Posts tagged as:

spam

WP-SpamFree - An Essential WordPress Plugin

by Rick on April 20, 2008

A wall of canisters of Spam

Most of my five or so readers won’t care too much about this, but it isn’t every day I come across a piece of software which absolutely amazes me.

WP-SpamFree is a WordPress plugin which “virtually eliminates automated comment spam from bots.” So many plugins make such a promise, but using WP-SpamFree has been nothing short of wonderful.

No longer do I log in to my blog to discover 30+ spam emails in Akismet’s quarantine.1 No longer are there hundreds of spam comments each week waiting to be checked at Cloud 9 Lyrics.

WP-SpamFree works, and it works well — so well that I’ve installed it on the five active blogs I maintain. And I’m posting this to recommend to anyone else out there running a self-hosted WordPress blog2 to install it as well. It’ll make your life easier, and it won’t inconvenience your users like some other antispam solutions may!

Popularity: 13%

  1. Akismet doesn’t actually block any spam; it simply separates posted spam out into a quarantine so that you can check it for false positives and such. In other words, you’re still dealing with the spam. Contrariwise, WP-SpamFree blocks spam at the door. [↩]
  2. I.e., one that isn’t hosted at WordPress.com. [↩]

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Actively Boycotting Online Advertising

by Rick on September 2, 2007

Effective later this afternoon when I have time to do such things, I’m beginning a boycott on online advertising. I’ll be removing ads from those sites for which I’m responsible, and I’ll be beefing up my Adblock Plus filters. Update: And lo, it is done.

I’m doing this because I believe, however naively, because I believe the Internet is a better place without the rampant advertising, without sites created just to display ads, and without articles interspersed with ads disguised as links. And frankly, all of this “legitimate” advertising blends right in with “spam,” and I’m beginning to wonder what the difference really is — it’s all unsolicited, after all.

Okay, “however naively” was an understatement. I guess when I was authoring this post, I forgot how stupid I think boycotts truly are. That’s what I get for blogging on whims, I suppose.

I’ll likely be bringing ads back to some of my sites, but I do want to state that I have zero problem with users who wish to block those ads, and links to ad-blocking resources can still be found below. :D

If you haven’t guessed, I’m also not one of those people who sit around watching the Superbowl strictly for the ads… But do you see what’s happening? Everything is becoming more and more not just commercialized but monetized — if something can be made to serve advertiser’s needs, it will be. It’s becoming more and more difficult to find areas of our lives which aren’t ads for something else.

And that’s some mammon I’d just rather not be a part of.

Wish to get separate yourself from the madness a bit?:

Firefox users, check out Adblock Plus.
Internet Explorer users, check out IE7Pro.
Windows users, check out what you can do with the HOSTS file.

Other suggestions are welcome below in the combox.

Popularity: 4%

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