Why is Google so F****** dense about SPAM?

[rickman]

Why is Google too dense to fix their SPAM problem? There are so many
ways they could address the problem and as far as I can tell, they
treat it as a PR concern and have tried to give us a control that does
nothing! You can flag posts as being spam very easily now. Each post
has a link at the bottom that lets you report spam. There are times
when I flag every post that come into the groups I read. I see
nothing happen with that SPAM. The existing SPAM posts are not
deleted. The same SPAM posts are not prevented. In other words, it
is a control that is not wired into anything.

Once I switched from a newsreader to Google I decided I liked it and
don't want to return. But I am getting tired of dealing with all the
SPAM. There are some days with some groups that the SPAM outnumbers
the real posts by 10 to 1. It makes the groups nearly useless. I
believe there is a similar page at embeddedrelated.com. Does that
work any better?

Rick

 

[Ed McGettigan]

On Jun 17, 4:29 am, rickman <gnu...@gmail.com> wrote:

Why is Google too dense to fix their SPAM problem?  There are so many
ways they could address the problem and as far as I can tell, they
treat it as a PR concern and have tried to give us a control that does
nothing!  You can flag posts as being spam very easily now.  Each post
has a link at the bottom that lets you report spam.  There are times
when I flag every post that come into the groups I read.  I see
nothing happen with that SPAM.  The existing SPAM posts are not
deleted.  The same SPAM posts are not prevented.  In other words, it
is a control that is not wired into anything.

Once I switched from a newsreader to Google I decided I liked it and
don't want to return.  But I am getting tired of dealing with all the
SPAM.  There are some days with some groups that the SPAM outnumbers
the real posts by 10 to 1.  It makes the groups nearly useless.  I
believe there is a similar page at embeddedrelated.com.  Does that
work any better?

Rick

I read the group through Google groups as well and have the same
experience with non-action with reporting spam. I also rate each of
the posts with the lowest 1-star.

If they at least gave an option to not display 1-start posts that
would be a big benefit.

 

[Jonathan Bromley]

On Thu, 17 Jun 2010 04:29:51 -0700 (PDT), rickman wrote:

Why is Google too dense to fix their SPAM problem?

It's "the tragedy of the commons" - they are
culturally committed to the open Internet with
all the evils and joys that brings.

On the other hand, as others have pointed out, there's
a perfectly serviceable free solution out there: I use
the old free version of Forte Agent (still available
on their website if you look hard enough) and
have signed up with the admirable eternal-september
news server. All free, no spam, and only the very
occasional dropped post (presumably mis-classified
as spam). The only really big drawback is that
eternal-september only keeps posts for about
three months before expiring them, so I tend to
archive for myself any gems I stumble across.
Forte Free Agent is a bit stupid about cross-posts
too, but that's so rarely a problem that I just
live with it.

I still find Usenet a more agreeable environment
than almost any Web-based forum mechanism, and
I'll go on using it as long as there are any
even vaguely interesting discussions going on.
Please don't go away, Rick
--
Jonathan Bromley

 

[d_s_klein]

On Jun 17, 4:29 am, rickman <gnu...@gmail.com> wrote:

Why is Google too dense to fix their SPAM problem?

It's not their spam problem, it's your (our) spam problem.

For all we know, they get to charge advertisers extra because we're
spending more time in the forum reporting spam.

RK

 

[Gabor]

On Jun 17, 2:29 pm, Jonathan Bromley <s...@oxfordbromley.plus.com>
wrote:

On Thu, 17 Jun 2010 04:29:51 -0700 (PDT), rickman wrote:
Why is Google too dense to fix their SPAM problem?

It's "the tragedy of the commons" - they are
culturally committed to the open Internet with
all the evils and joys that brings.

On the other hand, as others have pointed out, there's
a perfectly serviceable free solution out there: I use
the old free version of Forte Agent (still available
on their website if you look hard enough) and
have signed up with the admirable eternal-september
news server.  All free, no spam, and only the very
occasional dropped post (presumably mis-classified
as spam).  The only really big drawback is that
eternal-september only keeps posts for about
three months before expiring them, so I tend to
archive for myself any gems I stumble across.
Forte Free Agent is a bit stupid about cross-posts
too, but that's so rarely a problem that I just
live with it.

I still find Usenet a more agreeable environment
than almost any Web-based forum mechanism, and
I'll go on using it as long as there are any
even vaguely interesting discussions going on.
Please don't go away, Rick
--
Jonathan Bromley

Google is still the best portal to the UseNet for those of
us who are unable or unwilling to install newsreaders or
who just don't want the added hassle. In addition to the
spam filtering problem, Google Groups seems to have a
spam sourcing problem as well. Many regular UseNet users
will filter out all posts originated by Google Groups
(including this one) in order to avoid the spam coming
from the groups. For example the recent threads
"Simple hack to get $<random number> to your home", show
up as posted through Google Groups:

X-Trace: posting.google.com 1276801463 16334 127.0.0.1 (17 Jun 2010
19:04:23 GMT)
X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com
NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 17 Jun 2010 19:04:23 +0000 (UTC)
Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com

I'm not sure if sending complaints to groups-abuse@google.com
has any effect.

As to other moderated forums, I've seen that a large portion
of traffic that once showed up on c.a.f has now moved to
Xilinx Forums. This could represent the amount that used to
be posted to c.a.f via the Xilinx forum site, but I doubt it.
There is something to be said for a well-moderated site that
allows attachments, etc. UseNet is pretty much in the dark
ages in that respect. The real downside to the moderated
sites is the over-use of categories (remember when we were
trying to decide if there should be c.a.f.X?) Most
of us decided it's best to keep the forum as general
as practical.

I don't think there's any free ride...

Regards,
Gabor

 

[Jonathan Bromley]

On Thu, 17 Jun 2010 15:04:02 -0700 (PDT), Gabor wrote:

Google is still the best portal to the UseNet for those of
us who are unable or unwilling to install newsreaders

Maybe so, but it really doesn't work for me: the
threading model is a mess, the editing is a mess,
and the spam sucks. I use it when I have to, if
for any reason I don't have access to my usual
Usenet setup.

who just don't want the added hassle.

What hassle? It took me ten minutes to set up
and install my newsreader, five minutes to
subscribe at eternal-september. And now I
have a sane Usenet environment.

For example the recent threads
"Simple hack to get $<random number> to your home"

which I simply didn't see at all. But I *do* see
the overwhelming majority of meaningful posts that
came via Google Groups. I'm happy to let other
experts do the spam-filtering for me - my eyeballs
can easily handle the occasional escapees.

As to other moderated forums, I've seen that a large portion
of traffic that once showed up on c.a.f has now moved to
Xilinx Forums. This could represent the amount that used to
be posted to c.a.f via the Xilinx forum site, but I doubt it.
There is something to be said for a well-moderated site that
allows attachments, etc.

That's fair enough. On the other hand, there are enough
side-channels available these days that the attachments
problem is really no problem at all.

It's certainly true that no-one seems to be setting up
any new Usenet groups these days, at least not in our
line of work. For example, all the new SystemVerilog
verification methodologies (UVM, VMM, OVM) have their
own forum sites that work pretty well. I don't mind
using them, again on the condition that someone else
does the sysadmin effort. The modern forum engines
seem to work reasonably well provided there is only
modest traffic; all their window-dressing tends to
get in the way when there is a lot of material.

I don't think there's any free ride...

No, for sure. But I'm on a ride that's cheap enough
for me, and going in roughly the right direction too.
--
Jonathan Bromley

 

[martin_05]

On Jun 17, 4:29 am, rickman <gnu...@gmail.com> wrote:

Why is Google too dense to fix their SPAM problem?  There are so many
ways they could address the problem and as far as I can tell, they
treat it as a PR concern and have tried to give us a control that does
nothing!  You can flag posts as being spam very easily now.  Each post
has a link at the bottom that lets you report spam.  There are times
when I flag every post that come into the groups I read.  I see
nothing happen with that SPAM.  The existing SPAM posts are not
deleted.  The same SPAM posts are not prevented.  In other words, it
is a control that is not wired into anything.

I've actually been thinking about starting a series of forums to deal
with this very problem. The "comp" and other hierarchies on usenet
are simply too polluted with SPAM these days. The only way to break
the cycle is to break away from usenet and move to a privately managed
system that can enforce some rules. The boards, of course, would have
to have some advertising to support the costs of setup and running,
but would otherwise be free to users. Spammers would just not last
very long at all. C.A.F. regulars could certainly be setup as
moderators to raise the quality of the board even further. A modern
board like that could include attachments and other very useful modern
features.

If this if of interest please email me off list. I'll decide based on
the level of interest.

x@y.z
where:

x = martin_05
y = rocketmail
z = com

-Martin

 

[Ed McGettigan]

On Jun 21, 7:37 pm, martin_05 <martin...@rocketmail.com> wrote:

On Jun 17, 4:29 am, rickman <gnu...@gmail.com> wrote:

Why is Google too dense to fix their SPAM problem?  There are so many
ways they could address the problem and as far as I can tell, they
treat it as a PR concern and have tried to give us a control that does
nothing!  You can flag posts as being spam very easily now.  Each post
has a link at the bottom that lets you report spam.  There are times
when I flag every post that come into the groups I read.  I see
nothing happen with that SPAM.  The existing SPAM posts are not
deleted.  The same SPAM posts are not prevented.  In other words, it
is a control that is not wired into anything.

I've actually been thinking about starting a series of forums to deal
with this very problem.  The "comp" and other hierarchies on usenet
are simply too polluted with SPAM these days.  The only way to break
the cycle is to break away from usenet and move to a privately managed
system that can enforce some rules.  The boards, of course, would have
to have some advertising to support the costs of setup and running,
but would otherwise be free to users.  Spammers would just not last
very long at all.  C.A.F. regulars could certainly be setup as
moderators to raise the quality of the board even further.  A modern
board like that could include attachments and other very useful modern
features.

If this if of interest please email me off list.  I'll decide based on
the level of interest.

x...@y.z
where:

x = martin_05
y = rocketmail
z = com

-Martin

These forums for the most part already exist:

http://forums.xilinx.com
http://www.alteraforums.com
http://www.latticesemi.com/support/forums.cfm?source=topnav

Ed McGettigan
--
Xilinx Inc.

 

[Rich Webb]

On Tue, 22 Jun 2010 07:45:05 -0700 (PDT), rich12345 <aiiadict@gmail.com>
wrote:

On Jun 21, 7:37 pm, martin_05 <martin...@rocketmail.com> wrote:
enforce some rules.  The boards, of course, would have
to have some advertising to support the costs of setup and running,
but would otherwise be free to users.  Spammers would just not last
very long at all.  C.A.F. regulars could certainly be setup as
moderators to raise the quality of the board even further.  A modern
board like that could include attachments and other very useful modern
features.

you can create a group within "google groups" and moderate it. It is
"sponsored" by google-ads, which is nice. No banners, no popups, and
usually the ads are relevant to the content of the page being
currently viewed.

So because of the spam-floods from googlegroups that render much of
Usenet a less than happy experience for many users, one should move to
googlegroups and put eyeballs on their sponsored advertisements? How
nice of them to provide such a service...

--
Rich Webb Norfolk, VA

 

[Sandro]

On Jun 22, 8:26 am, Ed McGettigan <ed.mcgetti...@xilinx.com> wrote:

...
These forums for the most part already exist:

http://forums.xilinx.com
http://www.alteraforums.com
http://www.latticesemi.com/support/forums.cfm?source=topnav

Ed McGettigan
...

All,
I definetly prefer some spam to the (possible) censorship
by the brands...

Obviously it's a personal opinion and
I do know that a lot of spam could be a kind of censorship

Sandro

 

[rich12345]

On Jun 21, 7:37 pm, martin_05 <martin...@rocketmail.com> wrote:

enforce some rules.  The boards, of course, would have
to have some advertising to support the costs of setup and running,
but would otherwise be free to users.  Spammers would just not last
very long at all.  C.A.F. regulars could certainly be setup as
moderators to raise the quality of the board even further.  A modern
board like that could include attachments and other very useful modern
features.

you can create a group within "google groups" and moderate it. It is
"sponsored" by google-ads, which is nice. No banners, no popups, and
usually the ads are relevant to the content of the page being
currently viewed.

 

[Rich Webb]

On Tue, 22 Jun 2010 11:17:31 -0700 (PDT), martin_05
<martin_05@rocketmail.com> wrote:

you can create a group within "google groups" and moderate it.  It is
"sponsored" by google-ads, which is nice.  No banners, no popups, and
usually the ads are relevant to the content of the page being
currently viewed.

So because of the spam-floods from googlegroups that render much of
Usenet a less than happy experience for many users, one should move to
googlegroups and put eyeballs on their sponsored advertisements? How
nice of them to provide such a service...

No, I am talking about creating a set of forums on a privately owned
server that has nothing whatsoever to do with any of the FPGA
companies.

Roger that. Replying to the suggestion to move to GoogleGroups.

It's a shame to see CAF and other valuable usenet lists get clobbered
with viagra and other crap. My intent would be to create a nice clean
and professional environment that would be just as useful, if not more
due to newer technologies, than the usenet lists but devoid of trash.

Take a look at http://www.embeddedrelated.com/index.php, which gateways
comp.arch.embedded to and from a web forum, for some ideas. There is
minimal spam so I'd guess that their moderators or their upstream feed
does do some housekeeping. The advantage is that it still has Usenet
visibility, both ways.

--
Rich Webb Norfolk, VA

 

[martin_05]

you can create a group within "google groups" and moderate it.  It is
"sponsored" by google-ads, which is nice.  No banners, no popups, and
usually the ads are relevant to the content of the page being
currently viewed.

So because of the spam-floods from googlegroups that render much of
Usenet a less than happy experience for many users, one should move to
googlegroups and put eyeballs on their sponsored advertisements? How
nice of them to provide such a service...

No, I am talking about creating a set of forums on a privately owned
server that has nothing whatsoever to do with any of the FPGA
companies.

I own a small company in California. We do use FPGA's among other
things. I used to participate on this list actively probably 8 or 9
years ago and benefited greatly from both my participation and
learning from others. Mostly lurking for the last few years.

It's a shame to see CAF and other valuable usenet lists get clobbered
with viagra and other crap. My intent would be to create a nice clean
and professional environment that would be just as useful, if not more
due to newer technologies, than the usenet lists but devoid of trash.
Yes, the manufacturer-owned lists do exist...but they are manufacturer
owned.

I would aggregate a number of usenet lists into one service: fpga,
embedded, robotics, design are just a few that come to mind. Each one
would get its own area but one sign-up would provide entry into all.
I am more than ready to put money on the table and human resources to
make it happen. The google-hosted lists are pretty bland and lack
sophistication.


-Martin

 

[Sandro]

On Jun 22, 8:17 pm, martin_05 <martin...@rocketmail.com> wrote:

...
No, I am talking about creating a set of forums on a privately owned
server that has nothing whatsoever to do with any of the FPGA
companies.

and... who should be such private owner ?

...
It's a shame to see CAF and other valuable usenet lists get clobbered
with viagra and other crap.

I agree... but that happen because CAF is not a moderated group!
Why? because was created not moderated!

My intent would be to create a nice clean
and professional environment that would be just as useful, if not more
due to newer technologies, than the usenet lists but devoid of trash.
Yes, the manufacturer-owned lists do exist...but they are manufacturer
owned.

I would aggregate a number of usenet lists into one service:  fpga,
embedded, robotics, design are just a few that come to mind.  Each one
would get its own area but one sign-up would provide entry into all.
I am more than ready to put money on the table and human resources to
make it happen.  The google-hosted lists are pretty bland and lack
sophistication.

-Martin

I would avoid reinventing the wheel...
If you like, try to create a new moderated usenet group and pray to
move people involved in CAF in the new moderated group... but I think
is not so easy (moving people I mean)

The same google didn't reinvent the wheel ( not for their google
groups at least ;-) )
their google group is little more than an interface to access
usenet...

Regards

 

[d_s_klein]

On Jun 22, 12:14 pm, Rich Webb <bbew...@mapson.nozirev.ten> wrote:

On Tue, 22 Jun 2010 11:17:31 -0700 (PDT), martin_05

martin...@rocketmail.com> wrote:
you can create a group within "google groups" and moderate it. It is
"sponsored" by google-ads, which is nice. No banners, no popups, and
usually the ads are relevant to the content of the page being
currently viewed.

So because of the spam-floods from googlegroups that render much of
Usenet a less than happy experience for many users, one should move to
googlegroups and put eyeballs on their sponsored advertisements? How
nice of them to provide such a service...

No, I am talking about creating a set of forums on a privately owned
server that has nothing whatsoever to do with any of the FPGA
companies.

Roger that. Replying to the suggestion to move to GoogleGroups.

It's a shame to see CAF and other valuable usenet lists get clobbered
with viagra and other crap.  My intent would be to create a nice clean
and professional environment that would be just as useful, if not more
due to newer technologies, than the usenet lists but devoid of trash.

Take a look athttp://www.embeddedrelated.com/index.php, which gateways
comp.arch.embedded to and from a web forum, for some ideas. There is
minimal spam so I'd guess that their moderators or their upstream feed
does do some housekeeping. The advantage is that it still has Usenet
visibility, both ways.

--
Rich Webb     Norfolk, VA

Yet another way Google can make money from spam.

"We are not evil" - yeah, right.

 

[martin_05]

Yet another way Google can make money from spam.

"We are not evil" - yeah, right.

Just a quick comment to the above.

Do you have any sense of what it costs to devise, create, maintain and
support infrastructures such as Google's? And, if you do, would you
really propose that this ought to be offered for free and yet not try
to generate revenue in any way?

Unless you don't understand the basic business equation I would
suspect that upon reflection you might ultimately realize that Google
--and lots of other internet companies-- need to make money in order
to offer what they offer the world FOR FREE.

Just look at something like Google Earth or Google maps. Amazing
stuff. Free for you to use. Sure, they monetize whatever they can.
And, they should as these are not cheap products to produce (they
literally have cars driving every road in the world with cameras to
give you street view).

Anyhow, my point is that the vilification of a company like Google is
grossly unfounded and is probably a knee-jerk reaction rather than a
well thought-out position. Try this: Work your tail off for a year --
seven days a week-- to create a great product without pay. They put
it on the web for everyone to use for free. Then read a post from a
guy who says you are evil for trying to monetize your creation with
paid ads and such things.

-Martin

 

[Robert Miles]

"rickman" <gnuarm@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:c26e6846-bfea-4123-9a2f-9aa2fed77ec3@j8g2000yqd.googlegroups.com...

Why is Google too dense to fix their SPAM problem? There are so many
ways they could address the problem and as far as I can tell, they
treat it as a PR concern and have tried to give us a control that does
nothing! You can flag posts as being spam very easily now. Each post
has a link at the bottom that lets you report spam. There are times
when I flag every post that come into the groups I read. I see
nothing happen with that SPAM. The existing SPAM posts are not
deleted. The same SPAM posts are not prevented. In other words, it
is a control that is not wired into anything.

Once I switched from a newsreader to Google I decided I liked it and
don't want to return. But I am getting tired of dealing with all the
SPAM. There are some days with some groups that the SPAM outnumbers
the real posts by 10 to 1. It makes the groups nearly useless. I
believe there is a similar page at embeddedrelated.com. Does that
work any better?

Rick

I've found that if you report enough spam with the same
return address, a program (probably) at Google Groups
will notice this and temporarily disable the Google Groups
account it was posted with. This often requires getting
the full return address using a newsreader, rather than
the partial return address you can see through Google
Groups. Spammers find the nickname associated with
their accounts easier to change.

Disabling an account this way takes reporting about
40 spam messages with the same return address,
using at least two return addresses of your own (but
can be about half of them reported with each return
address, with only those in newsgroups you care about
reported with both return addresses. Expect this 40
number to rise gradually.

More info at:

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.support.diabetes/browse_thread/thread/192a32920e586a78/602f8e19821ca84d?q=

Getting attention from their humans (if any) is more
difficult, and often takes months. Do not expect them
to ever send you any return email.

Robert Miles