A Math Challenge Plugin

Spam comments has always been a problem in the blogosphere. Akismet and Spam Karma 2 are two of the most common spam protection plugins for wordpress blogs. What these plugins do, however, is simply catch spam comments and put them in queue for the administrator’s moderation.

Spam in blogs (also called simply blog spam or comment spam) is a form of spamdexing. It is done by automatically posting random comments, promoting commercial services, to blogs, wikis, guestbooks, or other publicly-accessible online discussion boards. Any web application that accepts and displays hyperlinks submitted by visitors may be a target.

Adding links that point to the spammer’s web site artificially increases the site’s search engine ranking. An increased ranking often results in the spammer’s commercial site being listed ahead of other sites for certain searches, increasing the number of potential visitors and paying customers.

Source: wikipedia

Spam comments are usually done through a program and/or machines. They are normally automatic once they’ve bookmarked your site. Now, although Akismet and Spam Karma 2 catch those spams and prevent them from being posted directly to your comments, they do not prevent them from reaching your comments (worse, they don’t cook them for breakfast! hehe). They help keep spam from being published, but not from reaching your comments.

As a result, you’ll need to check your admin panel regularly and browse through the captured spam comments for any erroneous catch. This is surely irritating, especially if you’re encountering an average of 10 to 20 spams per day (much worse is the case for other more popular sites).


Now, I would like to test and try this plugin called “challenge“:

Challenge is a WordPress plugin based on and improved over Steve Herod’sDid you pass math?” plugin, Challenge restricts comment spam by throwing the commenter a challenge.

I’m hoping then that this plugin will work in my case (deuts.net) and will not conflict with my other plugins.

As you can see, spam comments are generated through a program and not by human beings, thus they don’t have the ability to comprehend any other program or utility installed in a particular site. They are automatic and cannot adapt quickly to new programs running.

I’ve installed this plugin in my comments section, so don’t be surprised if you see/experience something strange the next time you post a comment. This is a test run of the plugin, and I hope everything will be fine.

Note: I’ve deactivated the wp-postratings plugin in the process because of some conflicts in the scripting with this new plugin. Thus, you will not be able to rate my entries anymore like usual.

7 Comments

nixxx October 27, 2006 Reply

spam are such a nuisance thing when ur a blogger
by the way i use spam karma 2 and its really good so far eat 33 spam 😀

deuts October 27, 2006 Reply

Well I have spam karma 2 and akismet installed. And I already have a total 437 spam since May of this year. Good for you, you only got 33.

Thanks for visiting my site anyway.

Poy October 27, 2006 Reply

ei mga tsong!…. kumusta na? Jorelle kumusta dyan sa inyo??? heheheh… oks dito bro…. so far… hehehe…..

deuts October 27, 2006 Reply

Ok lng kami dito pre, meron lng kami dito rooftop dito! hehehehe kaw ba san ka stay jan? cno ksama mo sa bahay?

GMCManalo October 27, 2006 Reply

I was worried that this message won’t come across because of the ‘Math Challenge’ plugin you’ve just installed.

I like this plugin, i’ll try it. Deuts, keep posting more wordpress plugins.

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