…that if you’d like to join this site as a member, just find my e-mail addy which I have cleverly put where you might expect it [note: in the contact info tab] and email me your chosen screen name, your actual name, and your chosen temporary password. I will install them by hand (at far less labor than I have been spending) and that should solve it. This is subject to revision as plans meet software head-on, but I think this is the most trouble-free method. We don’t get nearly as many new members as we do people who have met tragedy in Abu Dhabi and want us to benefit from the misfortune of their husbands…
You’ll still have to make your first post and wait for me to approve it—the very last hurdle!—and after I have, you can comment away forever.
I help fight spam on another site as a volunteer. May I make a suggestion? A lot of spam these days is not automated but crowd-sourced overseas. Those crowd members are quite computer literate, so they get past CAPTCHAs and the odds of them figuring out how to send you a message may be better than one of your readers. But the spammers are probably not SF literate. So, my suggestion is to put the address in the open, maybe slightly obscured, like, “address-atsign-…” but add, “Please put “[reg]” in the subject line and describe any of my books briefly so I know you’re not a spammer.”
That’s a good idea, but could trip up fans new to SF&F or new to CJ’s books.
Forum software these days often uses fields to add custom questions for the signup process. These are common things that a human could answer, but a software scripted / programmed bot cannot. (At least, not until some human programs in answers for the specific fields.)
Examples include math questions, simple word problems and common riddles, etc.
Usually, there are one or two such fields, and a single field my cycle through a small set of questions, each of which has a small set of correct answers provided.
Adding a simple question or two, which the respondent would answer in the reply message field of the email, might help.
Something from general science fiction or from your own books, CJC, might do it. A general language question might work.
And yes — I took down my forum because the bots had gotten around the current software version’s security *and* the custom fields I had in, so I was getting 50 or more spammer registrations to weed through per day. On a previous software version, I’d seen 100 to 300 spammers per day. So…given the lack of response from actual people, I took down my forum and blog for the time being, though I’ll likely bring the forum or both back later. Thankfully, the blog wasn’t getting that high a number, but it wasn’t as active as this one.
Some weeks ago, I was surprised one day to get a raft of spam, three different sets, all on, ah, enhancing certain body parts. It was odd, because these were repeats, a flood, different faked senders, but the same three messages with only minor variations, something a script might do. — Thankfully, that didn’t repeat, and the spam I’m getting via email has lessened the past month. Not that they won’t keep trying.
Something that’s appeared twice lately in my email has been a phishing attempt that looks like a call for job applicants at some business. It almost looks legit. Only the details give it away. The job may be overseas. The sender’s email and the name given for the sender or company do not match. The job position being offered looks like a completely cold call, i.e., not the receiver’s field, but entry-level, which might fool some people. Other details in the thing don’t quite match a close reading, and of course, the grammar and spelling may be obviously wrong in ways a native speaker, even with below-par spelling or grammar (which is very common) would not likely miss in a business letter.
Then there’s my anti-aunt, whose emails, forwarded crackpot crazy-stupid stuff, I long ago had to mark as spam. I still check on the rare, rare occasions she sends any personal family news. Sigh. How the woman could fall for that, I do not know. But she does.
Best wishes. Spam is beyond awful. It’s discouraging when you’re trying to get work done or have fun, either one.
I’m already signed up (Yay!), but I must admit, I can’t figure out where the usual place for an e-mail address would be.
The Contact Us tab above… 😉
Yeah, I’m finally in! So the new system appears to be an improvement on the old, at least in my personal case. Not that I particularly have anything to say. Other than to ask if you’re getting hit with the same SnowPocolypse we’re getting hit with on the Coast.
There it is! Nicely buried.