What should be reported as spam?

[PB]

As the regulars would know, we've had lots of spam problems
here recently. So when GWS advertised his new website, I
quickly marked it spam with this forum flag:



To the team: was that NOT the correct action? Because I'm
getting some flack for it. If what I did was wrong, then can
you please remove this flag option so it no longer exists?

BTW, I replied to GWS's post on his forum to explain that
this forum IS friendly and that it was just a case of spam
that got his post flagged. Hopefully he'll let my reply stay
posted instead of deleted, in the spirit of fairness.

[moogle]

It wasn't spam.

I can see why he wouldn't want to come back here though, it does seem unwelcoming to newcomers (maybe even long time members too, when they disagree with the general opinion).

[LuCiFeR[SD]]

PB... not wanting to give you any flack (You have always been very fair with me ).

My personal take on the usage of the report post option, especially with spam, comes down to gut instinct and a little investigation. if it is a persons first post and the content looks dubious then I report it. Especially if it goes to a site selling viagra or furniture or celebrity turd in a bag or something

if it is their 20th post... I look at all their other post content. I try to work out if it is a search engine rank manipulation bot or human. if everything looks good, I give the post the benefit of the doubt

in the case of GWS... I've not really investigated deeply (not that my opinion counts for much anyway... being such a grumpy old turd lately lol) but at first glance it seems legit. I don't really see an issue with the site. Its not really any different than people posting links to freeware stuff they find cool. its not trying to sell anything. it doesn't ask you for money. It just seems to be a programming related forum which gives you the option to upload files.

The only problem I see with this site (the same as any other 3rd party site) is that it could be here today and gone tomorrow, because people don't use it for whatever reason.

anyway. Sorry, didn't mean to ramble, but thats what my gut instinct tells me..... the site seems ok

[Demivec]

It wasn't spam.

GWS stated that it was a site for programmers of BASIC and that it included areas that were set aside for PureBasic.

His purpose in mentioning it was that it allowed the upload of attached files whereas this forum does not. A programmer could share there an executable without having to share source code if they wanted to do so.

There didn't appear to be any link to advertising.


A moderator who examined your report should have recognized the same facts.

[Danilo]

It is like telling people about your homepage. Also, we exchange URLs here every day, and many of us
are also interested in other programming environments, even other BASIC's sometimes.

It was a bit scary already when a 3rd party product, written with PB, got virtually banned here (asked to not advertise it here),
because FS was working on SpiderBasic Alpha secretly at the same time.
I'm not sure anymore if it's worth it to develop for PureBasic... maybe they are working on something similar right now,
and I can't advertise my add-on here. It's sad, and now you even want to control/remove every links to any other BASIC related sites?
Or programming sites in general? What about links to MSDN or Apple developer site? Advertisement for VB.NET, C#, and Objective-C?

Freedom or control and police state?

[idle]

There's no harm in reporting a post If it appears to be inappropriate or against the guidelines
Fact is If people didn't report posts a lot of spam would slip through.
In this instance the post wasn't considered spam so the report got closed.

[PB]

Since Kuron obviously missed this (see further down),
I've decided to highlight it in red for easier viewing:

I obviously made a bad judgement call. Apologies to GWS.

[oldBear]

There's no harm in reporting a post If it appears to be inappropriate or against the guidelines
Fact is If people didn't report posts a lot of spam would slip through.
In this instance the post wasn't considered spam so the report got closed.

Why was the topic locked? If it hadn't been, this discussion could be there instead of another new thread. (And this does seem more "Off-topic" than programming related.)

@Danilo "Freedom or control and police state?" +1

[Fred]

Moderation is done by humans, so each has its own judgement call so no need to jump to conclusion. BTW, this forum is for PureBasic, so if a topic doesn't fit we could lock it. Usually, the spam report shoud be used for robots (which have mostly disappears ).

[Tenaja]

Okay, I obviously made a bad judgement call. Apologies to GWS.

I do not agree that you made a bad call; it was perfectly within normal logic.

I also totally support Fred's decision to allow the post; it's his board, his rules.

What I DO think is unreasonable is for anybody to start screaming that this is an unfriendly board, just because we have rules, and we follow them.

[Kuron]

There was nothing remotely close to spam about Graham's post. The forum category he posted in specifically says: "Off Topic For everything that's not in any way related to PureBasic. General chat etc..." In no way did Graham violate the rules for that forum category.

PB seems to forget he is no longer a moderator and he is no longer a moderator for good reason.

One of the longest-running threads on the PB forums, is in the Off Topic category:

http://www.purebasic.fr/english/viewtop ... 17&t=14852

Lots of very helpful links to third party products and sites that are beneficial to fellow developers.

I seem to remember PB yelling spam when somebody posted a really helpful link to free models and other resources for game developers.

If somebody posts a link to a resource that is of no interest to you, does not mean it is spam and it does not mean it is of no interest to anybody else. People bitch about PureBasic getting no recognition and support from other sources and as soon as somebody decides to try and support PureBasic and give it some recognition, somebody shits all over them.

[PB]

Sometimes errors occur, and I apologized. No
need to come in and attack me when the dust settled.

[Tenaja]

Sometimes errors occur, and I apologized. No need to come in and attack me when the dust settled.

PB, I thought about marking it as spam, too. I decided not to, because it was close enough, for me, that I did not care.

The reality is that the post 100% matched the description in the "mark as spam" drop-down list. I do not think you made a mistake; it appeared more like you were following "the letter of the law".

The mistake is continuing to whine about it, especially after Fred cleared the air!

Now can we just move past this? Can't everybody agree that PB was not acting maliciously? Obviously, GWS' post matched the "spam" description, but the collective "we" do not care (and even more importantly, Fred does not care), and for the most part, all of us welcome him (GWS).

[Kuron]

There'd be way less spam and bot accounts if I were again.

If you were still moderator, there would be nobody but you and Fangles left, because you would have chased everybody off, based on how bad you used to piss members off back in the day. LOL

No need to come in and attack me when the dust settled.

Unfortunately, your bitch Tenaja decided to keep things going for you on another forum. You need to send him out behind the barn with Fangles and a tube of KY Jelly and let Fangles take care of him.

[Tenaja]

Hey, I do not know PB, or anything about him. All I know is that in this instance, I do not believe he did anything "wrong".

Can we move on now?