SpamBlocker
pieterh wrote on 23 Feb 2010 08:51
This is a design sketch for SpamBlocker, which makes it uneconomical for spammers to target Wikidot sites.
SpamBlocker is enabled by default on all sites, but admins can disable it selectively on their sites:
Let non-members link to sites outside Wikidot.com [_] (Warning, this opens the door to spammers)
It works as follows:
- When a page or comment or forum post is created or edited, Wikidot parses all links and finds external links.
- Any new "unsafe" links added by a non-member are mangled by adding a space before the ':' and each dot.
- Members or moderators can then edit the page/comment to fix the links.
Unfixed content will remain but since it does not create a link back to the spam site, is useless to the spammer.
Implementation notes
In an initial version, we'll not check custom domains and only treat subdomains of .wikidot.com as "safe". Later we can extend this to allow custom domains to be treated as "safe" as well. But this is a minority case and would make this change more work. Simpler is better :-)
Comments: 4
page revision: 5, last edited: 23 Feb 2010 15:47
When this will be implemented?
If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be vegan. - Paul McCartney
We're waiting for objections but will probably start work on it today.
Note that "external" sites means non-Wikidot sites. Link spammers never, in our experience, promote sites already hosted on Wikidot. They may start to do this but it has no value because what they are trying to do is steal pagerank, from Wikidot.com's universe to their own sites.
Portfolio
Just a quuick thought. Maybe wikidot sites can be excluded from this rule, since at the Community forum, there are many external links to other wikidot sites, mostly put by people who need help. And we are also sure that no wikidot site is spam, aren't we? If this rule is implemented to literally all external sites, then we can have a little problem at the Community site, since no one who is not a member of it can be able to post a link. And I am sure there are a lot of people who come to ask for help there and they are not members of the Community site.
It was just a thought…
If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be vegan. - Paul McCartney
OK, I thought you will be doing it with all links… This looks fine to me.
If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be vegan. - Paul McCartney