UPDATE: Small Site Problem -- Working On It!
We think we figured out what the problem is, and we're just waiting for some emails back.
If you post a comment with a link, including a link to your own site in your name, info, etc., the comment will likely go to my spam folder. (You will get a notification that the comments captcha needs to be filled out -- but that's actually not the case, providing you did fill it out.)
You don't have to avoid posting links -- just know that I will have to fish it out of the spam folder and publish it, which I'll do in between my writing jags all day.
Sorry! But we're on the way to getting this unbroken!
Post text from yesterday:
Apparently, a thing called surbl has been identifying sites including TimeInc, DEA.org, Amazon, and mine as spam sites. In other words, lots of sites -- sites people mentioned in comments. This is causing SpamLookup to send comments to spam.
Unfortunately, nobody emailed me to say they were having problems getting their comments to take so I only found out about this when I tried to respond to a comment and my own comment didn't go through.
I've posted the comments that went to my spam folder and deleted the duplicates. Sorry about this. Hoping Gregg will have this fixed soon.
In the mean time, I'll keep checking the spam folder and posting any comments that go there. If you try to post once and it the comments captcha says to go back, you've gotten the comment in there -- it's just in my spam folder for me to rescue, and I will.
If you can avoid mention of another site (or linking to it), that might help keep your comment from going to spam.
My email address -- adviceamy at aol.
Dumb bug is still eating my links. Lots of luck to Gregg.
mpetrie98 at February 1, 2017 2:11 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2017/02/02/small_site_prob.html#comment-6583101">comment from mpetrie98I just rescued the link. Going to take a nap now.
Amy Alkon
at February 1, 2017 2:52 PM
No. Your mission is all about vigilance.
Power through.
Crid at February 1, 2017 6:58 PM
Thanks!
mpetrie98 at February 1, 2017 7:28 PM
Sorry to hear your visitor comments got eaten -- using out of date server software is never a good idea, now less than ever :-( (too much spam and malware around, old software tends to be quite vulnerable).
Your comment spam filter was querying data that hasn't even existed for the last 8 years (since 2009) and what's worse, it was checking for the wrong results so that when the error code changed, it misinterpreted them, treating all comments with links as spam.
Anyway, it sounds like it's all fixed now. Good luck! :-)
Joe
SURBL
Joe Wein at February 1, 2017 11:52 PM
Joe, thanks so much for coming over to comment. It actually isn't fixed yet, and I agree with you on the older software.
Thanks for your explanation.
PS My boyfriend is a literary researcher (who worked for Elmore Leonard for 33 years) and also loves tech -- built himself a Hackintosh. He just put up my site and maintains it to be sweet -- he's not really in the website world.
We're hoping to get clarification from that wonderful guy Raymond, who's been writing to us, about what we need to upgrade -- whether he's talking about MT (which would be hard, because it would apparently kill all my old links if we went to Wordpress, which I have a hard time with on the Applied Evolutionary Psychology site, where I'm president...you really have to fool with the spacing between paragraphs to get it to work, and that would kill me timewise).
We're hoping we can just upgrade from SpamLookup to maybe Akismet's software to look up spam.
Unfortunately, due to how nobody wants to pay writers anymore, I can't just pay somebody a bunch of bucks to maintain my site; my boyfriend and I need to do it.
By the way, for anyone looking in, Akismet (antispam) is fantastic, and changed my life. (I do a lot less sobbing on the floor under my desk -- and yeah, I'm kidding, but that isn't all that off-base!)
Amy Alkon at February 2, 2017 5:32 AM
I've often thought that when you fold up the shop, I'd pay a few grand for a blu-ray with every post and comment. I've written more words here than I ever wrote in college, or even to that one busty girl in 1991.
Crid at February 2, 2017 9:39 AM
Loved reading all you've had to say over the years, Cridster.
Amy Alkon at February 2, 2017 9:52 AM
When did you first start your blog, Amy? Since Crid and I were here from the beginning, I'd like to know how long our mutual antagonism has endured.
Patrick at February 2, 2017 2:24 PM
The oldest posts are somewhat tattered by changes in server and other software, but I found a post of mine from 2005.
Nowadays, I'm happy when I find a Firefox plugin that speeds things up. I can only imagine how happy I'd be fixing this blog.
Radwaste at February 3, 2017 8:57 AM
To expand - possibly - on Joe's comment above, Patrick flagged you on 10/9/13 because your column let him post with the wrong security answer.
Radwaste at February 4, 2017 2:47 PM
Leave a comment