Also, since I came back to find over 10,000 spam comments plastered all over the Ghost, I’ve decided to take drastic action and installed a Captcha system, in the form of Jay Allen’s comment challenge. So, if any of y’all want to leave a comment from now herein, you’ll need to answer the not-very-tricky “challenge question.” (The answer, as the hint basically tells you, is Berkeley.) As a result, the spam ratio around here has gone from 10-15 a minute to none, zip, zero over the past 24 hours. Can the war on spam finally be over? I’m not rolling out the Mission Accomplished banner just yet, but I’m cautiously optimistic.
Tag: Spam
To Whom It May Concern…
“It must be on the basis by which I travel anywhere, being in a private aircraft, which bears a substantial cost unfortunately…I am confident that we will have a long, productive and warm relationship, but good relationships are built on firm understandings at the outset.” Among his many other shady dealings, it seems “Casino Jack” Abramoff tried to bilk the President of Gabon for $9 million, in order to set up a meeting with Dubya. Apparently, Gabon didn’t take up his offer…I wonder if they considered it spam.
You’ll never spam in this town again.
Well, much as it was fun to delete hundreds of poker, weight loss, and prescription-drug-related comment spam every day, I’ve gone ahead and (very belatedly) installed MT-Blacklist. Hopefully, it shouldn’t affect the few of you out there who do leave actual comments here…but if so, please tell me.
Three.Oh.
So, as most of y’all probably know by now, there was a great hullaballoo in the Blog Nation today over the release of MT 3.0, and specifically over Movable Type’s decision to start charging for various premium packages. Since GitM is just a one-user, one-blog operation, I still qualified for the free download, so I personally can’t complain. At any rate, we’re running 3.0 around these parts now, so if everything suddenly disappears, you’ll know why. To be honest, I’m such a low-level user anyway that I haven’t as yet noticed much difference from 2.62. The new comments-editing page seems geared to quick and easy mass deletions, which should alleviate the spam situation. I also haven’t enabled the TypeKey comment registration quite yet, but may begin playing with it in the next few days.
Spam Fortuna.
Ok, the Movable Type comment spam situation is now officially off the hook. I just spent the last hour of my life deleting 100 or so epigrams and witticisms sent in by diet loss and breast enhancement sites. This…must…stop.
Left-Handed Again.
Well, a number of people have suggested that I put the GitM sidebar back on the left side of the screen, so it’s been done. As per usual, I’ve also received a number of blog-comments asking me to try phentermine, gamble online, and procure some cheap auto insurance, but, alas, those requests will not so readily be fulfilled here. Sorry, xysggsll and Cheap Phentermine Now!, and thanks for writing. (Bring on the Typekey, y’all.)
Sea of Spam.
Like Genehack, Do You Feel Loved?, and countless other MT blogs, I’ve had to deal with a spate of comment spamming lately. So, for anyone else with similar issues, here’s an anti-spam hack for MT…please drop me a line if you notice the comments getting overrun.