start 4 or 5 flame topics on the board, and it seems like making this a members-only board is about the only way to prevent stuff like that from happening, or at least cut back.
There's two kinds of registered accounts. The most evil is 'register to read', where no one can even browse without an account. This is stupid, IMO, and of value only to boards with extreme bandwidth usage or legitimate reason to keep their discussions private. Nothing discourages registration like this does - why register if you don't know what you'll get? Register to post is a lesser evil, but really is anonymous posting such a huge risk or irritation to this forum? You've got a half dozen mods for every category, there's not much risk of anyone running amok for long with that kind of policing.
True but what's wrong with being a registered user. I'm on a dozen orso message boards and all require you te be registered to post, you can read everything (although on some forums some sub catagories can only be read when your a registered user). I don't see why we can't go with the registerd to post option. And what i really don't understand is why some people refuse to register in the first place, it's not like not registereing will make you anonymous because that just doens't exist on the internet anybody can find out who you are. So i voted for registerd user board, not to tick off some great non-regieterd posters but just because i think it's a normal way for any message board.
I think the question should be not 'what's wrong with registering' but 'why should we require it?' If it ain't broke don't fix it, right?
See, the problem is that it IS broke. We're getting an increasing number of unidentified, unregistered posters selling things, spamming the board, and have even had cases of registered posters signing out and posting as a guest to flame or do other things. So there really is an honest problem here that most of us notice. I completely agree with Silverbolt - we're not doing this to try and be asses to the people that don't like to register, we're trying to make this forum a place where you can discuss and trade things with the other members without having to filter through the increasing number of unregistered, unidentified posters. I've pretty much said my all, and since assembler has put this to a vote it's up to everybody on the board to say yea or nay. My take is, if it means maintaining a more quality atmosphere here, I don't see what the fuss is about a 5-minute registration. And yes, there are mods here who can take care of any problems, but I think I speak for all of us when I say that we'd rather be doing the normal mod tasks like moving topics to their appropriate places, etc. than having to clean up spam posts or edit excessive profanity.
That above post was by me by the way. I just wrote it to prove that becoming a Registered users only forum isn't going to stop SPAM or Flaming. If some wanker wants to start sh!t then they are going to do it even if they need to sign up to the board. You see, I'm sure visitors to this board who have been here for a very long time have their reasons for not signing up. It's a free world so we can't make them if they don't want to. It would be great if they did but that's up to them. The amount of spamming on this board isn't that bad. If there is anything at all that could lead to a flame war or what ever posted by a guest then it get's automatically deleted. No warnings, no PMs. Deletion is the way to go. Take no sh!t as so to say. As for registered users loging out and then back in under a different name like I did above then they should get an IP ban. It's not hard. Mods know who those users are so there's no hiding. :smt027 Yakumo
maybe it's the coward Japanese guy in me saying "go with the flow" but if every other site on the net makes their users register before posting (and register an email account w/ the site) then why shouldn't this one?
We've had people registering new users daily for about a week over at SX. And that's with e-mail verification and a couple other safeguards included. Going around an IP ban is not hard either.
You cannot stop serious spammers or flamers, but maybe some arse kids who are to lazy to register. I dont see many unwanted Guest Posts btw, but maybe they get deleted too fast
I voted yes. Mostly because with registered members, it's easy to control the board. I don't agree that only registered users are able to read the board. But yes, if they want to post, they must be registered.
