State of the forums

[WatterBoy]

Below is a copy of the first post from this thread.

Originally Posted by Kevin

Dear Friends,

I wanted to post and share with everyone two things...

First, I want to share and express my sincere thanks and gratitude for your loyal fellowship and support here at the BassFishin.Com Forums. We have an incredible family here. I am always in awe of the kindness and generosity that comes from our members, as fishermen, and as friends. I am in debt to the many members that call our forum "home" that have been integral in making it what it is today. I am very proud.

Secondly, as many of you are aware, we have had problems with spam bots registering and posting on the site. This has been a problem for awhile and I have taken many steps to slow the flood of posts made by these bots. However, they continue to get by all preventative measures and still are flooding the boards.

I am committed to putting a stop to this, and will do everything I can to ensure the quality of our forum is maintained, and that we continue to improve and grow together successfully.

A recent conversation with John (aka. bamabassman) has brought to light that there is potential for getting help with moderation, to help prevent spam bots from gaining access to the forums. I think this is a great idea and I know this is an option with the forum software, but will look into how exactly to implement it, since I have not done it before.

So here is what's going to happen...
1. Going to update the forums to STOP spam registrations
2. Going to implement moderators to help maintain integrity of forums
3. Kevin (me) will regularly monitor the boards
4. We will delete all existing spam accounts and posts
5. Clean up "Who's online" to not show spam bots
All the above changes are going to be my first priority this week, and I promise to fix everything. We have an incredible group of people here, and I refuse to let anything stand in the way of us being able to talk and chat freely without problems. I want to do my part and make that happen.

I am in a debt of gratitude to many members on the site, with special thanks to bamabassman (John) for staying in touch with me and always looking out for the members.

Good days are ahead. We have a new fishing season upon us, and it is my goal to bring a new sense of fun and enjoyment to the forums.

Stay tuned for these updates and upgrades. I will be sure to post back as things progress.

Thank you to everyone again for your loyal support and fellowship.

Take care,
Kevin

Bama, maybe we need you to get in touch with Kevin again and see what's up. We have seen the stoppage of spam registrations, but at the cost of not allowing *anyone* to register. It's progress, I guess, but it seems like we lose a lot by being closed to "real" new member registrations.

And what about steps 2 and 3 that were also going to happen as a "first priority" almost two months ago?

Some sort of update of where all these things stand sure would be nice.