Ignore User feature

[Seven]

Hello Mr.Burns,

quakeone.com is now spam free again.
And that is all I can say (check your links from above).

Of course spammers will come again. And we will remove them again.
That happens to all websites. Even to func_ and other much bigger forums, etc. We all know it. We all have seen it.

The difference from today compared to 1 week ago here at quakeone.com is:
We now have a moderator who cares and takes the time to remove spam posts from the forum.
Just like we did it 2 years ago. We had many moderators who took care of this site and as soon as a spam was detected, it got deleted.
There is hardly a prevention because spamers are not only non-humans. There are also real humans who sometimes even implement words to match the threads topic in their posts.
You will not believe it what jobless people with lots of time are capable to do nowadays. They earn money that way...

But that is not the subject here. Spam posts are in almsot every forum.
It just needs moderators who quickly takes care of it. Just like 2 days ago at func_ . There have been 3 spam posts, but within a short amount of time the mods there deleted them.
Just like it will be done from now on here at quakeone.com.
The plan is to check every 24 hours.


By the way, I remember the slogan here at quakeone some years ago. And I think you are old enough to also know that cartoon series:

By the power of Solecord

You maybe remember when those special/unforgettable quakeone users posted screenshots like this. It feels like yesterday... man i am old.

Together we will manage it...

Most important is, users do not get distracted by tons of spam anymore. Which still was the case some days ago.
Hopefully this will not happen again.

Special Thanks to Mindf!3ldzX for the magical sword Grayskull who made this all possible.
Any other spam protection code-wise is impossible due to Steves absence.

Have a nice time,
Seven

[MadGypsy]

@Quakeone.com is now spam free again.

Hardly.

SPAM-post free and SPAM free are very different things. There is an easy way to fix a lot of this. You need a honeypot. A honeypot is a form field that is invisible to users but not invisible to bots on the registration page. Bots tend to fill out everything so, if the honeypot field is filled out it's a bot and registration is denied. It would take minutes for a competent programmer to add this to this site. An invisible html form field and an extra PHP condition where the registration data is being sent.

To take it a step further, have IP's banned for any registrar that filled out the honeypot. Making a site SPAM free is mostly very easy. Some bots are smarter than others but, a honeypot can go a looooooong way in removing spam.

[Mr.Burns]

Hi Seven,
Well that's a good start and if you played a part in that then very well done good sir.
I notice that the are 2 more spam posts this morning (example 1 and example 2 ) so would you happen to know if all of the offending spammers have had or will soon have their accounts banned? .

Kind regards
Monty

[Seven]

Sorry it took so long.

Quakeone.com is now spam free again.
148 posts and 16 threads have been deleted.

At least that should no longer be the reason/excuse to not post/visit here anymore.

Best regards,
Seven

[Mr.Burns]

Interesting. I was just about to add 2 new spammers (LarryGreen and Paul Jackman) to the 85+ spammers already on my Ignore User listing in my User Profile (and OP) and it appears to have removed all the previous entries and won't allow any new entries to be saved. So although I tried to help and make it a little less painfull for us to use I'm affraid it looks like QuakeOne.com won't allow me to do that any more and it would seem pointless to continue with this thread. Sorry ppl.
It's early days but fortunately NextGenQuake.com doesn't appear to have any of these issues (woot) as I have yet to see a single spam posting or rogue member.

Kind regards
Monty

[MadGypsy]

Wow, I didn't look at the updated ignore list when I made my last post. That's insane. NGQ is actively monitored externally by one free service and one paid service. It also has a firewall and a few random things that make life complicated for bots. It also is stripped of hacker friendly info like version numbers and stuff like that as well as having well known WordPress files protected/rerouted/renamed. I am up to about 40,000 blocked malicious attempts and to date not one bogus signup has made it through the login. I have a log of attempted spam members. It's huge and NOT ONE has succeeded.

I fully realize this post reads like a manual spam bot. I think it's hilarious.

[MadGypsy]

You're welcome to join my site and make news about your engines Baker . I may not have a huge user base but my viewer base isn't too shabby. Write something huge about yourself in the forum. I'll wrap it up for you as news.

Func is cool. I read your stuff on func all the time but, there's no real presentation, just text walls. Your stuff probably isn't reaching any new people.

As far as not knowing about my site that's kinda nuts. 303 literally informed every known quake player and I have the spreadsheet he made of all these people with the "told"/ "need to tell" checklist running down it. I watched the list change practically real time.

I'm on my phone. Let my brain finish waking up and I'll get on my computer and post the checklist here so you can see it yourself.

I haven't spammed per se but I've dropped a link in a not so spammy way on most of the major Quake outlets. Discuss, func, here etc.

My last one on func was letting Daz know I added his video playlist for the forgotten sepulcher to my site. And well, my signature here has been a link to my site since day one. Google NextGenQuake and realize how much my signature here plays a part in the massive results.

EDIT: you'll just have to take my word for it on the spreadsheet. It used to be in the "shared with me" section of my google drive but it isn't there anymore. Maybe mark deleted it. It was friggin epic! It was like an Amish member directory. LOL

-------

Regarding all the stuff you said about how hard it would be to get this site back like the old. I could do it single-handed and offered to about a year ago. We don't need all of solecords custom scripts. Starting with a theme would make a huge difference. Ya know, they make themes for this shit that you can just DL and install. Why wasn't at least that done? Find something brown. It would be better than nothing. A lot of what you are saying about this site ~ I did all by myself on MY site in like 200 hours (2 weeks). If you think 100% custom re-styling and configuring wordpress and THIRTY-TWO plugins is somehow easier than doing this site, you are wrong.

Fun Fact: You know how NGQ was born? It had 0.0% to do with making a quakeone replacement. I was on the phone with dutch and we were talking about the sad state of this place. He had a project he wanted to post but he didn't want to post it here. I told him I would make him a "little website" where he could easily post his work. Somehow I wound up building NGQ instead. NGQ is Dutch's "little website" so he could post his project that he never finished or posted. LOL! I always go big, bro. This time I had someone actually relying on my work so I made damn sure to complete it.

1 guy was relying on me and there was no way in hell I was going to let him down. How many people are/were relying on Solecord? I just can't accept the "reasons" you posted, brother. I destroyed every one of them single-handedly with far less riding on the line.

go here and click the preview button. That's what NGQ looked like before I wrote a single line of code. I very literally did exactly what Solecord was supposed to do here and I didn't give 1 fucking excuse. It was not easy at all. I actually started over twice after getting a decent amount of work "completed". Dutch can testify that this is NGQ 3.0. I absolutely refused to give up. I'm not saying my site is the best thing ever, but I know it isn't junky in any imaginable way.

For the record and even though this doesn't help my user base any, There is a whole lot going on behind the scenes at NGQ. It's almost like a secret collective or something. I don't know the right way to say it but in some ways, NGQ is a mask for a whole lot of private conversations and projects that only members know anything about (and I'm the only member that knows about all of them). Give it some time. Probably a lot of time. I'll have stuff nobody has.

I'd also like to say that, I don't hate Sole or anything as extreme as that. My respect levels for the guy are just in the negative. If something is important to you you make a way. This site is like a billboard screaming that we aren't important, his own thing (this site) isn't important. The only problem with that is, as long as this site stands it is his responsibility. So now responsibilities aren't important and what the fuck does THAT say about the dude? I'm just waiting to see a solecord made Overwatch site so everything I ever guessed about the truth of all this will no longer be a guess.

[Baker]

I have the feeling that taking the new version of Vbulletin and getting it to even partially resemble the old site would be a monstrous undertaking.

1. Many of the add-ons the old site used probably don't exist
2. The internal guts of how the code works is surely completely different than the old, so Solecord would have spend tons of time figuring it out.
3. The old site contained lots of custom code written by Solecord. The new version, none of that would work.
4. Does Solecord even have free time? He may not. Things change.

As long as the site is at least still alive, that is a small consolation.

Yeah, the early days -- those were an unrivaled blast. American and European players discovering each other, exchanging code and tips and rebuilding servers in both USA and Europe. Me playing on the Euro servers because the custom maps were fun and all the players like you and Polarite were fun.

Exciting times those were.

[Mr.Burns]

Thanks Baker... you're a gentleman and that's well and truly bookmarked

As a member and staunch supporter of the site consistently from the very early days (in fact you very kindly invited me here back in xmas 2005 ), I feel quite dismayed concerning the state of the QuakeOne site, but as I've mentioned all this before and offered to help I can only assume that either no one appears to be listening or Sole must have his reasons to let things contnue the way they have for this long . That's the way these things go I suppose. It's a shame as this could so easily have been averted with even just a bit of tlc but I suppose we are where we are, things show no signs of changing, and there is nothing to be gained from me going over and over it.
On a more positive note MG seems to have really got the bit between his teeth and at this point in time it's feels a very different experience over on NGQ, so I would like to show a little faith and see where we can go with this new approach.

Warm regards
Monty

[Baker]

@Burns - You could always tune into the conversations at Func_Msgboard. Particularly in the Mark V thread http://celephais.net/board/view_thre...375&start=2336 . Quake engine talk and discussion of user feedback/thoughts going on quite frequently. I know you like that and some familiar faces like mh, myself and Gunter are often part of any conversation going on.

@Gypsy - You need to tell people about your site. For example, I just now realized you setup a forum. I'm mostly about engine and map development talk, so I already do all the chatting that I want @ Func, but if I didn't realize you had a forum that's pretty bad because I intermittently read stuff here.

(When Solecord, Yellow No. 5 and myself started this site --- we told everyone we could about it and spammed a lot. There were 100 registrations in 4-5 days. Sure you can't do that now, but still you have to tell people and do some spamming.)

Kind of disappointing that the QuakeOne upgrade last year was such a feature loss and enthusiasm killer.

[MadGypsy]

I appreciate you Mr. Burns. I don't know if you read it in the other post I made but NGQ is paid up for 2.5 years. It's not going anywhere and it's just a matter of time before more quakers show up. When I turned my site back on I fell in love with all the hard work I put into it and the results. I'm never going to shut it down even if I am the only person on the site.

I can make you a promise too. My site is NEVER going to turn into a steamy pile of completely embarrassing shit like this site did. I mean, fuck, man. What excuse could possibly be given at this point regarding the state of this site? This site is like Solecord is walking around in public with shit on the back of his pants and 1 shoe, babbling incoherently about Barry Manilow coming back in his helicopter to save mankind. Super fucking embarrassing! What I'm trying to say is my own integrity would never allow me to leave some shit like this up. Which is probably why he is never around. This shit is embarrassing.

I find it ironic that I in many many ways I completely rebuilt the original Quakeone and people are still hanging on to this bullshit. Almost all features of original Quakeone were baked into my site since the day I exposed it. You know what I'm missing? Server browser. And you know why I don't care? It doesn't seem like anybody is ever playing online. I could build a server browser. I'm not wasting my time on something filled up with 0's. I could just make a page and write this line.

All servers no players.

And maybe I will, lol.

[Mr.Burns]

Thanks for the kind words MG/OMK, that really meant a lot. I've had a little break from QuakeOne.com for the first time I can remember, and had some time for reflection and although I have no wish to leave the Quake Community, it is fair to say that I will probably be spending more time away from wading through the deluge spammers and trolling here at QuakeOne.com in order to try and find a decent post.
Instead I will be trying to do something with a bit more positivity like attempting to learn how to code games over on NGQ. I Hope to see you and some of my other Quake buddies there but I will still continue to pop back here from time to time if I find anything interesting, and of course I will remain an avid viewer of Arrrcee's Quake Youtube broadcasts (if ever I can catch another one going out live ) so I'll be around as they say.

Warm regards
Mr.Burns

[MadGypsy]

I turned NGQ back on. I will leave it on til November 12th when the site dies a horrible "outstanding payment" death. If anybody wants to take over the site simply buy a domain and contact me. Or, if you don't want it but don't want to see it die you can pay for it. Its $43.20 a year. I really don't care about this one way or another. If I did, I would just pay it myself.

edit: I just updated EVERYTHING and installed even better security.

[MadGypsy]

People use the term bereaved when their spouse/child dies (probably the most consistent use). If that is the case for you my heart and prayers go out to you.

You know what's important in this world? Pretty much nothing at all beyond our family and loved ones. That being said, NGQ can wait ... or die and it's not going to matter 1%. If you ever need to purge you can call/text/email me whenever you want. I'm always available, brother.

[OMacKnight]

No worries, best of luck with what you're up to though at the moment and I hope everything is going well for you. Perhaps later in the year it's something we can come back to when the schedules permit it.