Making posts by program - 450 posts in less than a day
By coffeechat
@coffeechat (1961)
New Zealand
February 12, 2007 4:01am CST
Should we report it? What shall I do?
Somebody was making 30 posts an hour on mylot for over 18 hours. S/He reached 450 posts. This person did not moderate any discussion or respond to friend requests. Just kept posting. I started a couple of discussions on the subject and I am sure it was reported. It looks like the person was banned.
Now I am seeing a similar pattern happening by another Mylotian, but this time the rate of posts is fewer per hour.
1. Can anyone identify this poster?
2. Should we report this to mylot or let the person continue the program posting?
What would you advise.
7 people like this
10 responses
@deepuj (591)
• India
13 Feb 07
Hey cofeechat, one things for sure u r the james bond here, u are really a nice detective, nice work again,.Thanks for coming up with such spammers all the time,we need ppl. like u to keep mylot a better place, report it to mylot, they ll sure take some action, last time the guy from china u mentioned got his post reduced, this can be the case again.Once again hats off to ur observation n keen-ness, gr8 job.
THanks a lot.
@coffeechat (1961)
• New Zealand
13 Feb 07
Thank you deepuj. It looks like this guy has been stopped.
The last Autoposter was stopped at 87 points. But he had already posted about 450.
This new Autoposter has been stopped at 122 posts.
As a matter of fact, these Autoposters have posted great jokes, many good and thought provoking rip offs from other websites.
But they are peripheral to the Mylot community, because they do not moderate their discussions, nor do they contribute to other people's discussions.
Cheers.
@Chiang_Mai_boy (3882)
• Thailand
12 Feb 07
If we can identify them we should report them. I hope mylot has their own safeguards against this but if we can help, we should. This type of behaver endangers the whole mylot community.
1 person likes this
@coffeechat (1961)
• New Zealand
12 Feb 07
Do see above response. But may I suggest that we take a look there and leave word here. So that we can track progress.
Cheers.
@lauriefnp (5109)
• United States
12 Feb 07
Good Morning!
You know that I'll be on this one as soon as I finish posting here. I'll report to MyLot also. Hopefully this discussion won't get deleted. I don't see any guidelines violations today! I'm glad that they followed through with banning the first one, but this may very well be the same person with a new user name. I'll check back here to see what's going on.
@lauriefnp (5109)
• United States
12 Feb 07
I can't find any of his stuff. Perhaps it has already been deleted?
@coffeechat (1961)
• New Zealand
12 Feb 07
I have added two links to Mr. NiceGuy's response.
Hope they work by the time you see this.
@jbrooks0127 (2324)
• United States
13 Feb 07
Can't say I have any more advise about what to do than you have already stated.
However it is clear someone broke the code.
Because it is in clear violation I am surprised that MyLot did not have a trap for something like this and spot it even before you did. It should be possible to monitor postings and check for an excessive amount then stop them.
The real question is how much is excessive. Most assuredly what you found is.
I also sent them a request to be a friend and you know where that went.
All I kknow that we can do is to go and report as many posts as possible. But before I would do that I would need to know they are what they seem.
If you got them banned I am sure they just learned from that and signed up again.
What is the new name?
@nw1911guy (1131)
• United States
12 Feb 07
I would say report it. Sounds to me like someone is trying to figure out how slow they have to go to get under the radar.
@LightninStrike (5915)
• Saint Vincent And The Grenadines
13 Feb 07
Agreed nw, i'd report it if i saw something like that. It's absolutely impossible to post 450 posts per day typing something reasonable on them, and making them average long, without pasting or using any forbidden practice.
@adidas7878 (1891)
• United States
16 Feb 07
i dont know how someone can post 450 a day, sometime i cant even make a post a day sometime, so unless they have a program maybe there is a program for it right? i am not sure if that is against the rules or not, maybe someone alreday report that.
@MrNiceGuy (4141)
• United States
12 Feb 07
Thats definately abuse, and I think it would become obvious after a while. I was thinking about how you could create a program to auto-post, but there wouldn't really be a way to post relevant material or customize the message so it wasn't obvious. I suppose you could set it low and make numerous accounts and just hope you make it to payout day.
@coffeechat (1961)
• New Zealand
12 Feb 07
You are right. It is possible to create an "autopost" program. To post relevant material, you create a cut and paste database to look up and then post over the web.
Do take a look at this post:
http://www.mylot.com/w/discussions/757243.aspx
This is a typical autopost entry.
1. It has got Chinese characters. Note, the poster has only 122 posts so should theoretically not be able to paste.
.
2. This post is clearly copied from a Chinese website.
http://www.learnabc.net/yyxz/six/200611/4933.html
.
3. Look at this discussion http://www.mylot.com/w/discussions/753176.aspx
.
Here, the program that populates the database has misbehaved and the joke got truncated.
This is rather clever, but quite annoying that mylot can be spammed in this way.
Personally, I do enjoy the interaction with people, taking in different views appreciating the humour and sometimes enjoying the poor english.
I have nothing against autoposts. (I cannot write programs) but if I could, it would certainly make my posting much more efficient. I would not waste time waiting for the sluggish mylot site to respond.
However, I do not appreciate people who post discussions and then disappear. They never moderate their Post and never give a "best response".
These autoposters do not join other discussions and contribute their views, understanding or even their bigotry.
It is some sort of twisted self gratification, that I do not condone; and neither should mylot.
2 people like this
@Chiang_Mai_boy (3882)
• Thailand
12 Feb 07
I have just gone back through thirty pages of new posts. I can't find anything by this guy. Mylot may have already taken care of the problem.
@Denmarkguy (1845)
• United States
17 Feb 07
It seems like there's ALWAYS going to be at least one joker out there who's trying to find a way around "the system." I am not sure how you can reach that many posts in a day if you can't "cut and paste," although I suppose they could have some kind of utility that disables javascripting.
For those of us who enjoy the interactive aspects of a site like this, I guess the best we can do is flag suspicious behavior and move on, and trust "the powers that be" to exclude accounts associated with TOS violations.
@coffeechat (1961)
• New Zealand
12 Feb 07
The first poster was wcq2008. This poster has been stopped.
The new one is maguodong. Check out his stuff. The posting style is the same.
1. The typing is absolutely perfect, no spelling mistakes, no punctuation mistakes.
2. All posts are neatly laid out. Compare these posts with the posts of so many others and you will see what I mean.
3. Will accept no Friend Requests.
4. Will not moderate any of the posts.
5. The time gap between posts is almost constant.
Do check it out and leave a message here if you think I am right.
1 person likes this