Question About Guest Access

[Uhura!]

What would be the danger of allowing Guests to post in a forum?

Is there a way to make Guest posting safe / spam free?

[sawz]

Is there a way to make Guest posting safe / spam free?

only if you moderate every post.

[ziycon]

As per what you already said, spam can cause a good bit of damage to your site, if its not looked after properly it can affect your site ranking and site reliability with search engines.

[ApplianceJunk]

Admin>Configuration>Security and Moderation>Anti-Spam

Guests must pass verification when making a post: Check box

Set up a verification question too.

Of coarse you will need to give guest permission to post a new topic too.

[Uhura!]

It seems that allowing Guests to post may be a way to increase forum activity. Do you guys / gals  know of anyone who has successfully used this feature to do that?

Just brain storming based on the awesome answers already provided...

What if I do captcha for each post & fix it so the post will not appear until approved by a moderator? Could an unapproved guest post containing spam still hurt the forum?

[ziycon]

If you are moderating all posts than there should be no problem. It just means that you'd have to be online 24/7 moderating posts for anyone to have a 'proper' discussion or have mods help out when your not around.

[Uhura!]

I disagree with having to moderate 24/7 The staff would do approvals at certain times during the day...times which are convenient to us.

Here is one problem though: If guest comments are not approved instantly and the conversation marches on among the members in the meantime...the conversation flow may be disrupted.

I am so curious to see more comments & thoughts about this idea.

[ApplianceJunk]

Here is one problem though: If guest comments are not approved instantly and the conversation marches on among the members in the meantime...the conversation flow may be disrupted.

You can give guest permission to post new topic, but not give them permission to post replies if you wish.

[Illori]

more then likely you will get spammers posting by the thousands instead of valid posts.

[ziycon]

You can setup post based permissions so anyone under say 5 posts has to be moderated while anyone with 5+ posts can post freely. You can change the minimum post count to whatever suits you best.

[sawz]

probably not a good idea, but its your board, do as you like.
just be prepared for the consequences.

[Oldiesmann]

It really won't work that well in my opinion. The problem you pointed out is the big reason - members won't see the replies from guests until you approve them, and there's a possibility that members have posted other replies to the topics by the time the posts are actually approved. Unless you're going to have someone there at all times who can approve relevant posts within minutes of the time they're made, it won't work. You'll also be spending a lot more time approving/deleting guest posts when that time could be spent being active in the discussions.

[ApplianceJunk]

I agree that it will attract spam post, but if you want to try it go ahead.
It's not like you can't remove the permission for guest to post if it don't work out for you.

[Uhura!]

So everyone concurs - this is a bad idea...but let's continue to discuss.

So far, the real problem remains that the conversation flow may be compromised because members who are logged in will continue speaking about the topic while the guest comment is awaiting moderation.

other people stated that there could be harm to the forum. What about using captcha & not allowing attachments? Please answer: Can that arrangement protect the forum?


Also, more thoughts: The bloggers do it. They allow guest commenting...In fact, 99% of mom blogs have no other option but guest commenting. A visitor posts a comment in a blog w& it doesn't not appear until it is approved & their sites aren't destroyed...

Why are we really afraid of this?

Please keep the comments coming!

[Illori]

even with captcha bots will post as captcha has been broken. also i am going to move this to Building Your Community and other Forum Advice as this is not really a 2.0 issue.

[Uhura!]

Can't spammers who get thru the registration process also break captcha?

Question: What are the key ways that security with guest permission to post is different than security for new members?

One way I thought of is - guests can use a fake email address. There's no email confirmation the way there is with member sign up.

Can anyone think of anything else?

[Illori]

when a bot tries to register, there are many anti-spam methods that can be used to stop that, almost none of them are affective when trying to allow guests to post.

[Uhura!]

Thaks illori and thanks to everyone who has weighed in with their observations & opinions.

Can anyone answer this question->

With captcha, 1 additional question, & guest comment moderation activated (guest comment will not appear until approved by a moderator), what is the harm that a bot or spammer can do to a forum if access to reply to a topic as a guest enabled?

[Illori]

depending on the anti-spam verification question a bot could still be able to post. or human spammers can get past easy questions.

[Uhura!]

Ok - so the bot or spammer posts...but their post still has to be approved by a staff person.

I zap their spammy post when I check the post approval queue....what's the material harm to the forum?