Thank you so much, Mary. A lot of hard work goes into this site that is unseen by us and I greatly appreciate it.

Mary - if you have time - or maybe someone else can - can you explain why the spammers attack blog comments? I was under the impression that the spammers get paid by their clients for both quantity of mails sent as well as the number of responses returned. I don't quite get how a spammer counts a comment in a weblog as an advertising attempt.

Or is this an attack that's based more on political motivations?

Mary,

Since I'm from Kansas, where that dreaded word "evolution" is now becoming further and further demonized by those right-minded fundies whom are out to save our children from eternal damnation, I would sincerely appreciate it if you would refrain from using that word, even in the most casual sense.

Thank you very much.

Go in peace, and may the Schwartz be with you.....

Mary,

Thanks for the very informative comments and for taking care of this problem!

I'd recommend requiring site registration with email verification before someone can post comments. There are ways spammers can get around this, but more hurdles lead to less spam IMHO.

Mary/Steve,

I had the same problem on my site. Mt-blacklist worked alright but not as well as i would have liked. I implemented mt-scode (which offers a CAPTCHA type) addition to your comments section. It has worked great for me so far. You can download the plugin and read about it at James' site.
mt-scode

You can check out my site to see how it looks if you want. He also has one for trackbacks but i havent installed that one yet. If you do decide to install it, and need any help, just shoot me an email.

Lets put this idea of "Aliens" to rest. It's a silly notion that gets its legs from people who have difficulty understanding the world around them.

(note to phidipidonian exploratory society: My studies of this friendly species calling themselves "hew-mans" have almost concluded. Although a backwards civilization, I believe the type called "ree-pub-lick-ons" (the closest meaning is "asshole" in our language) can be retrained for menial labor and simple gardening tasks on the home world, especially since they follow those they called "lee-durs" without question. I suggest their new owners holo-morph a religious figure called "Jee-zuz" when giving them simple commands. The recalcitrant group called "lih-bruhls" are more mentally advanced than "ree-pub-lick-ons," and so may pose a problem since they don't take to mind-control well. They may best serve our purposes when processed into cocktail weenies. They go especially well with a libation I have grown fond of, "bahr-beck-you" sauce. I like it on the rocks with a twist of lime.

My studies of their "lee-duhr," "Bah-hew-chh" (which loosley translates to: "the portion of the hemmorroid hanging from the anus"), and who I call "Moron", continue. Although not qualifying as a sentient-being on planets with any standards for intelligence, "Moron" none-the-less has risen to the top. Since his supporters believe in the silly notion of "rah-puh-ture", I suggest we send the Beast of Thermegalogadon to devour them. No one will be concerned when they see the empty clothes laying about. Send money. My study of "strih-purhs" and the "lahp-dan-se" is depleting my funds.)

Muck:

I was hoping that I could avoid going that far because I didn't want to chill the participation here. But I fear that we may have to implement such a system if this keeps us.

Captain:

Thanks for the tip and the offer. We may take you up on that.

I for one advocate banning anon posters, at least as a start. There appears to be a rash of these lately, anf frankly I find it kind of annoying when people are attempting to respond or have a discussion on something. In several instances, I've seen two anon posters battling it out, and it's extremely hard to follow after awhile.

Just my two sense. (~8

idio... the reason spammers attach comments and trackbacks is because as they accummulate more links to their site, the traffic weighting goes up for their site. The more links, the higher their site is in the return list when someone is looking for a particular product. Google and other web search products rate sites with a higher number of links pointing to it as being more relevant to the search and so these sites will rise to the top in a search for particular topics. By adding lots of links in their comments, these guys are trying to increase their relevance - which can mean real money for a site. Spammers are trying to sell all kinds of things: sex, gambling, prescription drugs, etc. They will attach hundreds of comments and trackbacks in the matter of a few minutes and they can bring servers to their knees because they are adding so many comments/trackbacks without letup. They are a real bane to blogs that allow comments.