New discussion forum
David
say I've not been a regular of late, mainly because of the spam problem. As
far as I can tell, there's nothing that can be done about the problem.
We started this group to be a place where men could discuss all aspects of
vasectomy. And I think the group has helped a lot of men over they years in
various ways. Therefore, it's a bit sad to see the group degenerate into the
spam-bucket it seems to have become.
I'd like to see the group revived to become a useful forum once again, and I
think that in order to do that it has to be spam free. Unfortunately, this
probably means moving to a web-based forum whereby spam filtering / manual
zapping can be easily achieved.
I've set up a forum on the alt.support.vasectomy website at
http://www.vasectomy-information.com/forum/index.php OK - it's early days,
and this group started out very quietly too. I'm hoping that over time the
new forum will gain popularity, and become what this group was a few years
ago.
I know that I'm hosting this forum, and that some people may have a problem
with that. However, all I can say is that the purpose of the group being web
based is to become what it once was, and a spam free forum - not a moderated
forum. I don't personally like moderated forums. I've contributed to them
myself, and found it intensely frustrating when discussions are shut down by
moderators because they feel they are getting out of hand, or for some
reason don't come under the TOS of the forum. I prefer to let discussions
run, and naturally resolve themselves and that the best form of moderation
is when senior posters lead by example. To that end, there are very few
rules in the new forum. All that is asked is that posters respect others
have an equal right to their views, and if you are posting something as
fact, please back it up.
If the forum grows (as I hope it will!) I'll be looking for others to help
administer it. I won't be looking to have people who share my views - I'll
be looking for people that want the forum to be a useful discussion forum,
and spam free. But that's down the line some way I guess.
Anyway,
Its a great shame that this forum has slid so far, and here's hoping that
the answer to the problem is to move to a new home.
David
> guess my ISPs must have efficient SPAM filters.
Mine isn't as bad as some, but to see the extent of the problem take a look
at Google Groups:-
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.support.vasectomy/topics
I don't know if most people read via their ISP's Usenet server, or read
online at Google. I suspect that reading online may be the more popular
method nowadays. I personally wouldn't post to the group as seen on Google
Groups, and I guess that it does put a lot of other people off.
I have emailed Google about it, and they aren't exactly helpful. Nor are
complaints to the ISP of the spammer any real use. Sometimes they clean up,
sometimes they apologise, but mostly they just ignore you.
David