Spamming of TiVo Wiki

[blindlemon]

Hi Folks,

Many of you will have seen and/or used the very useful TiVo information located at http://alt.org/wiki - eg:-

http://alt.org/wiki/index.php/TivoDiagnostics
http://alt.org/wiki/index.php/TivoHackingLinks/
http://alt.org/wiki/index.php/TivoHacking

Unfortunately, this wiki suffers excessively from SPAM and the spammer just won't give up.

However, luckily, it is now possible to monitor changes to these wiki pages via an RSS feed available from the Page History of each page - eg.

http://alt.org/wiki/index.php/TivoDiagnostics?action=PageHistory&format=rss

or all the recent changes to the wiki - eg.

http://alt.org/wiki/index.php/RecentChanges?format=rss

If you use Google as your homepage, then you can personalise this to show information from any RSS feed, thus allowing you to monitor changes to the wiki pages.

I've been doing this for a while and have been reverting spam on these pages as soon as I see it, but as I'm not watching 24x7 there are, inevitably, periods when the page contains nothing but spam - as the spammer seems to re-spam every few hours, probably automatically.

However, he is checking the results of his spamming too, as he recently got quite annoyed with me repeatedly de-spamming the wiki and left a nasty message on my page :p :D

So, in order to dissuade the guy (and I believe there is only one), could I ask that you also monitor the pages occasionally and de-spam them as necessary. To write to the wiki you need to log in - but this just means copying the page title with spaces removed into the login box and hitting enter to login as that page. You can then view the old revisions and edit the last un-spammed one - just re-saving the old revision with a comment to the effect that it has been de-spammed and that you are monitoring it via RSS will do.

Thanks in advance. The TiVo wiki is an excellent resource and if we can dissuade the spammer it will be much more useful for TiVo users in the future.

[cwaring]

I will certainly keep an eye on it. Might even figure out how to revert it back sometime soon ;)

[Nero2]

Would it be worth posting this in one of the US forums, ther're more of them than us would probably be able to help.

[blindlemon]

Done :)

[BrianHughes]

Just reverted Tivo Hacking Links - Said - There's a whole team of us now

[blindlemon]

Fantastic - thanks!

It'll be interesting to see how long it takes before he gives up... :)

[Prof. Yaffle]

Just reverted the TiVoDiagnostics link.

[cwaring]

So have I :confused: Musta got changed again!

[pixuk]

I've also de-spammed the wiki in the past, but I think it's a spambot rather than a human, which is why it's so persistent. Perhaps the only way to stop it would be to slightly modify the link url of the submit page, so it doesn't effect a human editor, but breaks robot attacks.

Pete

[blindlemon]

No, it's definitely a human.

He got quite upset when I made the mistake of de-spamming some other pages while logged in as TiVoHeaven - and shortly afterwards he started spamming the TiVoHeaven page with false allegations! He is also being abusive in the revision comments too...

[iankb]

Now, if we could only find a good hacker. Somebody who would hack the site that the spammer links to. :(

Just in case you haven't, have you read the section on Wikipedia Vandalism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Maintenance#Vandalism)? Do they use a consistent IP address or known proxy?

[stretch_blues]

It's late / early and I'm bored, so just emailed the site asking for comments! Wonder if they will distance themselves or be abusive... not much of a defense though given they are direct links to the site.. unless there are charity spammers around as well!

I'll never understand these muppets, as whilst I have no need for any of the 'medical supplies' the site offers, if I ever do I will keep them in mind and ignore them completely! Plus trying to start a petty battle with a group of intelligent, technically minded elite (cough cough :p ) is never going to acheive anything!
People hate spam, companies get negative response because of spam.. only person doing well is the spammer!