Too Hot for the UAE
Tyler notes that I’m banned in Dubai. I would like to say it’s because of my dangerous liberatory political ideas. More likely, though, it’s because of the pornographic trackback spam that has infested my archives. No, I like the first idea. UAE: You can’t handle the truth!
July 26th, 2005 00:09
Trackback and comment spam begets more trackback and comment spam. I’ve noticed this on my own blog — if a post has been hit once it is far more likely to be hit again, especially if I am slow to delete the spam. I assume this is because the post then comes up in searches for the spam keywords.
Personally, I’ve found that deleting any spam comment or trackback as soon as I am aware of it doesn’t take much time and seems to nip most of the problem in the bud. My blog has about the same number of visitors and almost as many incoming links as yours but I seem to suffer far, far less spam. This is despite my tendency to post about spam-attracting topics like dating, sex, dieting, etc. more often than most blogs.
Have you considered taking the time to delete the spam as it comes in, and perhaps from your archives as well? Yes, it does take a minute or two here and there (the archives would be a much longer project), but it seems to be one of those tasks in which “a stitch in time saves nine”.
Also, isn’t there some sort of Movable Type utility that automatically closes comments and trackbacks on older posts? I thought I read about that somewhere once (and oh, how I’m hoping they add that feature to TypePad soon). I’ve noticed that spammers seem attracted to my old posts, so if you set up your blog to automatically close comments and trackbacks on anything more than a month old (or however long) that might take care of a big chunk of the problem too.
Good luck with your spam and censorship by foreign governments! I just recently found your blog and I like it… you seem like a very interesting man.