I reinstalled the Say Thanks mod, and it appears to be working now.

The forum was moved to a new server during my overnight.

I posted before it was due to happen, but obviously the copy was made before then, so it's not here now.

Something in the file system changed, so we were getting error messages thrown out.

I've fixed what I can find wrong, but if anything still isn't working, let me know. If need be, by the help email top right of the forum header.

I had to remove the Say Thanks option, as something in it was incompatible with whatever changed.

Just what I needed, to start the day with my stress levels in orbit.

But we seem to be back and working now.

The host company didn't think the change would affect anyone, so didn't bother warning people. But it appears all the older php sites, and this version of SMF is getting old, were affected badly.

Anyway, let me know if you still find a problem, or are having a problem.

Wow. I'm so glad I found this treasure trove with so much going on. Just posting in here and I feel like an accomplished writer already, and I have only ONE book that I am still pondering over how TO publish. Heh. Allowing myself to dabble in the lovely creative energy that is so strong here and looking forward to reading and learning and understanding and getting myself familiar with everything here.
Thanks for setting this up, Timothy and everyone else that makes this place all that it is!

I'm only logged in on one computer.  On the others, I just browse the publicly available areas.  There is still plenty to read there so it is conceivable that someone might register in anticipation of becoming an active poster but then just lurk for a while and not bother to login until something compels them to jump in and post.

But, I would bet that most forum registrations are bots.  That was the case when I had open registrations on my forums years ago and I'm sure it is even worse now.

For people that register and don't activate, on the registration success page, I would put up a notice that they will receive an activation eMail and they'll need to click that link to finalize their registration and that accounts not activated within 10 days will be deleted.  Then, information on how to contact you if they don't receive the activation eMail.  Of course, that's assuming you don't have something like that already.

I know that sometimes when I've had problems registering on a site, I might wait a day or so before contacting the site just because I get busy or whatever.  So, 7 or 10 days or something gives legitimate people trying to register a good amount of time to complete the activation or contact you.

Also, deleting incomplete registrations also prevents problems with people trying to register and then the system saying, well, you're already registered.  Or whatever.  I've had that too where I couldn't register because I didn't receive the activation eMail and then couldn't try again at a later date because the account I tried to set up was still there.

Also, there's a trend these days where people don't want to have contact with actual people, so having to send you an eMail to activate their account is going to be a no-go for them.

I used to lurk before posting on sites for a while. New writers can be bashful. But if you're able to see them not logging on, I'd think a year of not logging on is uninterested enough. Can they still re-join?

I'm thinking about a more pro-active delete if not logged in the first time within a day policy.

I'd give a week or two. I've been known to sign up for things but not get around to doing much with them initially.

Whatever policy you've had for spammers, it's working. That sure has decreased here since a year ago.