Someone, ANYONE, explain to me ANY purpose Spambots serve! Not advertising--That's for sure!!!

[Basement Cat]

Our new Mods are only just coming on line. Give 'em a day or two to learn the ropes.

Upon my word of honor I've already seen a step up in forum keeping tonight. My word of honor.

Given that the bots swarm without notice and can fill a forum's first page inside of 5 minutes our increasing response time should serve as being comforting---especially in addition to the knowledge that tech matters are being addressed at highest levels.

Patience, padawans. The system based-fuck ups that resulted from March's tech work are dutifully being attended to.

And we are all volunteers who recognize the travesty of a spambot dominated site. We moderate the Escapist because we love this site and crave and hunger to preserve it even more than you do.

Please, padawans, be patient.

This too shall pass.

 

[Rangaman]

Aliens are using them to try and take control of our minds. That's the only logical explanation.

Holy shit, have you SEEN Gaming Discussion? The whole first page is nothing but spam now!

A few days ago it was 3 and 1/2 pages.

 

[FalloutJack]

Well, there's a theory around the old campfire (Okay, it was MY theory.) that it's the result of a banned former Escapist trying to reap some 'terrible revenge'.

What's his plan, to kill The Escapist? Too late for that.

It's funny, but it almost sounds as though you expect such an individual to be rational. Besides, we ain't dead yet. Try to restrain your doom-calling.

 

[Saelune]

Our new Mods are only just coming on line. Give 'em a day or two to learn the ropes.

Upon my word of honor I've already seen a step up in forum keeping tonight. My word of honor.

Given that the bots swarm without notice and can fill a forum's first page inside of 5 minutes our increasing response time should serve as being comforting---especially in addition to the knowledge that tech matters are being addressed at highest levels.

Patience, padawans. The system based-fuck ups that resulted from March's tech work are dutifully being attended to.

And we are all volunteers who recognize the travesty of a spambot dominated site. We moderate the Escapist because we love this site and crave and hunger to preserve it even more than you do.

Please, padawans, be patient.

This too shall pass.

Who are these new mods?

 

[Basement Cat]

Who are these new mods?

The most trustworthy souls: Lucifer, Satan, Mephistopheles, Azazel, etc...

 

[Saelune]

Who are these new mods?

The most trustworthy souls: Lucifer, Satan, Mephistopheles, Azezal, etc...

In the times long forgotten...new mods would be posted as "Introducing our new mods".

 

[Basement Cat]

Who are these new mods?

The most trustworthy souls: Lucifer, Satan, Mephistopheles, Azezal, etc...

In the times long forgotten...new mods would be posted as "Introducing our new mods".

Dr. Susse is our newest Moderator. EscapeGoat is back and recovered from the GG nightmare. He actually managed to get through that nightmare while retaining both his sanity and...well, his sanity.

Be nice, please. Fun is fun but this is business. Please?

 

[Saelune]

Who are these new mods?

The most trustworthy souls: Lucifer, Satan, Mephistopheles, Azezal, etc...

In the times long forgotten...new mods would be posted as "Introducing our new mods".

Dr. Susse is our newest Moderator. EscapeGoat is back and recovered from the GG nightmare. He actually managed to get through that nightmare while retaining both his sanity and...well, his sanity.

Be nice, please. Fun is fun but this is business. Please?

I just want the Escapist to thrive as much as anyone. These spam bots are beyond a nuisance. I just want that problem to be solved without adding new ones.

Transparency is a good thing.

 

[Basement Cat]

Who are these new mods?

The most trustworthy souls: Lucifer, Satan, Mephistopheles, Azezal, etc...

In the times long forgotten...new mods would be posted as "Introducing our new mods".

Dr. Susse is our newest Moderator. EscapeGoat is back and recovered from the GG nightmare. He actually managed to get through that nightmare while retaining both his sanity and...well, his sanity.

Be nice, please. Fun is fun but this is business. Please?

I just want the Escapist to thrive as much as anyone. These spam bots are beyond a nuisance. I just want that problem to be solved without adding new ones.

Transparency is a good thing.

I'm more inclined towards getting the problem solved than you are. But without an assigned Tech Team it simply takes more time than it did: "In the times long forgotten".

 

[thethain]

Basically, part of googles search algorithm involves how many locations a website is listed. And the reputation of the site that the new one is linked on.

For example getting your website a link from cnn.com grants more legitimacy (and therefore higher on search results) than being linked on supercheapcanadianpharmaceuticals.com. So I would guess some of these spam bots are being posted to every forum that they have figured out how to bypass in order to promote their page. I would think the folks at google probably already have a method of shooting down forum links influence, but for the spammer once the script is created it just takes a few process cycles to run it again. And even a marginal bump might get it to the next page up and mean lots of hits.

 

[Hollywood]

Has anyone ever bought something because of something spambot has wrote? It doesn't seem like a very practical, effective form of marketing.

 

[DudeistBelieve]

The title says it all.

We're fighting 'em off and recruiting new Moderators to help--so rest comfortable in the knowledge that a lot of firepower is coming online soon to fight the bots.

In the meantime: What purpose do they serve? Any?

If you're still recruiting mods, give me a sherrifs badge. I've been here long enough.