Attn: Mods and Wendy - Approval of new members

[bzar]

Originally Posted by adawn

I'm only (rarely) on the tapatalk VF Roost (not on FB at all) and on the tapatalk VF Roost, someone posted to the new member roster thread that they had been trying to register on VF but were still pending.

I finally made it over to Tapatalk VF Roost and posted to the thread. I posted the same info that I posted here.

the last time that people were waiting, the breakthrough was that someone was friends with Wendy on Facebook. This is not to be confused with Facebook VF Roost. i also bumped up the thread in General hoping someone might see it and let her know.

a quarterly review of pending members would be a good schedule to check for new people. I think the reason that memberships are put on hold is because a whole bunch of trolls joined when membership was "automatic." that was a horrible period. someone correct me if my memory is wrong. but i recall "automatic" VF membership in the early days.

[Joni O]

I reported this thread using the red triangle icon so Wendy would see it. That was a while ago. I'm friends with her on FB, but I haven't seen her there in years. She usually responds to email. Has anyone emailed her? She popped in to answer a question in another thread not that long ago.

[adawn]

Originally Posted by bzar

a quarterly review of pending members would be a good schedule to check for new people. I think the reason that memberships are put on hold is because a whole bunch of trolls joined when membership was "automatic." that was a horrible period. someone correct me if my memory is wrong. but i recall "automatic" VF membership in the early days.

Depending on the amount of trolls/fake new accounts VF experiences a day, a quarterly review might not be frequent enough to check as the amount of trolls/fake accounts might by that point have become so voluminous that it could be easy to miss the "real" new members amongst the many, many pages and thousands of trolls/fake accounts.

I do not claim to be an expert by any means but I'm a mod on another forum (different subject matter, not fitness) and I'm in charge of new member activations. I check a minimum of twice a day (even while on I'm on vacation). There are some mornings it's 3 pages of new members I wake up to (so maybe about 100 members). Sometimes more, sometimes less. It's pretty quick to spot, check, and activate the maybe 1-2 new "real" members. Sometimes they're all trolls/fake so zero new members. That starts the day. Maybe takes a few minutes. As the day progresses, I log in periodically to delete the fake accounts as they pop up in new members awaiting activation because I like to stay on top of it. And before I go to sleep at night, I do one final check/purge. Even with that, I still end up activating a spam/bot every once in awhile and they eventually post something spammy, and then forum members flag the post and I have to delete the thread and bot.

Not that anyone's suggested it, but it's definitely not advisable IMO to activate everyone without screening because then your forum turns into spam central and you require a lot of active mods to delete all the spam posts and accounts every hour. I know a forum that doesn't screen new members and you get a lot of spammy new posts (at night especially the new thread titles kind of look what your junk email inbox looks like) until a mod or admin logs on and deletes them.

Also, I wonder if there's an issue with site traffic and web hosting costs. I only mention this because the smallish website/forum I mod on ran into trouble with costs with their website host, who wanted them to upgrade their hosting package to a dedicated server (or something) due to increased site traffic and the site owner couldn't afford this. Apparently it's cheap to host a static website (like one advertising a business or organization) but forums can be more expensive?

The only reason I bring up site traffic is maybe WWWendy would rather keep VF like it is now. I've always said the current VF seems to function like a rather large (but mostly closed to new members) check-in/forum. Not sure if that's intentional or not on WWWendy's part.

For those curious about the fate of the forum I still mod on, the site owner ended up selling the site/forum to a large company related to the topic/interest of our forum. I don't like the large company she sold out to and its practices and it bugs me that our forum is now used by them to draw traffic to their site and then tries to trick people into giving them their business but that's a whole other can of worms. Not enough members wanted to donate to the site to keep it afloat, the site owner didn't want to keep doing it after so many years, and it at least has kept our forum somewhat intact (for now).

[bzar]

Dawn, i agree with everything you said even though i am inexperienced in board management. it's probably humbug to manage this thing as it is, let alone admitting new members!

i spend a lot of my time reading old threads. the conclusion is that there's really nothing new in the way of fitness, other than now we have lots of extra videos on youtube. in other words, most threads can be categorized into a "medium" list of fitness subjects.

[fanofladyvols]

Dawn,

That's great insight... thanks!

[hch]

Originally Posted by bzar

Title of the thread shows up on Google called "New members not being able to join VF" and my security/virus software blocks the thread from being opened.

Originally Posted by adawn

I opened the old "New members not being able to join VF thread" via a google search. My browser said it was "unsafe," but it sometimes randomly does that for some VF threads and I always just "proceed" despite the internet browser's protestations to go back to "safety" since it's VF.

When I replicated the search, I found search results starting with "https," not "http."

The problem seems to be the same type as discussed in a 2018 thread, "Website not secure?":

Originally Posted by WWWendy

Hi, as stated above the “insecure site” message appears because we use a free shared SSL certificate provided by our web hosting company. We DO have site security, but I have not purchased a separate VF owned SSL certificate with our name on it because VF does not sell anything, capture credit card info etc. so the cost is not worth it. The free shared certificate provides the same security except the name on the security certificate belongs to our hosting company. Because the name does not match videofitness.com the browser error message appears. This is a good thing in the case of a phishing situation / you would not want to log in to a site pretending to be amazon with your amazon credentials (for example). But in our case the mismatch goes not mean we are insecure, just that we use a shared security certificate.

[Vintage VFer]

Originally Posted by adawn

... Also, I wonder if there's an issue with site traffic and web hosting costs. I only mention this because the smallish website/forum I mod on ran into trouble with costs with their website host, who wanted them to upgrade their hosting package to a dedicated server (or something) due to increased site traffic and the site owner couldn't afford this. Apparently it's cheap to host a static website (like one advertising a business or organization) but forums can be more expensive?

The only reason I bring up site traffic is maybe WWWendy would rather keep VF like it is now. I've always said the current VF seems to function like a rather large (but mostly closed to new members) check-in/forum. Not sure if that's intentional or not on WWWendy's part. ...

Whenever these forum issues threads come up, all we can do is wonder, guess and/or speculate. I, for one, am tired of trying to read Wendy's mind.

When I took an interest in tarot cards at the beginning of the pandemic, I found a really great site. It had a forum and tons of reviews. Then, I realized it was no longer active. The person who owned the forum got tired and overwhelmed. But, she at least let the members know what was going on! You can still read threads and reviews. It is there for posterity.

Are we making waves asking for a status update from Wendy? Will she be so disgusted at our (my) ingratitude and just shut VF down without warning?

Maybe I shoud try a tarot card reading to see what will happen to VF. At least it would some sort of clue and not the endless years of deafening silence.

[adawn]

Originally Posted by Vintage VFer

Whenever these forum issues threads come up, all we can do is wonder, guess and/or speculate. I, for one, am tired of trying to read Wendy's mind.

...

Maybe I shoud try a tarot card reading to see what will happen to VF.

regarding the tarot card reading...

Personally, I don't mind VF as it is now. I was doing the speculation thing "for fun" I guess because I find how different forums operate differently interesting to some degree. Strange kind of fun I suppose, but it's not keeping me up at night or bothering me.

I assume there's a semi-logical reason why things are the way they are and I don't mind it being a rather closed group. Sure, new members might be nice once in a while, but I don't have access to the full picture so I'm content with "as is" (but am still happy to speculate when the opportunity arises).

[bzar]

Originally Posted by adawn

I'm content with "as is" (but am still happy to speculate when the opportunity arises).

this is what i was trying to convey when i said "i like reading old threads" and "there's nothing really new."

occasionally, i'll start or resurrect a thread about a workout for which there are no reviews or breakdowns.

[Vintage VFer]

adawn, I don't mind VF as it now either.

What chaps my hide is:

A) That there are folks who want to join VF and are left in limbo. I find that actually embarrassing! VF is a fabulous community of like-minded, kind people. I'm glad I was able to join when I did.

B) That, if I want to add a review to the VF Reviews of a video that isn't in the database already, I have to contact someone who hasn't posted here in many years. What is up with that?