Good Idea or Not?

[templates911]

I'm new to building a community site and have a lot of questions. Please bare with me.

I have limited the template downloads to users that have a post count of 5+. Do you think this is a good move?

The way I look at it requiring users to take a few min to post some in exchange for high quality templates with PSD files includes is a really good deal. On the other hand im afraid it might turn a lot of users off from the site. But we're working on a solution for people wish not to have these restrictions that would require a small donation to the site.

Looking forward to your opinions.

[Mike Panic]

not a bad way to protect your bandwidth... imho - i can make 5 posts in 2 min... just replying w/ "lol" or a smilie to a few posts then get access to the files...

its a catch 22

[templates911]

We have a restriction on post. They are required to be more than 100 chatacters long. Plus we a punishment for "Junk Post". The punishment would be upping the post count requirement to 15 before access is granted to download templates. If that isn't enough we would place a 30 ban on that users account.

So we make it clear to the user that its quicker to make 5 useful post than just trying to make "junk messages."

[michael_gersitz]

Yeah, tough decision.

How about 5 posts and being registered for 3 days?

[ev!]

yeah, i think 3 days would also work better

problem then is that people can do their five "lol" posts and wait 3 days.

What if you used a karma style system (like sitepoints reputation system) that meant other users had to say that the posts are worthy?

[templates911]

We already had a user try to post junk messages. But we quickly deleted them and banned there IP from the site for 30 days.

[ev!]

banning IPs realy only works for broadband users doesnt it?
ie. dialup = new IP every dial

[templates911]

Hmm, im pretty sure you get a new IP on dialup each time you dial.

[Heinrich]

better ban/suspend the username than ip.

[ev!]

then they could just use another username?
hehe, the joys of trying to ban people

[templates911]

I have banned there e-mail address, username, IP, and have the settings to where users cannot use the same email address to signup.

We can't completly ban a user but we can make it not worth there time to try to sign back up.

[a1nerd]

Is this the official forum for 4templates.com. I have purchased a few templates from you guys in the past. Good work.

[Lauren]

Don't even get me started on the nutjobs that use AOL just so that they can always be getting new IPs and email addys.

I have had to deal with several of those, or was it just the same person registering so many times? Who will ever know.

[templates911]

We're not the offical forum of 4templates.com but we're a close partner with them. Since I created the topic I have put a minimum post count of 5 to be able to view and download the templates and so far it's doing well.

[squire7]

Have you considered having the template preview available to the public, that may give a bit more incentive for people to join.

[templates911]

We're working on that. The only reason we dont have it at the moment is we havn't figured away around tagging the thumbnail images as something other than attachments but still be able to upload them as attachments.

[gladding]

Lauren, I believe if you notify AOL of the person attacking your board (give them details - usernames, emails, IPs), they do take it seriously and will take actions appropriately.

[A_Page06]

not a bad way to protect your bandwidth... imho - i can make 5 posts in 2 min... just replying w/ "lol" or a smilie to a few posts then get access to the files...

its a catch 22

was just gonna say...welcome to the wonderful world of spam