[dawges]

Originally Posted by ForceHSS

remove the test member and install these
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=268208
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=294633
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=248042
if you need help with the last mod follow this post

I installed all these when i first started my forum. since that time they have all been removed. If you are lucky enough for your forum to grow into a big forum like i was those things hurt you in the end in my opinion. I had spamomatic for over year and i let it run deleting all spammer accounts. However in the end my forum has a smaller member count that it would have if i would of let the spammer have the accounts and just ban them. Does a higher member count help? Of course it does.

Originally Posted by Max Taxable

Also you should take into account the chances of annoying legitimate users with your anti-spam postures. One of the best ways to KILL a forum is to moderate new members - new members can't do anything but read until a moderator approves their account. If this takes more than a few minutes to get accomplished, people will just leave and never return.

Also, the use of captchas, puzzles and the like annoy people and newer autospam programs have defeated those for the most part anyway. If it doesn't go smoothly on first couple of attempts, folks just give up and leave.


vBulletin4 doesn't need vBSEO, that's why it is no longer around. It doesn't need any SEO help, right out of the box.

I disagree with this also. I do all of those things and my forum keeps growing and growing. I get well over 150k unique hits a month to my forum now and very active forums in fact i have to run my forums on two dedicated servers. If you have a popular site nothing will stop people from getting in. Trust me i have tried all the suggestions in this thread so i know.