IP Banning - Something I'd hoped to avoid...

I'm not particularly keen on censorship, but I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt in that you probably acted in the best interests of a community where you are the putative leader. Moreover, this is *YOUR* Web site, first and foremost, and you have the right (if not the duty) to enforce whatever standards of conduct you consider reasonable and to do so in whatever manner you see fit. However, if you are concerned that your actions might be interpreted as heavy-handed in situations like those narrated above, you might want to refer the facts giving rise to your decision to a confidential group of trusted Threadwatch participants who would be able to give you confidential feedback regarding your actions, sort of a threadwatch Grand Jury which could insure that Threadwatch hecklers are not subject to arbitrary and capricious decisions by the power-that-be you.

Im not worried about either being heavy handed or having to justify, there are some guidelines so that everyone has a general idea of what's cool and what's not, but it boils down to this: If i consider it not to be in the best interests of TW, it goes. By nature TW is a more relaxed community than many others, but there are limits of course... One of the more unique limits is quality of topic

And to date, that has stood TW in good stead :)

Loverly. I've no time for racists, myself, and although I'd be right alongside the ACLU defending their right to parade down main street in silly pointy white sheets, I'll also vehemently defend the right of any provate property (and I include websites in that category) owner to boot said numbskulls off their turf.

As I am fond of reminding US citizens who like to wave the First Amendment around like a get-out-of-jail-free card, while the Constitution does guarantee freedom from gov't censorship, it in no way obligates other private citizens to provide anyone with a soapbox from which to make their speeches... and that's exactly how I think it should be.

Just a FYI for any early birds, don't click the charming picture link especially if you are just tucking into a couple of weetabix.

Well banned Mr W BTW.

...otherwise he would get round your ban quite easily (I am sure at least half of those reading TW can flick the switch at will)

I would guess most of these morons are not particularly technical, and an IP will do for them.

If it gets more troublesome, then you could consider new users having to get an email back from you, then log in from that, before they can post (must cut out some of the problems, but not all if they are prepared to wait). Many forums do that

Don't accept hotmail/yahootype email addresses

Bottom line is does it matter, since I have it on good authority that Nick W does not sleep, most "dodgy" posts get removed pretty smartish.

Where I was brought up in Northern Ireland, they just sent the lads with the baseball bats round to sort the problem - but that may not be an option in Denmark

>Where I was brought up in Northern Ireland, they just sent the lads with the baseball bats round to sort the problem

And the rest :)

Can I have my club please:

http://redcarp.com/art/_2004/viking.jpg

Aaah, that'll do it ;)

Good call btw Nick.

Here, here! This should be posted at the top of all forums, in fact. I have to laugh when people come to my forum and claim censorship. You don't like it, don't post there. Simple as that.

While it might be more intuitive and easier to manage via the drupal interface, as the site grows, there's more than likely going to be more offenders. Trawling through a potentially large array of bad IPs on a page by page basis might, in the long run put more pressure on the server than needs be.

Throwing the deny rules in at the server level (htaccess, httpd.conf) is more efficient, if slightly more unwieldy to look at.