Excessive "Views" Shown on Forum

[Joe RLVW]

Hi All,

Since the AGM I have been trying to take on board comments made there - and hence have been using the Forum more. It does seem like a very useful source of information, and a way of sharing knowledge with other members, so hopefully it will become more used over time.

There is a "Views" field which appears to be intended to show the number of times a thread has been viewed by members. See attached example.

I notice that the number of views starts off as a sensible number of views (from 1 when you start a new thread), numbered from single to double digit numbers for recent posts, and perhaps low 3 digit numbers for older topics.

However in the example attached (which now seems typical) the numbers are mostly all in the thousands range. Having posted replies to a view topics I noted the number of Views and these suddenly go from a sensible number incrementing by a few views / day, or perhaps a handful over a period of days to suddenly becoming several thousand. I do not believe these are real views by members of WRRC. This leaves me wondering whether there is some bug in the counter (seems unlikely) or more likely if the views are registering remote (hostile?) machines reading the information on the Forum automatically and on a regular basis.

Perhaps this is something the webmaster could have a look at please? I would have emailed about this issue but am not sure how the raise this issue? If anyone else knows please pass on.

Many thanks,

Regards,

Joe RLVW

[andrewnummelin]

This is almost certainly caused by automated bots indexing web sites, and these days probably also trawling for AI applications.

The Scalefour Society has recently required viewers of their forum to confirm that they are human to reduce this problem, but doing this causes irritation for members, so a difficult balance.

[Daifly]

I'm sure that Andrew has 'nailed it'. Andrews's comment about balance is also spot on.

If you want to get the attention of the Forum administrators, (that's Rod and I) then if you 'Report' your own post - the button with the exclamation mark top right of your post - it should get our attention!

Thanks

Dave

[Joe RLVW]

Hi,

Thanks for your replies Andrew and Dave, that's all helpful to understand. I can understand the dilemma you mention – so put some thoughts below:

While the "views" information reflects actual views by people (who might be either just interested or ultimately might reply) it is useful. However when it is distorted by random Bots (as you both think is the case, and I agree), it ceases to be useful (at least to me). This is because I have been using the “views” on topics I started as a gauge of progress whether people choose to reply or not.

In my limited experience many of the questions on the Forum are (very) difficult to answer and usually require some active investigation (certainly this is true for me) and might not receive any replies at all. This does nothing to encourage people to be active participants and use the Forum to share expertise or find out more about wider research topics. In this context a genuine indicator of “views” in my opinion acts as positive feedback even if no one knows the answer.

I have used other sites recently where simple check boxes appear that need to be ticked once to proceed to confirm you aren’t a Bot. I don’t find this onerous and is certainly easier than logging on. I am not sure whether these checks are sufficient to stop Bots or if something more sophisticated is needed (such as recaptcha type picture image checks). Equally we don’t know whether such checks these would be overly onerous for genuine site users. Personally I appreciate that I can view the information on the WRRC Forum without having to log on. Similarly it makes sense to me that it isn’t possible to view pictures or uploads without logging on (per the discussion / points made at the AGM I think by you Dave, which made perfect sense).

My view is that if I understand why I have to do something to access information on line (a simple check box or more complex test) then it becomes more acceptable (at least to me).

My suggestion would be if there is something relatively straightforward to implement that would stop Bots, then perhaps just try it and see what happens. The check could include a short explanation of why the check is done (e.g. to stop bots attacking the site/ stealing WRRC data). People are less likely to complain anyway if they understand why a change is introduced.

If you are concerned about what people might think/ or that the check discourages / annoys existing or new users – then it could be an option to even say something like WRRC is trialling security to prevent Bots stealing data and please give feedback (positive or negative) etc. Again a simple way would be needed to do this to minimise effort to make the change to the site mechanics.

[Perhaps the feedback could be (say) by clicking on a positive or negative feedback button that opens a box where users could type a comment about why they think it’s a good or bad idea.]

This seems like a possible way forward although it may be more trouble than it’s worth the effort.
What do you think?

Thanks

Regards,

Joe RLVW
PS I really like the fact that the picture on the home page of the site always seems to be something different. What a great advert and idea!