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Re: Tips for language learners

Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2021 12:49 pm
by Deinonysus
rdearman wrote:Yes, I agree we need to answer the questions of legitimate beginners. I would have actually kept the post by the spammer since there wasn't actually anything harmful in the post itself, but when I deleted the account all the messages (and signature) went with it.

Also thank you to all the members who reported the spam links in the signature block. If you see spam in posts please report it so that I can try to keep on top of the exploits and remove them as quickly as possible.
Ah, I see. I didn't notice the signature.

Re: Tips for language learners

Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2021 12:50 pm
by Cavesa
rdearman wrote:I got rid of mandatory password changes when I used to be an IT administrator because it is just a bad idea. Here are some password examples for a company with a mandatory password change monthly.

January1#
February1#

Note the capital, number, and special character. Means all the rules, secure as a wet paper bag.


Exactly, that was part of the point of the joke, majority of the thread has turned to "how to forget both vocab and your passowords even more efficiently" :-)

garyb wrote:This is clearly a spam post, why are people posting serious replies?


I couldn't tell, it looked like a "normal" a bit oblivious person with saviour complex.

Thanks guys, especially Kanewai and Rdearman, for explanation. I didn't know this spammer strategy, didn't notice the signature.

Re: Spam message removed.

Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2021 12:57 pm
by garyb
This isn't Reddit, thankfully, so there is a bit less tolerance towards generic and repetitive low-effort posts (for the record I find Reddit great for certain topics, but all the language learning communities I've seen on there have been awful, in particular the language-specific ones) but I like to think that genuine beginner questions do get a good response here since everyone's situation and goals are a bit different.

Most Web browsers these days are broken in that if you type in an IP address it'll search for the address in a search engine rather than actually connecting to that address, and the spam post here had links with typical router addresses so it was aimed at making their page show higher in the results for such a search.

Re: Spam message removed.

Posted: Sat May 01, 2021 10:32 pm
by Cainntear

Re: Spam message removed.

Posted: Sun May 02, 2021 11:02 am
by rdearman
Cainntear wrote:Speaking of Reddit...!

Great, I can copy the OP from there. LOL.

Re: Spam message removed.

Posted: Sun May 02, 2021 10:07 pm
by Le Baron
Having been the first responder to the OP the listing of this topic now makes it look I started a spam thread! :lol:

Re: Spam message removed.

Posted: Sun May 02, 2021 10:33 pm
by kanewai
garyb wrote:This isn't Reddit, thankfully, so there is a bit less tolerance towards generic and repetitive low-effort posts (for the record I find Reddit great for certain topics, but all the language learning communities I've seen on there have been awful, in particular the language-specific ones) but I like to think that genuine beginner questions do get a good response here since everyone's situation and goals are a bit different.
Reddit seems to reward karma-farming; a lot of the topics there get overrun quickly with those low-effort posts. I'm glad to help hold the line here. I find it's usually pretty easy to differentiate between an honest beginner and an "expert" without much actual knowledge.

Re: Spam message removed.

Posted: Mon May 03, 2021 9:20 am
by rdearman
kanewai wrote:
garyb wrote:This isn't Reddit, thankfully, so there is a bit less tolerance towards generic and repetitive low-effort posts (for the record I find Reddit great for certain topics, but all the language learning communities I've seen on there have been awful, in particular the language-specific ones) but I like to think that genuine beginner questions do get a good response here since everyone's situation and goals are a bit different.
Reddit seems to reward karma-farming; a lot of the topics there get overrun quickly with those low-effort posts. I'm glad to help hold the line here. I find it's usually pretty easy to differentiate between an honest beginner and an "expert" without much actual knowledge.

Shite! I'm busted.

Re: Spam message removed.

Posted: Mon May 03, 2021 9:36 am
by Kraut
Reddit seems to reward karma-farming; a lot of the topics there get overrun quickly with those low-effort posts. I'm glad to help hold the line here. I find it's usually pretty easy to differentiate between an honest beginner and an "expert" without much actual knowledge.


https://www.urbandictionary.com/define. ... %20Farming

Karma Farming

The act of saying or doing good for the explicit reason of increasing ones own karma.

Planting 'Karma Seeds'.
"Need to do some Karma Farming this afternoon, I'll go wish everyone has a good day on facebook"

"That guy is really Karma Farming with all the volunteer hours he's put into Food Bank"

Re: Spam message removed.

Posted: Mon May 03, 2021 8:10 pm
by kanewai
Kraut wrote:Karma Farming

The act of saying or doing good for the explicit reason of increasing ones own karma.

Planting 'Karma Seeds'.
"Need to do some Karma Farming this afternoon, I'll go wish everyone has a good day on facebook"

"That guy is really Karma Farming with all the volunteer hours he's put into Food Bank"
Reddit rewards "karma" for popular posts, so on that particular site karma farming means people who copy popular posts & repost as their own, or who create multiple fake accounts & upvote themselves. There are even bots designed to give their owners thousands of upvotes to increase their internet karma.

rdearman wrote:Shite! I'm busted.
We know you're not a bot! You must have passed that "prove you're not a robot" test hundreds of times by now.

Granted, you are also the one who designed the "prove you're not a robot test," so ... oh. oh no.

gasp