Just recently, I brought a buddy of mine (and fellow Camaro guy) in here, he joined and intro'd himself. He voiced some frustrations pertaining to the 10 post rule though, and he doesn't want to come back because of it. That rule wasn't in affect when I joined, so I can't see what he can (or can't see in this case). He and I are moderators on another forum, so it's not like it's beginners bad luck here either.
Here was his feedback... "no picture gallery, no seeing individual pages, no contacting other members, think there was a few other things. Limited on what and where can post. I guess that's a good thing in some ways, keeps the lurkers at bay, but it also discourages folks from participating at a later time. I've only been in there twice since I joined cause I can't look around and "get the feel of it". Looks like, from what I can see, that's it's a pretty cool site, but I prolly won't visit there much just because of that rule. I don't wanna post a bunch of nonsense just for the sake of post count."
Now, I understand the rule was to thwart spammers, which it has, but mostly only from posting pictures in here. Spammers still do get in here, and I usually spot some on a weekly basis. The ten post rule hasn't stopped spammers, it just made them sneakier. Once in a while there will be a spammer who posts a page full of text, but more often than not, they will add a one liner "I agree, what he said" type of response. Or a totally incoherent response to the subject matter. But in that one line they put a key word spam hyperlink.
Other new members have voiced their frustration as well when trying to get tech help, but they can't post a picture for show & tell. IMO, I think this ten post rule may be shooting ourselves in the foot, resulting in lower good new member retention, as opposed to losing the spammers.
A one or two post count would make more sense, to at least stop a spammer from doing a quick hit & run. To many, getting a "feel" of what the site is like is what makes them want to come back. And they don't get that feel when some important things are locked out.
I'm here every day, and floating around in most of the sections. Put me in a position to do something about a spammer when I see one, and I'll be glad to help zap them out.

 

I got the ray guns so we can incinerate on site 69.

But totally agree with you on the 10 post count rule but your buddy should have still stuck around before he/she said or felt the way he/she did.

 

Point taken and thank you for the feedback.

We are not in need of more moderators at this time.

I went ahead and lowered the post count to 3 from 10.

We will see if it helps or hurts us and go from there.

 

guess you're not worthy

 

How many more mods do we need? Besides we just got Craby to help out recently..

 

I think there are plenty of mods but I think the 10 post count thing is kind of pointless... 3 is better but I still think it's kind of senseless. What is a spammer account gonna do that it already cannot do with the 10 post count rule in effect? The 10 post count rule only affects those people who are actually trying to get involved, talk to other members, and add a little more life to this place.

 

I never had a problem with the 10 post rule. Imo.

 

it restricts the PM's they can send and places they can view or post. in the past we had spammers who would send out thousands of junk PM's pretending to be CF Admins

 

Yes, thousands. It lasted for weeks, even more. PM's said that the accounts would be closed or IP reported. It was a nightmare for NJ and myself as admins. I spent hours finding these guys and removing all the junk e-mails... there were many multiple accounts. And, I had members sending me PM's asking about it (they still do even)... it wasnt just admin who were effected. I went around to our sister sites and they were all having the same problems... so we all decided to make some adjustments and the 10 post count came into effect. Perhaps now its proper to have it lowered.

 

Makes sense. I just figure if a spammer can send thousands of PMs, he can make 10 spam posts too :P Lowering it will make it better so that most will get the quota when they post in their introduction thread.