Topic: Invitation Feature to Fight Against Spam Accounts (Read 225 times)

I have to admit that it was one of the possible issue that I failed to be certain what the best solution is, but if I may assume, they can get from their crypto friend? I mean, someone should know someone else that's already on crypto, right? I never get any private torrent invitation code --and I rarely try to get any-- so I'm not sure how they worked, but isn't it work by having a friend that's already inside?

And about users inviting their alt, it's actually one of the purpose in my concept. With the tracking feature (in assumption that it is possible), we can track whose alt is who, thus when we get one of their alt spamming, we can track their account source (in other word, who invite them) and distribute the same consequences of banning (or negative trusts) to the inviter.

Regarding just found about bitcoin on google, I have to admit that I base the concept on an assumption that most --if not all-- people do what I did on my first time knowing crypto or when I stumbled on any website's membership; that is: reading and surfing around this forum a bit to know more before I decide if it worth signing up or not, which this forum faciliate by guest-mode. By the time they decide if they want to be on the forum, they have a slightly better understanding about crypto to decide if they're interested (thus, will make effort on being on the forum by looking for invitation code) or just sated as a guest that can only read and not post.

And about invite-source, the concept on my head was actually more to:

Suppose A is the guest, B is his friend who runs out of invitation code, and C is the invite-source. A will ask B, but as B can't provide that, B will ask C to give one. Which C will then inspect B's post history to see how related he is to spamming activity (thus, can roughly estimate how likely A is a spammer) and decide if he worth given one invitation code.

I would understand and withdraw the idea if this feature is not possible, though.

I think a better way to combat the bump-spam problem in the altcoin section is to change the order in which threads are displayed from time of last post to something different.

How would a newcomer get an invite code if he doesn't know anyone? This doesn't make much sense. The only people who are going to be able to join the forum are the user's alt accounts you are trying to fight (people would just invite themselves) and those who know someone here. It's not like those "invite-sources" will go from website to website distributing codes.

What if I just read about Bitcoin, found the forum through Google and want to get some help?

That's not going to happen.

Since Merit feature being introduced, I think there are a lot of improvements on better part of the forum community's overall posts, but IMO, it is not necessarily effective against spam accounts. There are lots of ICO projects suddenly flooded with "wow, what a nice project, will follow!" posts made by newbies with date-jumping post history, posted at every several minutes that serve as an bumping accounts. I tried to look for some examples to give a better understanding, but I can't give a good ones. Nevertheless, I think most of us know what kind of posts I mean.

Without any intention to blame anyone, I think the situation are caused by a rather simple steps to create new account. The bumping and spam accounts can roam freely knowing that if one of their alts being banned, they only need minutes to create a new ones. Even with IP restriction policy, where if someone signing up from a known abusive IP, there are ways to bypass the restrictions.

I had an idea, what if we introduce a way to sign up via invitation code?

It works much like membership on private torrent site where new members will have to have an invitation code to register. This registration code(s) can only be given by existing members in reflect to their rank (and in a way, by merit, as merit are required to raise rank) or by DT or mods, like

• Full member has 2 invitation code
• Senior member has 3 invitation code (and so on)
• DT has 5 invitation code
• Mods... well, in my concept, Mods are giving "invitation Giveaway" on certain events (again, much like those private torrent)

Or maybe there will be this special group like Merit-Source where they have steady flow of invitation code?

The idea is: if the registration is rather difficult, it will possibly contribute on minimizing creation of new accounts and account abuse.

To complicate thing, suppose such idea above is applicable, I think a system where we can track who registered with whose invitation code will greatly helps, as it means the existing members need to be carefully giving their code because it can be tracked back to them. Means, if Sergey00-Smiley who invited by Holydarkness do an abuse or scamming members, it is not impossible that Holydarkness will bear a consequence of his action, maybe he'll get a red trust for inviting a scammers? Or get a banning together with Servey00-Smiley?

The bad side, it might encourage irresponsible members to sell their invitation code, but if it was tied to their membership and traceable, with the dire consequence ahead if the one buy their code do an abuse they will also get consequences, I think most will reconsider before selling. And oh, also, it will greatly decrease the number of new members on this forum (which, essentially destroy the concept of open forum), but given the outcome, and the idea where Invitation-Source and Mods can give invitation(s) to those they deemed fit... I'd like to know what other think about this.

p.s.: apology if similar idea already proposed once, kindly point it to me and I'll delete this one. I can't find any, though. Also, will move to respective board if I post on the wrong board, this is the first time I use this board.