About the Forum Upgrade, New Look, and Path Forward

[Cupcake x]

First of all, I would like to apologize to the Admins and the Mods if anyone was offended when I (and other members) stated that they aren't doing enough to keep up with our troll issues. When this post was originally made to address the changes to the site, it was in the midst of quite a bit of drama and there was no mention of anything that was being done to prevent further problems besides "keep using the report button". I don't apologize for what I said because I feel that it was valid to question why the mods weren't addressing the drama going on and it just seemed like they wanted to upgrade the site. That is why I became slightly angered to see a brand new site but nothing done to improve our situation. Also, I did not offer any suggestions because I'm not very tech savvy. I can do a lot of things on a computer but when it comes to a very technical situation, I'm not the person to go to. I left my post open for other people with more knowledge about computers to leave their input though figuring that someone who knows about computers and IPs and Proxys might be able to offer some help.

I understand that the mods are doing what they can and I appreciate all their help this far. IES is a great place even with the troll(s) and it's not going to scare me off. I do like Barbiegirl's suggestion. It makes it so that even our younger members are able to authenticate their accounts (if they have a cell phone which I'm sure most of them do). I would not agree with the suggestion of having to pay though even though it's the safest thing to do but only because it would prevent legitimate members who cannot afford the fee from joining the site and receiving the help they need. I also like the suggestion that someone brought up a week or so ago about maybe taking a picture with your member name to prove you are a "real" member. And for the members who don't want their faces shown, they can just hold the piece of paper in front of their face. Know what I mean?

Either way, I think the new site looks cheerful (although it's taking some time to get used to) and I'm looking forward to seeing the progress we are able to make as a community.

Best of health and happiness to everyone <3

[scottness]

I also like the suggestion that someone brought up a week or so ago about maybe taking a picture with your member name to prove you are a "real" member. And for the members who don't want their faces shown, they can just hold the piece of paper in front of their face. Know what I mean?

I was referring to this Michelle.

[iesadmin]

I really like Barbie's idea, I hadn't thought of that. It doesn't seem anything like that exists currently, but if someone tracks it down, let me know. That would indeed be a great option.

I don't see requiring a photo working on a forum like this where anonymity is a concern. Especially for people that have never been here before and have no trust developed. We're also not going to manually approve every member. It's a ton of work to avoid one or two troublemakers, and there would be no way of knowing if they were or were not one of who we're watching for anyway.

I appreciate the link to the forum mod. Unfortunately that is compatible with a very old version of the software and only checks the banned IP which is the root problem, we don't know the true IP because of the proxy. We already ban by IP, but thanks!

To the upgrade itself...the greater point is that although we have a pain in the ass user, we don't stop doing everything else we need to focus on that exclusively. We do what we need to AND we try to improve on that issue. Sort of like just because you may need to go on a diet, you don't need to quit your job to focus on that entirely because that would cause it's own set of new problems.

I appreciate the suggestions!

[barbiegirl]

I really like Barbie's idea, I hadn't thought of that. It doesn't seem anything like that exists currently, but if someone tracks it down, let me know. That would indeed be a great option.

Facebook has something similar, at least if you want to do anything without constantly having to do those stupid authentication boxes. I don't know of any specific software that could achieve this, but there has to be some way to do it. It might be something that you would have to set up through a mobile or internet provider, not through software. I don't know.

[iesadmin]

It's not something that I can find existing that is compatible for this software. With enough time and money, anything can be built custom, absolutely. I'm sure Craigslist and Facebook can do it, but that's completely different than doing the same thing here from scratch. But again, if someone can find it existing as a compatible software application or plugin, let me know.