Thank you for your well thought out contribution...

It is because of trolls like the following that I have no interest in using the oft-broken CAPTCHA, preferring to use spam filters and moderation of *every* comment.

Below is just one of the dozens of unsavory comments that have been submitted to my blog over the past 24 hours.

Yes it takes valuable time to trawl through comments; sometimes legitimate comments are trapped by the spam filters; and legitimate comments can take a while to be approved if submitted during the middle of my night, but the effort is worth it, if only to stop flame-storms and charmless correspondents such as "nesmes".

Argue a point with me if you are so inclined, disagree with me all you want.  If you stick to addressing the topic at hand, and do not attack the messenger instead of the message, then your comment will in all likelihood get through - but if you get personal, or you denigrate end users, or you participate in a flame-storm, then in all likelihood your comment will not get through.  Such are the charms of an autocracy ;o)

 

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Check out the translation:

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Published Thu, Aug 21 2008 14:24 by sandi
Filed under:

Comments

# re: Thank you for your well thought out contribution...

Thursday, August 21, 2008 2:40 AM by redwolfe_98

the persons comment seems harmless, to me..

# re: Thank you for your well thought out contribution...

Thursday, August 21, 2008 5:39 AM by Lucian Constantin

Sandi, please don't tell me that you think CAPTCHA is broken because it allows trolls to get through. CAPTCHA was built to differentiate between human input and computer-generated input and block the latest. Trolls are still human.

CAPTCHA is not supposed to replace moderation, but it is supposed to limit the quantity of the content you have to moderate by taking the spam bots out of the equation.

CAPTCHA also is not supposed to replace spam filters either, because spam can be performed by humans as well as bots. Again, it just reduces the content the spam filter has to check, thus lowering the chance of spam getting through because spam filters are not perfect and more spam messages translates to more chances of failing.

There are also multiple CAPTCHA implementations, some more reliable than others in terms of complexity.

# re: Thank you for your well thought out contribution...

Thursday, August 21, 2008 6:18 AM by sandi

Of *course* I do NOT think that CAPTCHA is broken "because it allows trolls to get through".  I was referring to reports like this:

internetcommunications.tmcnet.com/.../18772-yahoos-captcha-brokenis-spam-tsunami-the-offing.htm

and this

blogs.zdnet.com/security

and this

www.informationweek.com/.../showArticle.jhtml

and this

blogs.msdn.com/.../was-a-captcha-broken.aspx

I could go on but you get the idea.

The CS spam filters used by msmvps.com already capture 99.9% of spam - I see only one or two a month that slip through (and often less than that - I can go for months without a single piece slipping through) and it auto-deleted.  I only check it if somebody emails me to ask why their comment didn't go through.

If it wasn't for flaming and trolling I would consider moving to CAPTCHA and allowing all comments to publish without moderation, but CAPTCHA doesn't protect against human beings acting like prats.