Slashdot Mirror
Slashdot Updates
The formkey bug that was wreaking havoc all weekend was fixed. It was a mistake in seeding rand that was causing a small percentage of users to have problems posting. It wasn't a conspiracy designed to thwart anyone, just you. Man it was a pain in the ass. But it was squashed on Sunday (thank god).
Anonymous Coward filtering is now in place. It's not exactly finished, but it'll do for now. Essentially there is now a user preference that sets all AC posts to -1. This has been a very common user request for some time, so turn it on if you like. It's currently off by default. It's only a baby step: eventually there will be more fine-tuned controls for anonymous posts, as well as comment types. For Example: I'd personally like to assign a -2 penalty on any comment rated 'funny' because most of them frankly just aren't funny at all. But humor is far too subjective to say that the moderation is unfair. Anyway, now everyone can decide for themselves. That should happen in the next few weeks.
Last up, I'm gonna talk a little about advertisements and subscriptions. Slashdot continues to grow: our traffic has increased by like 10% in the last few months, and simply selling the banner ads you see on top of each page isn't going to be enough to keep us afloat if we keep growing. And selling banner ads in 2001 is an awful lot harder then it was in 1999.
The change will be a different ad size on the article page. Currently we have the standard banner size on top of all pages, but soon the article pages will instead have those huge square things that you see on CNet or ZD. I know this will be unpopular with many people, myself included, but when we make the switch, we will also have some sort of subscription system where you can pay a fee to disable them honestly. (No I don't know how much yet!)
Just to shut down the conspiracy theorists, nobody is forcing us to make these changes: The navbar. The new ad formats. The subscription system. I could just say 'No' to changes like these. But Slashdot is now four years old ... and I want it to still be here four years from now. I hope you can understand the expensive reality associated with making this site happen every day for a quarter of a million readers.
Now flame me if you feel it necessary. Get it out of your system.
You are so full of shit I can't believe it.
Give the guy a break. Are they supposed to pull the money for the servers and bandwidth out of their asses?
I love popups! I'll take everybody else's!
You're becoming bitter, Rob. What a shame.
Bowie J. Poag
Get an ad-blocking program.
Yeah, that's great until the sites that you want to read go the way of the dodo because they depend on the click-throughs that their ads generate and that you're eliminating because you're more intent on preventing something from showing up than you are on actually getting the content you need.
Not you personally, but the royal "you".
Take a look at the world around you. On television, you see advertising, unless you're watching a premium service that you pay for, like HBO or pay-per-view. On radio, you see advertising unless you're listening to a station like NPR which is funded through user donations (and during fund drives, fundraising pleas work just like advertisements). Even movies have taken on advertising to supplement the rising costs of making movies people want to see. I'm not sure what made the Internet think it was going to be any different, but that attitude has caught up with its proponents and sites are failing.
I really wish that rather than Slashdot taking on additional, large-scale advertising or premium payment, they move to an NPR-like member format, where Slashdot is "sponsored" by various individuals and companies. I have more respect for NPR than I do for HBO, and I hope Slashdot doesn't turn into "every other site", but rather becomes a model of a way to be successful and still maintain respect.
[blockquote]For Example: I'd personally like to assign a -2 penalty on any comment rated 'funny' because most of them frankly just aren't funny at all. [/blockquote]
And then what will those of us too stupid to post information about the article do for karma?
Woot w00t w007.
Now, take a site like Salon, which should have subscriptions. Salon creates its own content - and that's often unique and interesting content, and it requires the investment of a great deal of time and effort from Salon writers, many of whom actually go to work in a building and work all day.
So how much time and effort - or other resources - does Slashdot invest in the daily operations of the site? Very little.
Slashdot's content is entirely community-driven; it's all submitted by the users, for free. What do the editors have to do? Why, the horrible, grueling task of reading through user submissions, choosing a few to post, and relaxing as the site does its thing.
In fact, it seems that the real cost of Slashdot is relatively small: the cost of servers/bandwidth, and a modest salary for the editors and administrators who do this as a full-time job.
IIRC, Slashdot lasted years as Taco and Hemo's only job. This sudden need for money seems to go back to the Andover takeover; it's entirely a business decision. But unlike Salon, this isn't a business venture that requires huge amounts of effort, because the content is provided by users.
So, let me get to my main beef: We already "pay" for the site by submitting content! Should Slashdot be profitting off our article submissions, and our comments? That's why I read the site, not because of the editors. If we keep the Salon analogy, essentially suggesting charging the "writers" rather than paying them. Maybe I should be paid by advertisers for submitting this comment, rather than the site?
Now, if the editors would at least do their jobs well, I might reconsider - but I don't see fact-checking, I don't see anything done to stop all these duplicate stories -- heck, I don't even see spell-checking!
If Slashdot even wants to consider this system, they should have completely open records. Show us all your costs, from servers to salaries, and your profit. Let us know that we're being charged this because of need, and not because of the avarice of a few businessmen over at VA.
-- Imagine how much more advanced our technology would be if we had eight fingers per hand.
Rob, could you take some time to discuss the recent changes with respect to storing IP profiles for every user, banning users, banning IP addresses, and banning entire subnets? Judging from the current updates posted to Sourceforge, it looks like you are working not just on filtering ACs but also on pre-filtering of logged in users, that is, preventing abusive users from posting. MySQL.pm in particular now contains this interesting code fragment:
#logem' so we can banem'
$self->sqlInsert("abusers", {
uid => $uid,
ipid => $ipid,
subnetid => $subnetid,
pagename => $script_name,
querystring => $query_string || '',
reason => $reason,
-ts => 'now()',
and
$submission->{subnetid} = getCurrentUser('subnetid');
Could you discuss who in particular you are logging and banning? Specifically, is it just those darn Windows advocates, or are you broadening the scope? Personally, I would really appreciate it if you could subnet ban those people for life.
Thanks,
-Sheldon.
"A coward is incapable of causing destruction; it is the prerogative of the brave" - Mahatma Ghandi
Give the guy a break. Are they supposed to pull the money for the servers and bandwidth out of their asses?
I actually don't mind the bar (and I haven't disabled it). My comment was based on the observation that taco doesn't want it there. Looks like he should have thought harder about selling out during the good times. I have no doubt that slashdot would be without it if the site wasn't "0wn3d".
Life is the leading cause of death in America.
Exactly. Lameness filters do nothing but piss off the few legitimate users who are left. The only thing Taco is accomplishing by adding new filters, is to increase the crapflooders resolve to attempt to bypass those filters.
Remember what Slashdot was like a few years ago? Before karma and moderation and lameness filters. The signal to noise ratio was VERY high, and Slashdot was the pinnacle of the budding open source community. Compare that to the Slashdot we have now, where 50%+ of the comments are pure crap, and inneffective filters are alienating the few responsible users who are left.
Not good, Rob. You tried the moderation thing. It didn't work. It's time to drop it and move on to something new.
-atrowe: Card-carrying Mensa member. I have no toleranse for stupidity.
I agree, though I'll add the following:
The only people that will bitch about the (potential) subscription cost are the same ones who will never pay for it anyway.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
Actually you are wrong. Critizing linux get you modded up more often then down. Praising the stability of windows will always get you modded up as will any pro MS post. Try it sometime.
War is necrophilia.
"Try reading at -1 and see all of the crap that is posted by these Anon Cowards and you'll get my point. "
/. I am deadly serious! If you are broad-minded and intelligent then the racism, sexism etc. will not offend you- and you can enjoy all the running jokes and occasionally side-splitting remarks by ACs.
My god- I didn't even consider that there could be people who don't browse at -1 flat.
If you're not reading at -1 then you're not reading
Also- by not browsing at -1 you are saying that you trust the moderators not to mod good stuff down and bad stuff up. You trust the moderators? ahahahahahahhaahah. You would have to be a FOOL!
graspee