Just to say that I find the captcha of the forum SUPER annoying.
I understand the need for UNregistered users but hey, for the others, what is the point?
Plus the little animal is always the mouse 
Theyâre designed to stop the spammers, ones that actually create accounts. These restrictions live alongside the ones thor using hyperlinks And PMs.
Basically, theyâre set to reduce the likelihood theyâll link-spam the site. Anyone who has used the forum for a while knows the history here.
They go away after a small number of posts. When they start actively spamming with auto-genâd accounts the questions are changed.
If I remember there is an option in many forum solutions that allows to promote users. With this, you can keep the captcha for beginners and let the users with more
Serious posts with less troubles.
donât you have this option?
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Users are automatically promoted out of these buckets by their post counts.
At 5 posts, when you first posted this note, youâre a considered to be a beginner to the forum. Some of the restrictions were already lifted with your first post, and as you participate more in the forum, more limitations are automatically raised.
I went ahead and updated the Sticky Post/FAQ for this board to indicate the information above.
As @guessed mentioned earlier, there is quite some history here; that is, the settings are the result of several tweak-and-test iterations. This particular set has proven rather effective, which may not be all that visible to the regular user, but certainly to the admins/mods. Realizing there is a positive correlation between efficacy and annoyance, things are as relaxed as they can be.
i have run a forum for a game-server for over 700 active users, so i have a fairly good idea of how to run one and i have noticed the board is running fine and fast and does the job⊠like the structure of it and anti-spam measures. it would also be a good idea if one cannot make an account unless one owns a vera. its a long time ago since i was on a forum where people actually help eachother out instead of trolling and flaming. admins do a really good job of being there when needed. iâd give it a 9. the wiki on the other hand could use some serious make-over lol
[quote=âoTi@, post:6, topic:170862â]@chevdor,
As @guessed mentioned earlier, there is quite some history here; that is, the settings are the result of several tweak-and-test iterations. This particular set has proven rather effective, which may not be all that visible to the regular user, but certainly to the admins/mods. Realizing there is a positive correlation between efficacy and annoyance, things are as relaxed as they can be.[/quote]
ok thanks for the explanations. At least, from my mobile, I donât get those checks
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I am not sure that such restriction is good.I started posted before having a Vera to ask a few questions. Although, the idea is not bad and yes, some forum could have such restriction.
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I am not sure that such restriction is good.I started posted before having a Vera to ask a few questions. Although, the idea is not bad and yes, some forum could have such restriction.[/quote]
hence i say the wiki needs work⊠these questions you might have had should have been answered in the product specs or wiki or faqs⊠if not you could send a mail to support âŠ
The forum is intentionally open to all, whether Vera owners or not, as long as itâs on topic postings. A number of people use this as a vetting ground prior to purchase, and thats a completely legit use.
For the most part, the forum restrictions have only been put in place as a result of abuse from the Spammers⊠And they try everything!!!
The Wiki is a whole other deal. Itâs in serious need of lockdown by the MCV team, and weâve told them as much several times over the last 12-18 months. The number of spam accounts/day, and the number of spam postings has increased a lot over the last few months and has not been cleaned up. The loopholes are far and wide in that infrastructure, so itâs ripe for widespread abuse (like an impromptu email gatewayâŠ)
A number of people here contribute to the wiki to improve the quality of content/examples there, but itâs going to be slow going compared to dedicated [MCV] resources adding structure, content etcâŠ
A rudimentary ruleset for content contribution, and linking would also help the volunteers. If targeted correctly, it could also reduce their support volumes.
hear hear
All these requirements to post will be losing MCV money. Many new users interested in asking questions before purchasing will just give up. It will also reduce activity on the forum of existing customers and the community being less active than it could be, will be another negative for new users.
There are more sophisticated and un-obtrusive ways to prevent spammers, e.g. only allowing a post after X seconds, limit the number of posts to one per minute, no more than 3 an hour etc for new users. And combine with just one captcha, not three! Plus they are only needed once in a session, rather than on every post, or even just for the first post.
From a practical standpoint, that hasnât turned out to be the case.
There are more sophisticated and un-obtrusive ways to prevent spammers, e.g. only allowing a post after X seconds, limit the number of posts to one per minute, no more than 3 an hour etc for new users. And combine with just one captcha, not three! Plus they are only needed once in a session, rather than on every post, or even just for the first post.Those are in place also, and spammers blew past the simplistic counter-measures in a few days.
Using multiple âgrade 2â questions, where the questions are changed periodically, has worked well at holding back the generic flog-my-wares spammers ⊠with a few minor exceptions.
As per the Sticky FAQ post, the stuff youâre seeing only lasts a small # of posts. As with everything itâs about balance.
The question you have to ask is whether theyâd lose more money by having people not using the forums at all due to spammers. For example, I donât contribute to the Wiki because itâs un-managed. If the forums got into the same state, youâd see a similar result here.
Having joined not too long ago, my $0.02.
Yes, the captchaâs were a nuisance when I first joined.
No, they did not deter me from using the board.
Yes, I can, unfortunately, see the need for their use.
No, I was not happy about being subjected to their use.
Yes, if it keeps the âKeep your Vera h@rd all nightâ type of bullshits at bay I am all for it.
No, one should not be able to only access the forums after a Vera purchase.
Yes, the forums helped me on my purchasing decision.
We gradually arrived at the current spam measures, and at the current level have proven to be very effective, drastically minimizing the amount of maintenance required. From other feedback I get the impression users are happy with the activity level and quality of this forum, despite the anti-spam hurdles for Newbies.
[quote=âBOFH, post:15, topic:170862â]No, one should not be able to only access the forums after a Vera purchase.
Yes, the forums helped me on my purchasing decision.[/quote]
I agree! That makes it a total of $0.04 ;D
Just a suggestion⊠add the words âcaptchaâs only for first 20 postsâ right under the captcha, to encourage the new member (me 10 minutes ago) interested enough to make a somewhat casual but useful post (my deadbolt fires triple notifications?) to keep calm and soldier on 
(ARRGH! IT HAPPENED AGAIN ON THIS ONE!!)
The following error or errors occurred while posting this message:
The letters you typed donât match the letters that were shown in the picture.
is it pkbgkc or pkbckc? If I had to have to do this every timeâŠ!
Ryan,
The verification will only be required for the first 25 posts. It is a security mechanism to deter spammers and keep the forum clean and free for them.
Iâm new here, but I am happy to read that after 25 posts this anoying thdcxg captcha thing will be gone
and I hope that also two brainless questions will be gone, are they?
I am also wondering if these questions really are helpfull for getting rid of spammers.
one of the questions I have now is the same question as beforeâŠ