A bot would miss a few by guessing, but it'd frustrate the grammatically challenged.
I like the Pick the cats captcha.
They need to make a version of that pick the cats captcha that doesn't require JavaScript. Outside of that issue, as a real captcha, I see it working.
A bot would miss a few by guessing, but it'd frustrate the grammatically challenged.
That's the entire point.
How to keep the grammatically challenged off the Internet.
Breed bots with perfect English grammar.
One Captcha I hate is is Solve Media. They use (American?) advertisements in their captcha's where you have to 'finish the sentence'. I think the idea is genious, but WTF they used advertisements that I'm not even familiar with. Their website isn't straightforward about the origins either. Can you imagine what kind of WTF-moments I had when I was deemed non-human ? 
They use (American?) advertisements in their captcha's where you have to 'finish the sentence'.
You watch the video and type exactly what appears in "quotes"...
Steam has (had?) notoriously difficult captchas (I don't think the service itself, but the forums and such). I can only solve like 5% of them. 
I think a grammar based captcha system is a good idea, but it needs to be more complicated than that so that it can actually have thousands or millions of possible captchas. You'd need to require somebody to fill in a few blanks, including properly capitalization and punctuation. It would need to be able to accommodate the occasional screw up by a human too.
The problem with this is that only educated people will be able to use the internet.
s/problem/great thing
Keeping educated people from accessing a tremendous source of education seems a touch counter-productive ...
I think a grammar based captcha system is a good idea, but it needs to be more complicated than that so that it can actually have thousands or millions of possible captchas. You'd need to require somebody to fill in a few blanks, including properly capitalization and punctuation. It would need to be able to accommodate the occasional screw up by a human too.
It doesn't need any of this. For the longest time Coding Horror used a single CAPTCHA image, which from my own experience using similar techniques, stops approximately 95% of spam submissions.
CAPTCHAs work well for stopping bots (although a simple Q&A may work better), but they do nothing to stop SEO spammers. For example, of the last 100 a.cc registrations, 83 have been spammers manually registering via the help of form filling software, etc.
Speaking of SEO spammers, one (Basementalice) posted a profile page on the wiki.
You should not accept any join_dt that is less than a week. All spammers active or not will be deleted by that time.
I found the email!
Name: basementalice Whaley
Email: ElizabethTBeall@rediffmail.com
now let's see inappropriate.
You should not accept any join_dt that is less than a week. All spammers active or not will be deleted by that time.
Not a horrible idea, but not great either. Maybe I'll add that grammar captcha
append:
Actually, I think I can let them log in, but make their account a "Guest" or "Read only" account for a week. Maybe. Still don't like restricting valid users.
These are real people, so a CAPTCHA won't help. Even a 24 hour limit would probably be sufficient. (Time is in UTC.)
It's just that there are some people who make an account, do nothing, and come back a few days later to insert spam. But those people probably aren't the ones likely to try the wiki.
These are real people, so a CAPTCHA won't help.
The grammar one may. The SEO company that's been spamming me with phone company has real problems with grammar. They are even a Canadian based company.
It doesn't need any of this. For the longest time Coding Horror used a single CAPTCHA image, which from my own experience using similar techniques, stops approximately 95% of spam submissions.
Who said anything about spam? This captcha is about stopping people that don't care about spelling or grammar from accessing the Internet. 
For example, of the last 100 a.cc registrations, 83 have been spammers manually registering via the help of form filling software, etc.
How do you separate the spammers from valid users?
How do you separate the spammers from valid users?
The patterns are obvious. The easiest-to-detect log in from an IP in India, Singapore, or the Philippines but claim they are from the USA. Then they post bbcode into their profile and leave. Those could easily be instant-banned with 100% accuracy.
To get around that, they try to create a silent account and insert the spam later. But then they find out that their accounts are being deleted automatically for lack of activity.
To get around that, they post a seemingly on-topic reply to any forum topic. But that is a sure sign of a spammer too as nobody (especially on this forum) joins out of nowhere just to reply to a topic.
So the only thing they could do to avoid detection is to actually actively participate in the community as a regular programmer would. But then once they try to insert a spam link somewhere they'd be banned anyway.
To get around that, they post a seemingly on-topic reply to any forum topic. But that is a sure sign of a spammer too as nobody (especially on this forum) joins out of nowhere just to reply to a topic.
Although it's not that likely that someone would just join to reply to some random topic, it's not impossible either.
The likelihood that the person is a spammer is nearly 100% given that he never visited the site before and came from an external application. Most people come here from a specific programming related Google search and don't join until lurking around for a few weeks.
When you take that with a fake sounding name and/or a spammy business email address, it's 100% sure it's somebody who is up to no good.
Member since: 25-01-2009 6:03 PM
And here I was, hoping you'd just joined
So, what I'm getting from this thread, is that it's still too early for me to start my spamming plans.
Well re-read the OP! It's almost too late too!
Oh sweet irony. 
^This
{"name":"604677","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/f\/2\/f2a59a7267c150d6e50d20b0194c4788.jpg","w":477,"h":500,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/f\/2\/f2a59a7267c150d6e50d20b0194c4788"}
Oh sweet irony.
There's nothing wrong with that (the second "too" is intended).
There's nothing wrong with that (the second "too" is intended).
I don't think gnolam was referring to your post, because I recall that there was a spam post in between.
Oh.
Yes, there was a spam post there.
{"name":"604678","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/4\/3\/43a2179ea5621fe9870931ed1e00b077.png","w":878,"h":304,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/4\/3\/43a2179ea5621fe9870931ed1e00b077"}
From the profile of:
{"name":"604679","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/c\/d\/cd596e24c651a8896e851b3c59bd13cb.png","w":521,"h":273,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/c\/d\/cd596e24c651a8896e851b3c59bd13cb"}
But that is a sure sign of a spammer too as nobody (especially on this forum) joins out of nowhere just to reply to a topic.
Unless the thread name is Batman. 