Recently, I have notice a large amount of junk posts here that seemed to slip by our staff. As I see this junk, I will be deleting it unless it negatively affects the flow of the discussion. When I delete these posts, 1.5 times the number credits that the post earned will be deducted from the users account. This is automated as a punishment for posting junk. I have no control over your credits and I cannot manually adjust your credits up or down.

Junk: one line or very small posts or posts that are off topic or make no sense!
Spam: Unsolicited or inappropriately submitted links or any referal links posted!

Junk posts are deleted. If there are enough of them we ban you or suspend your account.
Spam posts are deleted and you will be banned!

"But I didn't spam and my post was rather large!"
This happen when the topic that you posted in gets deleted. I hate when this happens since it punishes good members for the bad behavior of bad members. PLEASE, don't reply to junk or spam! Use the report this post button or PM a staff members. If you really want to be a good neighbor, you can simple add a one line post like so:
This won't cost you anything in credits when deleted because quoted material is ignored by the credit script!

Pointing this stuff out to staff and other members will greatly reduce the amount of spam that we have here. As a result, we will be better enabled to provide you with the assistance you need when you need it instead of trying to sort through all of the junk!

One additional thought, if you think that there is a possibility that an article has been plagiarized, don't reply to it. Again, these topic or posts will be deleted and your post may go with it!

Thank you for your cooperations in this matter.

vujsa

vujsa, recently I too did see some spam/junk posts here around the forums and at times I did use the report button.

But I did not know the dangers of replying to such topics. Thanks for bringing it to our notice, and in the future I will be sure that I use only the 'Report' button and not the 'Reply' button to indicate junk, spam or plagiarized material here at the AstaHost forums.

I am new here so it hasn't affected me but who know's it just might. Its kind of right and wrong at the same time. Doesn't IPB have a place where you can just put all post into a spam section.

This is a warning for the members to be aware of what they are replying to as well as a statement of action taken against those that post such junk in the first place.

Yes, there are places I can move junk and spam to. When possible, the unwanted material is placed there but at the end of the day, it is just easier to delete the trash. The credit system dictates that a suitable number of credits be taken away when your content is deleted. Otherwise we'd get loads of junk here that would get deleted and then have to manually update credits which at this time is only possible by the server admin.

The system is set up to punish bad members but occasionally, a good member gets stuck in the middle. This is true in the real World as well so I have a hard time getting upset about it. My job is to keep the forum tidy, approve/deny hosting applications, and deal with members problems (good and bad). I do my job as well as I can and as fairly as possible. If a significant number of quality replies follow an unwanted post, arrangements may be made to preserve the discussion. Usually, a junk posts is followed by more junk replies with maybe a couple of decent replies in between. In which case the lesser evil is adopted.

I understand that this may not be the most popular course of action but I think that most of the members understand the reasoning and realize that they do have some control over their own destiny.

Please be assured that every effort is taken to ensure that quality members are impacted as little as possible when any action is taken.

vujsa

I see no problem in the approach you are taking vujsa. I have been and am a forum administrators myself, and I know how tiring it can be to keep the forum clean and tidy of all the spammers.

The present setup is good, and I take this occassion to say that all you adminstrators and moderators are doing a great job. And I will make sure that I will just use the 'Report' button in the future whenever I come across such junk/spam.

I just feel a need to point out how ironic it would be for this topic to be deleted and everyone to lose the credits *1.5 for it haha..ha...hrm. Maybe I just like irony too much.

But yea at first I felt bad deleting topics with replies but now I just make sure to let people know (the good members who get caught in the middle, as you say, at least) why they lost points and how to avoid it in the future.

Haha... that would be really ironic, Jeigh...

Thanx vujsa for letting us know about the 1.5x credits being deleted. I never know about this and I have actually replied to some deleted posts. So now I should be more careful... And I do agree that it is a good system since it doesn't encourage people to reply to junk/spam posts.

Just a note, I am still deleting junk here! I recently deleted a number of copied or useless tutorial submissions. This means that if your submission is not visable, then I deleted it and you lost whatever credits you earned for it.

I revived this topic since apparently nobody understands that they will lose credits if I delete a junk topic that you reply to!

I'm sorry, I have no choice in this matter since there is an overwhelming number of unacceptable posts. What in an unacceptable post?
See below:
One to two line posts.
Posts with fewer than 20 words.
Posts copied from somewhere else.
Posts that promote a product or include a referral link.
Posts typed with "text message" or abbreviated words. (how r u?, thks, ic!, etc...)
Posts that are poorly formated. (All CAPS, all bold, too much color, anything hard or harsh to read!)
Any other posts which a member complains about or a staff members deems unacceptable!

Thank you,
vujsa