Scratch

The Ultimate Scratch Dictionary: Spamming and Trolling
Chapters
1- Spam on the main site
2- Spam on the forums
3- SEO spam
4- Trolling
5- What should I do if I see a spammer or a troll?
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1- Spam on the main site
Spam on the main site is usually more like "kadfhadfjh" or "hey people plz check out my project!! (link)". Sometimes, though, the occasional commercial spammer will show up, usually with randomly generated usernames. (See this topic for more information about that.) The first example is just plain old annoying, but the second example isn't nessecarialy spam. If the link has something to do with the project, it's fine. A comment like this is okay: "I have a project similar to this: (link) It has a three life system though!" Notice that they explained that the project was somehow related.
2- Spam on the Forums
Spam on the forums can usually be classified kind of like spam on the main site, but there are a few differences.
1. Spam on the forums is normally commercial spam. Fortunately we don't see much of that because our awesome moderators delete it quickly.
2. Linking to projects is allowed in certain sections of the forums: Show & Tell and your signature.
Other things that could be classified as spam on the forums are Necroposting/bumping and posting irrelevant topics/replies.
3- SEO spam
I thought this deserves its own section since it takes some explaination.
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. It means that spambots flood their posts and comments with keywords, hoping that search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing will pick up the keywords and show the spammer's sites. 
Here is a useful post by Cheddargirl about SEO spam:

cheddargirl wrote:

Come to think of it, maybe they're trying to find an easy way to spam without being seen. On black hat SEO websites and blogs, they do warn that Scratch is one of those websites where spam is caught easily so they warn spammers to find ways to spam the website without being seen easily. How evil and vile of them.

You can usually tell pretty easily if a user is a commercial spammer. They'll most likely have one or more of the following characteristics:
-Has a randomly generated name like "ieahghe."
-Posts a generic reply to a topic, then has a link to their site at the bottom of the post like this:
"thank you post was very helpful to me. thumbs up to your great work"
[insert link here]"
-Posts in gibberish or another language, then with a link in the middle of the post.
-Their name might sound like someone's real name. Be careful though, because sometimes real users have their names like that.
There's more information on SEO spam here and here.
4- Trolling
Trolling is similar to spamming, but with the sole intention of annoying people to get attention. Someone could post gibberish, repetitive comments, or purposefully post something offtopic to get the thread derailed. I'm not going to make this section very long because I don't feel like I need to, but there's more information here.
5- What should I do if I see a spammer or a troll?
Report or flag it! If someone spams on your own projects, don't just delete the comments. If you flag them, it lets the Scratch Team know about the problem. Don't reply to trolling, because the troll will get what they want- attention. Don't repost the spam either- It may seem obvious, but some people do it anyways. We have excellent admins and mods, and the spam will get cleaned up quickly. 
Thank you for reading, and if you have any suggestions for things for me to add, post a reply or post a comment on one of my projects 

Last edited by Mokat (2012-10-27 20:21:29)