Home » Other » Suggestions & Feedback » Same poster with duplicate/multiple usernames
| Same poster with duplicate/multiple usernames [message #620838] |
Wed, 06 August 2014 09:59  |
Lalit Kumar B
Messages: 3174
Registered: May 2013
Location: World Wide on the Web
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Senior Member |
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Hello Frank Naude and moderators,
I just saw few profiles with similar usernames, I mean the leading name in the username is same. Based on that criteria, after few searches, I found the profile description quite similar. I have a gut feeling that all such usernames belong to the same person.
I am not advocating whether is legitimate or not to have multiple usernames. My concern is, if we, the regulars here in OraFAQ are able to find such profiles, would it be a good idea to inform those folks via PM and merge their profiles. I think this should help in reducing a bit of site maintenance.
If you guys agree with my suggestion, we could make use of this topic to keep a track of such duplicate profiles. Would it help?
Regards,
Lalit
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| Re: Same poster with duplicate/multiple usernames [message #620845 is a reply to message #620838] |
Wed, 06 August 2014 10:49  |
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Littlefoot
Messages: 21823
Registered: June 2005
Location: Croatia, Europe
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Senior Member
Account Moderator |
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Well, as far as it is nice of you to investigate such things, you missed the point when saying that doing *stuff* about these accounts would reduce site maintenance. How exactly? Apart from searching for them, you suggest that we should PM them, keep track of who responded and who did not, merge accounts if they agree ...
As it is now, no action is required.
So, how can you call it reduction?
Besides, I'd say that those multiple personalities didn't post more than a dozem messages (vast majority posts 1 or 2 messages; search for site statistics topic in Community hangout and you'll see). Moreover, real clones who produce mess here are well known DBA-to-be Balaji / Ajit etc., and his handles don't follow the similarity pattern you mentioned.
As of now, I'd rather keep your idea exactly what it is: an idea.
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| Re: Same poster with duplicate/multiple usernames [message #620853 is a reply to message #620851] |
Wed, 06 August 2014 11:42 |
Lalit Kumar B
Messages: 3174
Registered: May 2013
Location: World Wide on the Web
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Senior Member |
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That's really a good effort from you Michel for this wonderful site.
Perhaps, regarding my suggestion, we could PM only those users who seem to be regular posters. Intial PM shall be a warning, later it would be moderator's decision.
My initial thought before posting the suggestion was that, these duplicate users doesn't helpnthe site in anyway rather than just increasing the overhead of site's maintenance. And of course, all you moderators have had been doing a good job restricting the spammers. However, seldom we encounter regular posters who are pretty much annoying.
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| Re: Same poster with duplicate/multiple usernames [message #620870 is a reply to message #620854] |
Wed, 06 August 2014 13:11 |
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Barbara Boehmer
Messages: 9102
Registered: November 2002
Location: California, USA
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Senior Member |
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If they are spammers, their messages are deleted and they are banned. That is already being done.
If they are not spammers, who cares if they have multiple log-ins? Most of us moderators have two log-ins, one that we use for moderation and most things and another with privileges of a regular user, so that, when necessary, we can see what regular users see and don't see or can do and not do. I think it would be overly picky and create resentment to PM people about having multiple log-ins and suggest that they not do that. However, it can sometimes be entertaining to figure out who is also who, here and on other forums.
So, I say track whatever you like if it makes you happy, but don't suggest that anybody should not have more than one log-in persona.
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| Re: Same poster with duplicate/multiple usernames [message #620871 is a reply to message #620854] |
Wed, 06 August 2014 13:13 |
Lalit Kumar B
Messages: 3174
Registered: May 2013
Location: World Wide on the Web
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Senior Member |
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Ok, I will try to explain, perhaps I wasn't pretty clear with my idea. Few hours back, when I was casually viewing "show what people are doing", I saw strange things. For example, SAIx looking at SAIy profile, SAIy looking at SAIz profile. When I visited each of their profiles, I found their profiles similar, with handsome number of posts. None of those posts were related to Marketing or Training.
That was one such example that I coincidentally found, I guess there might be much more. As every application's maintenance cost generally depends on the number of users, I think even OraFAQ spends some additional cost. There must be backup processes scheduled, DB to maintain the data, handling the traffic etc. for the site's 24x7 availability. Above stated examples would add up to the existing maintenance cost. So, more the users, more is the data to maintain and take the backup, more is the cost to maintain the Application. I don't know the exact statistics, so all this might turn out to be quite minimal in practice and trivial to be implemented. But we cannot extrapolate it right now.
I am not suggesting to make additional efforts to find out such regular users with multiple accounts. We could merge their accounts as and when we come to know about them. Just like "Banned spammers", we could also have "Merged user accounts" for those regular posters with duplicate/multiple accounts.
P.S. : Littlefoot and Michel, no doubt, sometimes we don't even come to know about the spammers whom you guys ban the moment you see them. My suggestion is not about the spammers, but those regular posters with illegitimate and unnecessary accounts.
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| Re: Same poster with duplicate/multiple usernames [message #620872 is a reply to message #620870] |
Wed, 06 August 2014 13:19 |
Lalit Kumar B
Messages: 3174
Registered: May 2013
Location: World Wide on the Web
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Senior Member |
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Barbara Boehmer wrote on Wed, 06 August 2014 23:41
So, I say track whatever you like if it makes you happy, but don't suggest that anybody should not have more than one log-in persona.
Hi Barbara,
Having multiple accounts for a reason (like you mentioned) is legitimate and well understood.
Sorry if I was unclear with my words, but I was pointing to other concerns as stated in above post. As you said, "If they are spammers", I am not talking about spammers, but the spammers in disguise of regular posters (using multiple accounts).
[Updated on: Wed, 06 August 2014 13:22] Report message to a moderator |
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| Re: Same poster with duplicate/multiple usernames [message #620877 is a reply to message #620871] |
Wed, 06 August 2014 14:25 |
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Littlefoot
Messages: 21823
Registered: June 2005
Location: Croatia, Europe
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Senior Member
Account Moderator |
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Lalit Kumar B
... additional cost. There must be backup processes scheduled, DB to maintain the data, handling the traffic etc. for the site's 24x7 availability. Above stated examples would add up to the existing maintenance cost. So, more the users, more is the data to maintain and take the backup, more is the cost to maintain the Application.
I understand what you are saying. However, I don't agree with you.
Most forum members keep their info at minimum and fill only required fields. I don't think that clones write too much information for every clone they make, so - I don't expect member info to be THAT large and affect backup much (when compared to messages' size).
Messages they post? Suppose that there are LF1, LF2, ... LF10 members. Even if they switch from one login to another between every two posts they create, they create 10 messages which is the same as if LF1 (alone, no clones) created 10 messages himself. Therefore, no overhead here.
Traffic? The same person (LFx) doesn't post 10 messages simultaneously.
Sorry, but I'm still not convinced that anything should be done.
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