sharke
paulo
sharke
They could always insist upon a Facebook login. Like it or not, Facebook accounts are becoming a form of online identification. It's not perfect, but it's better than the "enter some BS email address and the contents of this Captcha" method that's bred millions of online trolls. The reason is because Facebook takes the issue of multiple accounts very seriously and is continually developing new ways to detect and delete them. They have a good motive: duplicate accounts negatively impact their advertising efforts. If someone reports a possible multiple account to them, they'll delete it immediately if it looks genuine (by whatever standards they use to identify duplicate accounts).
Since the authenticity of accounts is very important to Facebook, other websites can thus take advantage of this by incorporating Facebook login functionality. It's not watertight, but it's 100x more reliable than random email accounts.
There's another method this forum could use: all new registrations have to be confirmed by entering a code that the forum software sends to your phone. I think this is better than a Facebook login. Not everyone has a Facebook account, but everyone has a phone, and nobody's going to go out and buy a new phone just to open a new forum account.
First off I have to confess that I don't know what this thread is about really, or more accurately what led to it being posted, but please don't even go there with the link to FB idea. Terrible call that. There is something very bad about FB imho and I find it increasingly disturbing to see the number of things that you can't do these days without going to FB and logging on first.
Also, here in the UK I saw a TV ad the other night for Andrex (toilet paper for those who don't know) asking for people to go on FB and tell them how you wipe your arse !! WTF ???
Absolutely beyond belief, really.
Personal opinions about the FB disease aside, the best way to deal with any forum troublemakers is to just ignore them. This is the only forum that I participate in, but if I had to give out personal info in order to do so, then I would just not do it. Not because I am hiding beyond a false persona, but because of my concerns about what happens to all that information.
It's particularly sad that given that the internet gives us all the opportunity to present ourselves as any personality we may choose, that so many choose obnoxious arsehole, but there ya go, that's people for ya. If you can't ignore them, just laugh at them. It's just the internet and none of it really matters.
Making those that do participate in the intended manner jump through hoops in order to be able to do so is just giving the idiots the pleasure of knowing that they got under your skin. I couldn't really care how many kitchen sales threads or whatever get put up, cos I just don't look at them.
Facebook isn't the evil some people say it is. It's only as intrusive to the extent that you ask it to be. You don't have to give it your telephone number, your address or even your real date of birth. And if you do choose to give it that, you can make it private. If you're not an everyday Facebook user and you don't have an account yet, there is absolutely nothing wrong with opening a Facebook account for the sole purpose of using it for logins and commenting on blogs etc. You don't even have to upload an avatar. The only thing you're obliged to give Facebook is your email address, and let's face it most people have a separate non-personal email address that they use for forum logins and other assorted online BS. The advantage with using Facebook logins is, like I said, that Facebook goes to great lengths to make sure that individuals don't have multiple accounts. So in using Facebook logins on your site, you're essentially taking advantage of the work that Facebook does in that respect.
It's become trendy to bash Facebook for privacy issues, but let's face it, the only people who have privacy issues are those who don't take the responsibility to set the appropriate privacy levels on their accounts, and those who put all of their personal info in their profiles. You don't have to put any of that info in your profile. I can't believe how many people put their telephone number in their Facebook profile. Are they looking for strangers to call them? Crazy.
We'll obviously never agree on FB so no point in going there, you seem like a nice guy and all, but you seem to be arguing against yourself a little there. You start off by saying FB is a good method of id because of the work that they do to ensure that accounts are legit and proper and then go on to say how easy it is to set up an account with zero personal info just so that you could gain access to places that require FB login. Ermm..... am I missing something ?
As for those who think that volunteer admins would help, I can sort see your point as far as the simple deletion of spam goes, but imagine a world where some of the big egos around here suddenly had the power to intervene in and delete threads. I think I'd rather have the spam and verbal handbags any day.
It's a bit like what someone very wise once said........." wanting to be a politican should automatically eliminate you from actually being allowed to be one! "