No comments from new journals

[arbat]

Title
No comments from new journals

Short, concise description of the idea
I want to block new journals from commenting in mine.

Full description of the ideaOn many occasions people create empty journals just for spam. This way, when that one-time-empty-journal is banned, they can create another

Comments

[azurelunatic]

Blocking journals that were created recently, for whatever value of 'recently', from commenting, without other measures to make sure that spammers get caught before those two months expire, does not particularly strike me as useful -- that will mean that spammers will create batches of journals two months ahead of time, and then start spamming with them as soon as they could do so. It would only be the dumb spammers who started trying to spam on the first day and would get blocked in some places and caught in others. (Though the people who blocked new journals would doubtless be shielded from those dumb spammers.)

If something like this is implemented, an obvious amendment would be "block new users from commenting [more than once per day] unless I have added them as a friend" because I certainly hope no-one will add a spammer as a friend (or keep a spammer as a friend, if one manages to fool someone for a short time).

[arbat]

There are other problems besides "normal" spammers. For example, you may ban a real person from your journal - only to have him back under different nickname, freshly created.

Now, while you are off in your office - an idiot like this can easily flood your journal with comments just in spite. Proposed measure will make it impossible.

[azurelunatic]

Yes, it would make casual abuse of that sort harder.

Cleaning up from someone who does such a thing can be made easier now by reporting him for ban evasion. A suspended user's comments disappear.

[arbat]

Been there. Investigation takes days, - and during those days the spam continues.

How about ban for new journals from a given IP, or an IP range?

[azurelunatic]

LiveJournal seems to avoid anything to do with blocking journals, or even blocking anonymous comments, based on IP addresses. I think it could be useful for someone who knows what they are doing, but would generate a lot of work for Support if used by the completely clueless.

One of the factors that goes into considering whether to develop a feature is whether it is usable by a broad range of people, rather than just a few.

[arbat]

True.

However, there is a feature that allows me to log and see the IPs of those who leave comments in my journal. I assume that if this feature was provided it means that sufficient number of people who know what an IP is.

I have used IPs on few occasion to identify spammers who used multiple "sock puppet" accounts to post messages to my journal. My proposal is just an automation of something I have been doing manually.

[azurelunatic]

There are people who seem to think of the IP address as not an IP address, but more like an actual identifier of the person behind the account. Such a person would block, say, a troll who lives at the same university as them, and then complain, "Why can none of my friends at the same university comment to my journal? They are complaining they are banned."

[arbat]

I was thinking more like:

-- Why can none of my friends at the same university comment to my journal? They are complaining they get messages that I banned IP XXX.XX... Oh... wait...

[azurelunatic]

Your generous thoughts do you credit, but this logical progression is outside the grasp of many who believe they know exactly how IP addresses work.

[charliemc]

Yes, agreed.