Remove banned users instead of banning them?

[iamdarkyoshi]

It seems like the spammers are artificially inflating our user count (unless banned users don't get counted) but they are also taking up usernames that actual users could potentially use.

 

Over 1,600 of our users are banned users, and I can't help but think that a good majority of them are the spammers, some of which have fairly normal usernames, like https://linustechtips.com/main/profile/477441-whirlpppol/

 

I don't know of anyone who would actually want a username of whirlpppol, but I've seen far stranger names in use.

 

Would something like this be possible?

[Guest]

Removing users would make a lot of posts/conversations pointless... 

 

Don't know if they could have a placeholder for banned members to keep their posts and release the username but I don't think it's a good idea to purge their account. 

 

My old (original) account was banned because I lost access to it and so had to make a second account (against the rules) and on that profile almost all of the posts are perfectly acceptable 2000+ r.i.p

[iamdarkyoshi]

3 minutes ago, AUniqueName said:

Removing users would make a lot of posts/conversations pointless... 

 

Don't know if they could have a placeholder for banned members to keep their posts and release the username but I don't think it's a good idea to purge their account. 

 

My old (original) account was banned because I lost access to it and so had to make a second account (against the rules) and on that profile almost all of the posts are perfectly acceptable 2000+ r.i.p

I'm talking about the spam accounts that make like one completely useless post and get banned

[Guest]

Just now, iamdarkyoshi said:

I'm talking about the spam accounts that make like one completely useless post and get banned

 

Oh right. 

 

Pretty sure they can delete those accounts right? They've done it in the past no? 

 

Will now let you wait for mortis's answer seeing as though that's what you're after rather than me talking for the sake of talking

[JoostinOnline]

I use vBulletin instead of IP Board, but there's a plug in for my forum called Spam-O-Matic that removes everything a spam bot has posted, deletes the account, and reports the email to a spam database. Maybe there is an equivalent for IP Board. 

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

24 minutes ago, AUniqueName said:

Removing users would make a lot of posts/conversations pointless... 

 

Don't know if they could have a placeholder for banned members to keep their posts and release the username but I don't think it's a good idea to purge their account. 

 

My old (original) account was banned because I lost access to it and so had to make a second account (against the rules) and on that profile almost all of the posts are perfectly acceptable 2000+ r.i.p

I believe the posts remain and the poster information gets replaced with "Guest" when accounts get removed. Though, if it's a spam account, the spam posts would most likely be removed before the account itself gets banned/removed. @Ryan_Vickers is this how you guys handle it?

[vanished]

45 minutes ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

I believe the posts remain and the poster information gets replaced with "Guest" when accounts get removed. Though, if it's a spam account, the spam posts would most likely be removed before the account itself gets banned/removed. @Ryan_Vickers is this how you guys handle it?

When a user is banned, the only publicly visible change is the text "Banned" under their name.  All the posts stay, etc.  When we actually delete an account, again, the posts stay, but all the account details are wiped out so it becomes a blank image with the name "Guest".  For dealing with spam, we have a quick and easy way to ban them and remove all the posts from public view.

[Blade of Grass]

1 hour ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

It seems like the spammers are artificially inflating our user count (unless banned users don't get counted) but they are also taking up usernames that actual users could potentially use.

I don't remember if the count excludes banned members, but even if it did it doesn't really matter much.

 

Spambots and their posts get queued for deletion, but we will not make the usernames of banned members available to be reused (it would be very confusing to everyone if shortly after a member was banned, someone else came back using the same username).