Possible restrictions on newbie accounts.

[Lucius]

I have noticed that some members have expressed doubts about the credibility of newbie members who open the topic, ask a question and then no longer participate in the discussion. It is certainly not logical to say that all such cases are actually alt accounts that start a discussion in which they then engage with their signature accounts, but there is no doubt that some members are doing just that. How to prevent such behavior while at the same time not deny newbie members who really need help to ask legitimate questions?

The first proposal is to create a board dedicated only to newbie members, and that board should be signature free, but the question is how to force newbies to post there, unless they were denied access to post anywhere on forum. This is probably a bad idea, but it may have potential with some modifications.

The second suggestion focuses more on a topic opened by a newbie member to be automatically locked in let's say 5 answers in the event that the topic launcher does not ask a new question or reply in any other way. I know it is possible that the answer to a question is not given in 5 answers, but if we look at the Beginners & Help board a specific answer to the question will probably be in the first 5 posts.

Would such a measure (or something similar) make any sense at all, does it limit the forum's freedom of expression and whether it can prevent the abuse of a newbie accounts?

[o_e_l_e_o]

There is also a trend of newbies who start threads in an effort to advertise a site by asking some kind of "innocent" question about the site. The site invariably turns out out to be a scam, and the newbie is never seen or heard from again.

The first proposal is to create a board dedicated only to newbie members, and that board should be signature free, but the question is how to force newbies to post there, unless they were denied access to post anywhere on forum.

This is essentially a newbie jail, which theymos has stated clearly he will never re-introduce.

The second suggestion focuses more on a topic opened by a newbie member to be automatically locked in let's say 5 answers in the event that the topic launcher does not ask a new question or reply in any other way.

Users who are asking questions so they themselves can answer them will already have scripted the answer they are going to post. Locking the thread after 5 posts won't stop them from posting with their main account.

I don't think there is a way you are going to be able to combat this without catching honest newbies in the crossfire.

[truth or dare]

I have noticed that some members have expressed doubts about the credibility of newbie members who open the topic, ask a question and then no longer participate in the discussion. It is certainly not logical to say that all such cases are actually alt accounts that start a discussion in which they then engage with their signature accounts, but there is no doubt that some members are doing just that. How to prevent such behavior while at the same time not deny newbie members who really need help to ask legitimate questions?

The first proposal is to create a board dedicated only to newbie members, and that board should be signature free, but the question is how to force newbies to post there, unless they were denied access to post anywhere on forum. This is probably a bad idea, but it may have potential with some modifications.

The second suggestion focuses more on a topic opened by a newbie member to be automatically locked in let's say 5 answers in the event that the topic launcher does not ask a new question or reply in any other way. I know it is possible that the answer to a question is not given in 5 answers, but if we look at the Beginners & Help board a specific answer to the question will probably be in the first 5 posts.

Would such a measure (or something similar) make any sense at all, does it limit the forum's freedom of expression and whether it can prevent the abuse of a newbie accounts?

Imagine all of the insoluble negative problems just leaving newbie jail would have prevented.

Imagine how much better if sigs didn't exist the forum would be.

I will support your original proposal, if we reset the forum to operate under 2012 conditions free of merit cancer and the corrupt and faux " decentralized" trust.

Noob jail is (what you are essentially suggesting) would work great.  Those sig bans for X period are not being put to optimal use either.

The second solution would create enormous work and be very subjective.


Edit - I see a member already recognized you were describing noob jail which worked great. If now combined with sig bans upon release for x period if reasonable standard was not maintained could be great. Only if merit cancer was deleted as no longer required.

Default trust can be activity/ trade history determined.

[DireWolfM14]

I remember a discussion in one of the technical boards not long ago were a seasoned member speculated that the newbie who started the thread might be an alt of someone wearing a signature.  Posing a question with an alt, then engaging in the discussion to increase his post count.   I consider myself fairly skeptical and suspicious, but that suspicion seemed darn cynical to me.  I understand your concern, but the restrictions you're proposing seem like "throwing the baby out with the bath water."

The first proposal is to create a board dedicated only to newbie members, and that board should be signature free, but the question is how to force newbies to post there, unless they were denied access to post anywhere on forum. This is probably a bad idea, but it may have potential with some modifications.

A dedicated newbie board would become cluttered pretty darn quick.  We have boards dedicated to specific topics for a reason, a board like the one you're proposing would be all over the place with no structure.

The second suggestion focuses more on a topic opened by a newbie member to be automatically locked in let's say 5 answers in the event that the topic launcher does not ask a new question or reply in any other way. I know it is possible that the answer to a question is not given in 5 answers, but if we look at the Beginners & Help board a specific answer to the question will probably be in the first 5 posts.

This is a discussion board, and restrictions and limits on discussions would be counter-productive in my opinion.  I'm not saying that I think you're wrong, but what your proposing would only hurt legitimate newbies' ability to ask questions.

The other thing to keep in mind is there very well might not be a malicious sig-spammer behind it at all.  This isn't the only forum I've seen where newbies show up, ask a question, and never return to acknowledge a resolution.  There could be many reasons behind such behavior.

[joniboini]

Report to moderator should be enough. If the topic is still valuable, request the mods to lock it. Else, ask them to trash it if possible.

I also share the same thought that the 5 post (or whatever number it is) is not necessary. What we need is an active engagement to report if something has already been answered. Not prolonging the discussion or adding a bunch of unnecessary stuff, or even worse, repeating what others already said.

[Upgrade00]

Posing a question with an alt, then engaging in the discussion to increase his post count.

A member can cook up a half baked reply to a random thread on the forum much faster than they would if they went through the route of creating a new thread on an alt and then replying to it. I think the idea behind that action is fishing for merits rather than increasing post count.

I am also against newbie restrictions, there is already quite a handful of them aimed at reducing spam.

The first proposal is to create a board dedicated only to newbie members, and that board should be signature free,

How will newbies learn in a board dedicated just for them without seasoned members to answer their questions and queries? I can already see scammers opening newbie accounts and filling such board with lots of scam traps for newbies to fall into.

[The Cryptovator]

Your idea isn't bad, but I think it will effect all newbies who will join this forum with good intentions. Just for couple of abuser we shouldn't prevent all newbies from learn & constructive discussion. I have noticed as well newbies spam has been increasing nowadays. To prevent them we should use report button and moderators should more careful about handle reports. Locking thread after got answer will prevent others newbies from get lesson from it. So only obvious spam thread could be trashed or locked. I don't think theymos is going to do something like that suggested by OP.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

There is also a trend of newbies who start threads in an effort to advertise a site by asking some kind of "innocent" question about the site.

I've definitely seen that happen numerous times, with the most recent in my memory being about one of the lesser-known hardware wallets.  It's obvious when a brand new account does this, and I usually tune that crap out.

I have noticed that some members have expressed doubts about the credibility of newbie members who open the topic, ask a question and then no longer participate in the discussion.

That drives me nuts, because sometimes members will start a legitimately interesting thread and then they just abandon it without participating in the discussion they presumably wanted to spark.  Another thing that drives me even more nuttier is when a member (usually a low-ranked one) solicits opinions about an issue and doesn't give their own input.  What ends up happening is a thread is started with basically a one-line post which sometimes you can't even understand.

All that aside, I thought Theymos wasn't keen on restricting newbies--I remember quite a few threads just like this one with people wanting the "newbie jail" brought back and all sorts of other suggestions, but they all died off with nothing being changed.  And I don't know, the forum doesn't seem to have gotten much worse in the past few years, and especially since the introduction of the merit system.  There's no longer a forum-wide crisis of shitposting like there was leading up to Jan. 2018, so I doubt Theymos would even consider newbie restrictions.

[dkbit98]

I am not anti-newbie, as I was also newbie once but I saw abuse so many times,
and I also asked for some restrictions for newbie accounts before.
They should be limited in terms of home many topics they can create.

[Stedsm]

The question isn't the "debate-or-not?", but actually it's about the newbies not having knowledge of either the question they were asking or how things work here (or even those stupid alts). If a newbie himself is given an opportunity to just lock his thread once he's received enough answers for his/her question, s/he should do it. This "lock topic" feature is a game of a kid and they aren't too silly to come and say that "we never knew such things existed". It's not in the forum's liability to lock the thread but the newbies should do it, and IMHO the best way would be to display a warning in red color above their thread (just to them only) to lock the topic if what they're looking for, has been achieved. And a mod should step in and lock their thread if s/he believes that newbie is not responding, has enough replies and got the answer they were asking for and/or last but not the least, it's an alt account.

[Pmalek]

Maybe instead of a newbie restriction the forum can take another route and send an automatic email to the registered email addresses of new users who create at least one thread. it could contain a link to started threads and a remainder to come back, check the replies, and consider locking the topic if the replies have been satisfactory.

I have noticed such threads myself and although they are mostly created by newbies I am still against restricting a whole group because of the actions of some of them. Newbies should have the same posting rights but if they break rules don't hesitate to report or warn them about it.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Maybe instead of a newbie restriction the forum can take another route and send an automatic email to the registered email addresses of new users who create at least one thread.

If they aren't even coming back to read the replies to the question they asked, then an email reminder will achieve very little. That's assuming of course they have actually used an email they will check to sign up, and not just a throw away.

This also does nothing to solve the issue of fake newbies opening threads to respond to with their main account, or fake newbies opening threads to advertise some scam.

When the vast majority of senior members don't lock their threads which turn in to spam-fests, why should we be holding newbies to a higher standard?

[DireWolfM14]

Maybe instead of a newbie restriction the forum can take another route and send an automatic email to the registered email addresses of new users who create at least one thread.

If they aren't even coming back to read the replies to the question they asked, then an email reminder will achieve very little. That's assuming of course they have actually used an email they will check to sign up, and not just a throw away.

To further address this notion; in the circumstances address by the OP we are only assuming the newbie hasn't come back to read the responses.  Checking the newbie's profile page to check the last log-in isn't enough to make that assumption since the forum can be read without logging in.

[Harlot]

Would such a measure (or something similar) make any sense at all, does it limit the forum's freedom of expression and whether it can prevent the abuse of a newbie accounts?

I would say yes for thread locking but the one where the newbies can only create threads on a particular board would definitely limit someone's freedom. So thread locking is the best solution here since in this way you will really know if a newbie is interested in their own topic or not. 5 posts left unreplied is good but we can also make it better by seeing if the newbie member already made other posts from different topics, in this way you will know that the newbie is really not interested in their topic. I don't know if the latter can be done automatically in the forum so I suggest that thread locking can also be done with the user of "report to moderator" function so the mods can also lock it right away before it turns into a megathread.

[ChuckBuck]

Checking the newbie's profile page to check the last log-in isn't enough to make that assumption since the forum can be read without logging in.

Agree with you on this view  In case you do not keep logging in, users can still receive email notifications, links from emails do not require you to log in to see, so checking the last log-in is not an accurate option.

They should be limited in terms of home many topics they can create.

No, they should not be limited. We have to admit that new accounts are being abused for malicious purposes. But we have to accept it, because many people don't use this forum, but they know it as the best place to ask some issues (I'm talking about non-advertising questions). In this case, they can ask in any sections (because newbies don't know exactly where to ask questions), if we set limits, it will cause difficulties for them, which is not recommended, because fundamentally, this forum is geared towards freedom for all users  In summary, the abuse of new accounts will cause discomfort, but if limited functionality of new people, it will happen other unwanted incidents. New accounts have limited posting time at the start, I think it is already the best solution for now....

[ABCbits]

I have an alternative idea, signature is automatically disabled on thread if the OP is newbie. That way, we don't need to restrict newbie account in any way.
If it's genuine question, OP is more likely to get helpful answer since spammer aren't interested on thread where it's signature is disabled.

[Timelord2067]

I registered after having lurked the sexcoin thread for a number of weeks.  If I'd been told, "sorry, you can read but not post" I'm sure most if not all of us would not have bothered to register.

Some people register for "how to" advice, some go straight to the gambling or trading sections.  You would have to duplicate the entire forum in a "newbies only" sub section which is unpracticable.

[dkbit98]

No, they should not be limited. We have to admit that new accounts are being abused for malicious purposes. But we have to accept it, because many people don't use this forum, but they know it as the best place to ask some issues (I'm talking about non-advertising questions). In this case, they can ask in any sections (because newbies don't know exactly where to ask questions), if we set limits, it will cause difficulties for them, which is not recommended, because fundamentally, this forum is geared towards freedom for all users   In summary, the abuse of new accounts will cause discomfort, but if limited functionality of new people, it will happen other unwanted incidents. New accounts have limited posting time at the start, I think it is already the best solution for now....

Bunch of mambo-jambo philosophy that showed not to work like it should in real life.
It is like giving guns and bombs to kids....because hey its 'freedom'
Let babies run the show.

[Lucius]

This is essentially a newbie jail, which theymos has stated clearly he will never re-introduce.

I know about that statement, which is why I emphasized that it was probably a bad option. But I still think that something in that direction would be a good filter to separate the good from the bad newbies. Good and active members would get out of such a jail very quick, it take only 1 merit + activity.

I remember a discussion in one of the technical boards not long ago were a seasoned member speculated that the newbie who started the thread might be an alt of someone wearing a signature.   

We probably think of the same topic, but lately I've seen at least 4-5 similar ones in which some members express doubts about whether it's a legitimate newbie question, or fake one just starting discussion to get signature alt accounts in action. Of course I will not cite examples, because there is no point in making any allegations without solid evidence.

I have an alternative idea, signature is automatically disabled on thread if the OP is newbie. That way, we don't need to restrict newbie account in any way.
If it's genuine question, OP is more likely to get helpful answer since spammer aren't interested on thread where it's signature is disabled.

Good idea, this would definitely prevent anyone from opening a topic with the intention of using their alt accounts for signature spam. The question remains how technically feasible is this?


Thank you all for your answers and suggestions

[DTalk]

The forum has been created for the purpose of discussion on bitcoin, helping others to solve problem they face while using bitcoin. In a nutshell, the forum is all about a place of discussion for the bitcoin enthusiast. Signature is a partial benefit users are enjoying and some are enjoying benefits of paid signature.
In this regard, newbies are not the actual problem forum is facing. It's the signature campaign. Imagine, there's no signature campaign, no problem would have been there.

Imagine from my side, I am pretty sure Theymos would consider adding a local board for us if there was no signature campaign. Now, because of signature campaign, if Theymos create new board for us, a lot of spammer will be there and an active moderator will also be required which would not be the case if no signature was there.
In my local, all the media and blogs are misleading Bitcoin which might be another reason of govt not giving it a try which is why I had tried to get a local board and later even tried to build a local forum which was failed.
I have no problem with signature campaign but if for signature campaign, newbie some way get deprived of the forum feature, even a little bit, I would say no to signature campaign.