Members need to be approved by moderators

dee1961

There are too many "kids" spammers and just plain rude people able to access the site and take over that chat area. I don't know what you can do other than approve all memberships to this site to cut down on this problem. Just a thought.. thanks

NoH8

That's a great idea, Dee. It would also prevent people who've been banned for breaking the rules from coming back with different names.

Beesie

Dee, are you concerned about the chatroom or the discussion board?  Perhaps there is something that can be done about the chatroom but on the discussion board, I don't think the Moderators would want to restrict access.  This is a public board and the objective is to reach and help as many people as possible.  And what would be the basis of restriction?  How would the moderators know who is real and who isn't?  How would they know in advance who will be rude?  I share your concern and frustration and I really do wish there was a way that we could stop spammers from ever getting on to the board but the fact is that this site has had problems with spammers forever and believe it not, right now things are actually pretty good.  It used to be so much worse, with spammers posting hundreds of times over a few days, tying up the boards or filling the boards with obscenities. By restricting new members to 5 posts a day and by allowing existing members to delete spam posts, for the most part we are able to get rid of spammers pretty quickly.  

Amy, to your comment, we wouldn't want those who've been banned because of something said on the political threads to be allowed to come back just because they need support for Stage IV cancer, would we?  Hmmm... and here I thought the mission of BC.Org was "to help women and their loved ones make sense of the complex medical and personal information about breast cancer, so they can make the best decisions for their lives."  When was it that social networking took over as a priority?

dee1961

Hello, Just to clarify my post said chat area. I was in the chat room yesterday and it was overun with kids messing around and just being plain rude and hateful. It has happend on numerous occasions. There are plenty of sites that have to be approved through an email address that you give when signing up. Kids probably aren't going to want to to go through that much hassle. Just was an idea that I thought could help out not start a debate... thanks

Beesie

Dee, thanks for clarifying.  I don't participate in the chats so I don't know what can be done to stop people from entering but I do agree that intruders are probably a bigger problem there than on the discussion board so it would be good if something can be done.

Jo, I agree.  That would seem to be the right thing to do. 

soprano

I agree with Beesie and Dee about not retstricting members on the discussion boards.  (although I see where things could get out of hand with chat) It is a public forum after all and I fear that if membership were restricted people who need this resource might not be able to access it.  I stumbled upon it while googling "Taxotere and Cytoxan" and it has been a true blessing for both me and for my mother.  Thank you for providing this helpful and informative place and thanks to all of the wonderful women and men who frequent these boards.

Soprano

camsdh

This is not the place, but since it was brought up.  I am a banned person..banned for life I assume..  In context, I was banned due to a post on the Political Board because I used a word one time.  The word had been used before and I asked what it meant..the public reply on thread was it was a PC way to say a cuss word.. so I used it by saying something irritates the ____ out of me.  I have sense learned that one lady here used a screen name before I came on the boards that the first two letters of the word I used were initials for.  After over 600 post without a problem, I was banned for life.  I created another name and came back only to PM people that pm'ed me because I found out that they did not know I was banned and thought I had access to my PM's.  i did yield to temptation and posted under this name, first to identify myself as Ibcspouse, and then to answer a couple of questions on the Ibc and clinical trial site..  I have no problem with the mods banning me, I did object to Nicki being rebanned. 

Ibcspouse aka camsdh.

flash

I've been pretty regular on the chat room since 2007.  There isn't too much of a problem with "trolls" and generally "trolls" go away if you start talking extensively about something boring like food.  There really isn't an effective way of limiting the board no matter how much it would be nice to be able to do so.  You want people to feel comfortable about coming into the chat or onto the discussion board.

the moderators also built the chat room with an ability to "ignore" someone if you don't want to listen to their input.  that also works quite well. 

I've met too many wonderful women and wouldn't want to miss meeting any of my "sisters."

Moderators

We've added a number of measures that have reduced the spammers significantly. However, a few sneak past. Given how many members we have, we had decided against the mods needing to approve each new membership. But, maybe we should re-visit it. 

 Thanks for your constructive ideas. 

Melissa