On Mon, 09 Jun 2008 09:06:33 +0100, Adrian Stott <adrian@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
wrote:
>Given the volume of spam on URW lately, may I remind you all that it
>is very easy to avoid reading this stuff.
<snip>
Yes it is. Go here:
http://www.nfilter.org
Download NP-120.exe, open it with Winzip or some other unzipper, or
rename the .exe to .zip and double click it. Extract, run setup.exe,
install.
Run it (it's on the start menu) click the Stop button. Then click on
Edit | Configuration | Network tab. On the Network tab put in your
current usenet server and ****t (usually 119). Click OK.
Click Edit on the menu again and Filters. A notepad opens with the
nfliter.dat file containing a few example filters and explanations.
To filter out 99.9% of the junk in these groups simply put this at the
bottom of the file and save it:
* drop xref:*:*:*:*
To filter out Altnet (a source of colossal amounts of junk but almost
zero useful or interesting posts) put this in the nfilter.dat:
* drop Path:*news.alt.net*
To lose all Google groups posts:
* drop Message-ID:*googlegroups.com*
To lose all Teranews posts (another source of ****heads):
* drop Path:*teranews.com*
You get the idea. Place whatever server you don't like there and it
won't matter if the **** posting from it changes his name a million
times. He will simply cease to exist.
Once you have added the filters, save the file, close it, and on the
Nfilter/Newsproxy window, click the Start button.
In your newsreader - whatever it is - replace your news server name
with 'localhost'. Leave any passwords and usernames as they are. Next
time you download headers in your favourite groups, you won't know the
impotent ****head trolls are even there. You will never see them
again.
Here's what uk.rec.waterways looks like (in Agent, but the same
applies to all newsreaders) with Crossposts (Xpost****e) highlighted:
http://i30.tinypic.com/2w1zhgp.png
Here's what the group looks like with posts from Altnet (Altopia.com)
[ALTNET****E] highlighted:
http://i29.tinypic.com/349dxz8.png
Pretty clear that almost all of the rubbish is crossposted and coming
from Altnet. While Altnet is notorious for having users that post
worthless crap to newsgroups, under multiple different identities, the
likelyhood of missing a useful or interesting post by filtering out
the Altnet server entirely is almost non-existant. Even less than the
chance of seeing a useful post from Googlegroups.
Here's an image of uk.media.tv.misc showing just _some_ of the
multiple names used by the same, single, solitary, solo poster from
Altnet:
http://i27.tinypic.com/20u333p.png
Here's what the group uk.rec.waterways looks like using ONE SINGLE
FILTER - the first example above, to remove articles crossposted to
three or more groups:
http://i29.tinypic.com/qn1v5x.png
Repeat: one simple filter kills almost all of the junk. Dead. Similar
results apply to the other groups this message is posted to.
Spammers and trolls can never, ever kill a newsgroup. Only the regular
posters who give up the group can do that.
In uk.media.tv.misc the following filter:
uk.media.tv.misc flag:[BBJUNK] xref:*free.uk.tv.bigbrother*
Results in the flagging of all posts made to the BB newsgroup,
regardless of whether they have BB9 in the subject or not:
http://i31.tinypic.com/33auzpf.png
To kill them instead of flagging, simple change the filter to:
uk.media.tv.misc drop xref:*free.uk.tv.bigbrother*
Here's what uk.media.tv.misc looks like with just three filters
applied, killing crossposts to more than 3 groups, killing Altnet
posts and killing crossposts to/from the Big Brother newsgroup:
http://i25.tinypic.com/2lig1gh.png
There are many, many more sophisticated ways of killing or flagging
posts as junk. But even one or two simple filters can clean 99% of
crap easily.
Like I said, the only people who can kill a newsgroup are the regular
posters, if they give up and desert it instead of employing simple
methods to make the ****wits disappear.
|
