Preventing spam, keeping the spam that does get through as limited as possible, and removing spam are the most frustrating task I have with the forums. Over the years we've tried to keep the forums as open as possible to everyone and done the lightest reasonable moderation. That's meant that we've been more open to getting spammed at a time when the spammers are really upping their posting. We're getting 3-5 spam posts a day right now, which to me is unacceptable.

So, one of the big wins of the new forums that I mention above is a much more sophisticated spam filter. Although I'm constantly adjusting things after the fact to allow things like moniker and specialist to be posted, obviously we need a better system and it's coming. I wish I would tell you we'd have it tomorrow but honestly it looks like we're about 4 weeks away right now. Last week it looked like we were 2 weeks away, so yes, we've taken a step backwards this week. We had some problems replicating the latest dev server to the test production server, now the dev server's acting up, things I'm sure you've all faced at one time. ;)

So in the mean time I'd ask for patience. The spam issue really got out of control about 18 months ago and we implemented the "report abuse" feature and I'd encourage you all to use that whenever you see spam. We lost several really valuable members around that time as a result of our being unable to control the spam so I'm sensitive and maybe overcautious right now. But there is a big improvement coming.

Jim Minatel
Acquisitions Director
Wiley Technology Publishing
WROX Press
Blog: http://wroxblog.typepad.com/
Wrox online library: http://wrox.books24x7.com