Traffic Question

[Wifey]

I'm pretty sure my board qualifies as big....almost 12,000 members, over 1.5 million page views a month -- not sure what y'all are considering.

Anyhow, with any big board you have people who hate you, am I right? I suppose it's dependent upon the topic and things of that nature or the amount of whiny brats you attract.

Anyhow, I'm curious as to whether or not any of you can give any advice on how to block incoming traffic from clicks off a certain website. I don't feel the need to drag more strain to my bandwidth (I'm already on the second largest hosting package my hosting service offers and I'd prefer not to take that $30 jump!). I'm wondering if this might save a little bit of bandwidth.

Any help? I need to get it where users can't view my forum unless they register - well, let me take that back - they can only see the MAIN page of the forum - index.php - but can't click into any threads or actual forums. I can't remember how to do that! I haven't worked on my board beyond adding avatars and themes in, GOD knows how long because I haven't had time, and I while hacking comes easily back, the simple stuff confuses the shiznit out of me for some reason, LOL.

[FlyBoy73]

We had a troll forum go at us one time a few years back. They would coordinate attacks on other forums. I think the name was SexSexWorld or something along those lines. Anyway, we fortunately had a real bloodhound on our staff who located them planning out this attack. Since they had discussed us a month or two before our URL made it into one of the search engines. When they started showing up we were prepared for them but eventually I had my server manager build in a re-direct for anyone who came from their website's URL. I think it somehow stuck. Not sure how it worked but I ended up testing it out myself an had to dump my cookies to get past it, I believe.

The best thing anyone can do that has others trolling, flaming or just causing trouble is to make them waste their time. This has worked very well for us, though we have a lot of staff to help remove things quickly. Let the troll rant and then erase him. Nobody likes to spend time on things only to see them destroyed. Trolls & flamers only will stick around as long as they have a voice. Take it and they're going to get tired. If they are milking your bandwidth then this won't really work for you but there are other options such as blocking them - if you know their IP's add them to the IP banning table in admincp.

The down side to making everyone register is that the search engines won't be able to index your site and you need that if you want to grow.

Always trade-offs..

[COBRAws]

It would be great to have a Miserable Users referrer hack, or something like that.

So people coming from badpeople.com that regged in my board, would be automatically put into this miserable users list.
Anyway the best choice is to have a good and present staff so when something wrong happens, the mess is cleaned asap.

Althogh my current forum is just 13.000 members, i never had any big issue with people like this.

[Paul M]

I need to get it where users can't view my forum unless they register - well, let me take that back - they can only see the MAIN page of the forum - index.php - but can't click into any threads or actual forums. TBH, I think you should avoid doing that - IMO it's a very bad idea and will drive potential members away.

Nothing pisses me off more when looking at a new forum than getting a no permission screen when I try and look at threads etc, I simply leave, never to return. I think most people do the same.

[Wifey]

I know Paul, I hate it too. I did it recently to test it out and my registration SKYROCKETED. I've had 200 new members in the past two days.

We'll see. I'm not sure how to solve my intial problem!

[Ntfu2]

I'm with paul, unless there is a reason for the section to be blocked off to unregistered people (like you have to pay for access) then i never return to those sites either :D

[Bhuwan]

Aren't you more likely to gain a member if they have to register to view a thread?

Just curious; I am not arguin git is better, just want to see what ya'll think :)

[Erwin]

Nope - why would anyone register if they don't know the content of the site?

[Bhuwan]

Nope - why would anyone register if they don't know the content of the site?

I know this is a bad assumption, but what if we assumed the end-user knew the content based on the title?


Sorry to hijack this thread :(

[Erwin]

How about quality of the content? How would I know if I can't see it?

[Bhuwan]

:) just wanted to prove what your saying :) thanks!

[FlyBoy73]

Forget all the testing or proving. We've tested it, and we've seen 200% plus gains in registration but what does that actually mean? Really, not much, if they are only registering to search or view.

I don't usually go against the grain on things like this but when people pull results in the search engines they kinda-sorta trust what they get, and more than 1/4 of the people who click often register.. But, it is out of frustration, and that does not mean they turn into active members. They do it for a reason and they 'probably' often never come back.

My own personal view mirrors that of others posting in this thread. I would never register if that is what it takes.. That isn't an assumption... That has been my reaction when visiting other forums. I simply won't waste the time unless it is the end-all-be-all of information; and rarely does anyone hold that rank..

For those who might be considering it.... You might get a temporary increase in registered members but that does not automatically equate to a new posting base, and it definitely will kill search engine bots spidering your content.

Just my "thoughts"... ;)

[Erwin]

... including the adsense spider so no content-specific adsense ads. :)