DT and Campaign managers stance on multiple accounts in campaigns

[yahoo62278]

As most of you know ive been involved with the fight against the spammers of the forum. I also realize its a battle we will never win but we can do what we can to try and stop the bullshit.

Most of the problem IMO revolves around the account farmers. There are some users who control upwards of 10 or more accounts. We will never really know the exact numbers. These farmers are in multiple campaigns posting trash like its a weekly job. They just post senseless junk because they have 5 other accounts they need to meet posting requirements on. This leads to multiple replies in the same threads over and over, alts replying to each other in these threads, and users scrambling to find threads they can post these quick shit replies in. Im also starting to think alot of these necro posters are guaranteed alts but i cannot prove it. I just feel like theyre posting every 2 minutes so that they can get 10 posts in and move to next account.

Anyways, If the accounts are proven to be owned by another person would it be a bad idea to tag them? Yes the forum allows multiple accounts, i know this, but if we allow only 1 account period for sig campaigns i think we can solve a few problems. IMO account sales will go down cause all the alts will start bleeding red. Obviously less spammers will be in the campaigns. Let me know your opinions as it will help me in my decision process.

I kno some will start screaming if managers were doing their jobs this shit wouldnt be happening. I agree that some could probably do a better job, but some of the managers have been doing alot. Look at our list in the SMAS thread. We have over 200 names on the blacklist.

Just tossing this out there for a discussion purpose for now

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[Avirunes]

Most of the problem IMO revolves around the account farmers. There are some users who control upwards of 10 or more accounts. We will never really know the exact numbers. These farmers are in multiple campaigns posting trash like its a weekly job. They just post senseless junk because they have 5 other accounts they need to meet posting requirements on. This leads to multiple replies in the same threads over and over, alts replying to each other in these threads, and users scrambling to find threads they can post these quick shit replies in. Im also starting to think alot of these necro posters are guaranteed alts but i cannot prove it. I just feel like theyre posting every 2 minutes so that they can get 10 posts in and move to next account.

Also you miss that some of them to even copies post. Most of those are either seen discussing their opinions in tipster threads or discussion threads.

Anyways, If the accounts are proven to be owned by another person would it be a bad idea to tag them? Yes the forum allows multiple accounts, i know this, but if we allow only 1 account period for sig campaigns i think we can solve a few problems. IMO account sales will go down cause all the alts will start bleeding red. Obviously less spammers will be in the campaigns. Let me know your opinions as it will help me in my decision process.

Don't know about connection to same user but if they are using their alts to create a discussion and increase post count then it is fair to give them red trust. BTW the thing I am mostly worried is that there are many signature campaign's being managed by site owners themselves who don't check these kind of threads nor they try to remove users even after someone posts or PM's them to get things noticed.

I was thinking of something like doing a monthly check on participants of signature campaigns. Just couple of days ago, I did a check and I found some crazy local posters and full with alts from a single campaign. So I might be starting it in coming week or two.

[Fortify]

It's a bit tricky to be sure, even if you are an admin, whether one person is running multiple accounts. If you see really low quality posts then the best you can do as a user is to report them to the campaign manager. Many people might be sharing an IP address due to the way that some ISP's are set up around the world, or multiple people in foreign countries may have a weak grasp of English because it is their second language. I think campaign managers can do more to stop it, but then the spammers just move to the campaign that has the least checks involved. Due to the way the internet works, it's a never ending battle and you cannot win.

[Lauda]

Anyways, If the accounts are proven to be owned by another person would it be a bad idea to tag them?

It depends on what you think about these users. I wouldn't trust someone who owns e.g. >5 accounts with anything. Therefore, I usually tag those once discovered.

Due to the way the internet works, it's a never ending battle and you cannot win.

I'm pretty sure you can win most of the battles with the proper policies.
As far as my campaign manager position is concerned: If you are caught doing this, you will instantly be permanently blacklisted and tagged.
As far as my DT position is concerned: If you are caught doing this, you will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis and probably get tagged.
This is a good starting point if you want to tag some alt rings: [User Generated] - Known alts of anyone.

[Quickseller]

The only reason a campaign manager would have a "no alt" rule in the first place is to build/farm trust....maybe we should have a public discussion about campaign managers farming trust in this way.

[yahoo62278]

The only reason a campaign manager would have a "no alt" rule in the first place is to build/farm trust....maybe we should have a public discussion about campaign managers farming trust in this way.

How would a manager be farming trust? Im looking at it as if we know for a fact a user has alts and is entering multiple campaigns, then theyre posting shit 99% of the time. If we allow only 1 account for sig campaigns period some of that stops.

I could care less about trust farming. Ive never asked for anyone to positive trust me. Never asked to be on DT, it all just came naturally.

Lately i feel like youre just in an argumentative mood, maybe its just me. Ive never had a problem with you personally but i would like a deeper explanation as to your meaning here.

[Lauda]

How would a manager be farming trust? Im looking at it as if we know for a fact a user has alts and is entering multiple campaigns, then theyre posting shit 99% of the time. If we allow only 1 account for sig campaigns period some of that stops.

I could maybe see a improbable scenario, where the campaign has a very few limited amount of spots and due to this rule you're favoring individuals. However, I don't expect them to leave trust ratings because of disallowing alts. However, in most of our campaigns (I think) there are plenty of open spots so this is a moot point. I don't expect a unified stance here, as DT members don't have to cooperate at all should they choose not to.

[Joel_Jantsen]

Speaking honestly,if you're just going to consider "DT's" and "Campaign Managers" stance on the subject,the thread shouldn't be opened for the community members to participate.You could have discussed with them personally since they're limited in numbers.

If I was you,I'd probably take everyone's opinion into consideration since the forum is driven by community as the whole and not just DT1,2/Campaign Managers.

As far as the post is concerned,I could share my views but I don't think that counts.

[yahoo62278]

Speaking honestly,if you're just going to consider "DT's" and "Campaign Managers" stance on the subject,the thread shouldn't be opened for the community members to participate.You could have discussed with them personally since they're limited in numbers.

If I was you,I'd probably take everyone's opinion into consideration since the forum is driven by community as the whole and not just DT1,2/Campaign Managers.

As far as the post is concerned,I could share my views but I don't think that counts.

The community is more then welcome to share their opinions but its the DT users and mangers whos gonna enforce if we all come to an agreement. Maybe if enough of the community chimes in 1 way or the other, then opinions can change.

[SFR10]

Anyways, If the accounts are proven to be owned by another person would it be a bad idea to tag them? Yes the forum allows multiple accounts, i know this, but if we allow only 1 account period for sig campaigns i think we can solve a few problems. IMO account sales will go down cause all the alts will start bleeding red. Obviously less spammers will be in the campaigns. Let me know your opinions as it will help me in my decision process.

I like the direction you're heading to (in general) but some things should be solved by their roots (in order to make it more successful). I fully support the idea of allowing 1 account for participating in signature campaigns (at a time) but this should be forced by forum itself (be added as an actual rule). This way more would obey it, even though others would still try to cheat the system but with proper awareness, they could get caught and be banned accordingly. Unfortunately tagging such users with negative ratings would only bring temporary fixes (as soon as they get one or some of their accounts tagged, they'll try to either purchase another one or create another one).

Regardless of the possible outcomes (temporary fix or not), every single step would be vital into bringing the amount of spam down so if users that have two or more accounts participating in campaigns (with bad and useless posts) are caught, those accounts deserve to be tagged (maybe some trial period like 1st offense 7 days of being tagged, 2nd offense 14 days of being tagged and so on...... so they wouldn't be able to participate on any campaign), but in special cases of someone that has two participating accounts but he/she is a very high quality and knowledgeable while being useful, I think an exception should be made even though it's really hard to keep the quality up with two accounts since there's always the urge of making more post than they should in the first place.

My suggestions:
1. Enforcing it as a forum rule (1 participating account per person on campaigns)
2. Case to case basis evaluation for tagging users with trial period punishments

[tspacepilot]

The only reason a campaign manager would have a "no alt" rule in the first place is to build/farm trust....maybe we should have a public discussion about campaign managers farming trust in this way.

Hard to see how this is the case.  The OP mentions several reasons why one might want to enforce a no alt rule.  It'll be fun to see a typicall quickseller explanation with the old hand-waiving and 'most-likely ...' stuff, if he does choose to try to explain it.

How would a manager be farming trust? Im looking at it as if we know for a fact a user has alts and is entering multiple campaigns, then theyre posting shit 99% of the time. If we allow only 1 account for sig campaigns period some of that stops.

Clear and concise.  What you say here is certainly reasonable.  What's going on is that you're threatening a cornerstone of Quickseller's MO on this forum: account sales and many many alts for sockpuppetry and manipulation.  Don't forget that he started out selling many many accounts.  Even now, when he gets into arguments, he pulls out an army of accounts to shill for him.

Lately i feel like youre just in an argumentative mood, maybe its just me. Ive never had a problem with you personally but i would like a deeper explanation as to your meaning here.

You're not likely to get anything clear, but we may get a typical QS paragraph trying to support his argument, then a handful of alts to back him up.