After a year of mostly being on hiatus, I’m coming back to regular daily operations. As previously mentioned, there will be an announcement forthcoming related to that and to the larger news that enables me to spend much more time at WUWT than ever before. This will include some plans for expansion, as well as some significant changes about how we operate.
The biggest change is a new initiative with new partners, which I hope to be able to announce any day now. Just waiting on paperwork.
One change will affect our readers, and make for a better reading and commenting experience overall, and it will be starting this coming week.
One of the biggest problems we’ve had is with trolls that use fake names, fake emails, and fake connections (proxys) to threadbomb. One in particular in Oregon has bragged about it, one in Canada made threats, and I called the police on him.
And, it keeps happening; some people who are narcissistic mann-equins think they are entitled to do it, because they are holier-than-thou defenders of the planet or something. Some of these same people also impersonate other commenters here. We’ve stopped them all (at least we think we have). But, we need better tools to detect and stop this.
This coming week, WUWT will no longer be an open commenting system, it will require registration to comment. I’ll give 24 hours notice, and it will likely be next Monday. Many, many, websites that allow comments require this, and it has become clear to me, that we need to go that direction too. Doing so will help keep the quality of conversation elevated, and will only require a one-time registration that will take about two minutes to complete. It will stop the trolls, the impersonators, and the drive-bys and give us a tool for enforcing our commenting policy. It will also ease moderation duties.
Reading content will still be publicly available as I abhor paywalls, and I know you do too.
And there will be other changes, including better search, better commenting tools, and an expanded reference section drawing from the WUWT archives setup as a separate but complimentary website.
The new initiative with new partners will give us a big boost, plus help other climate skeptic websites too. The separate climate reference website in the works, so you don’t have to wade through the over 20,000 articles here.
The plan is simple: A rising tide lifts all boats, where the “boats” is climate skepticism worldwide. To that end, invite a friend to visit WUWT, and learn.
Now, a request.
During the last year, Charles Rotter aka Charles the Moderator, has been mostly keeping WUWT running with the help of guest authors, such as Eric Worrall, David Archibald, Bob Tisdale, Willis Eschenbach, David Middleton, Kip Hansen, and others. Charles did this so that I could get my own life and business back together, after several years of loss followed by the CampFire and all the mess that entailed.
I’d like to reward him, since he’s done this without any remuneration at all (despite persistent false claims we have “big oil” backing) and so I’d like to ask our readers to consider making a donation to WUWT, on his behalf for his year of solid work.
Thank you for your consideration.
If the button above does not work for you, try the one at the upper right on the sidebar.
Thank you, all of you. My sincerest best wishes for a happy and prosperous new year!
-Anthony
Yes, I noticed the thread on which someone had impersonated Geoff Sherrington, and the real Geoff then had to come in and disclaim those comments. And he isn’t the only one.
But this missive lacks a key piece of information: how do we register?
Look for the announcement, all of the instructions will be there.
Some single sign on providers like Google, Microsoft, Facebook, etc. would be great
But email verification for those of us who have as little as possible (or nothing) to do with those companies is also wanted.
Exactly.
agreed a wordpress sign in is required for “likes” already so it could be dual purposed,please.
I wont use fbk gaggle or gates muck either
Not really. It’s best to have as little as possible to do with Big Data, for reasons ranging from blatant abuse to absurd tribal dissonances.
Yes, I try not o post anywhere it has to be through facebook etc.
PLEASE make sure it is WORKING before switching over. I have no problem at all with having to register – but it took two weeks for another site that recently locked down to get things to the point where I could get past WordFence.
Do we have to use our entire name, or is the screen name acceptable? I’ve already had trolls trying to track me down (not connected to WUWT) and have no wish to repeat that.
Thanks!
Likewise.
My screen name will be “M Courtney” or it will not be here at all.
Can’t have my potential contract partners finding my climate scepticism rather than my work record when googling me.
No-one pays us to be sceptical of AGW. But the bills are real.
Likewise, I have professional reasons not to use a real ID when commenting here. If you’re retired or financially independent, you not consider it matters. For me it does.
I don’t have FarceBook or Twatter accounts for the same reason.
Anyway , the delay in posts getting published here has long since killed any possibility to have any kind of discussion or exchange with others. Sadly, that went a a year or two ago.
Looking forward to seeing what the new improved WUWT will have to offer.
“I don’t have FarceBook…” Facistbook is fitting as well.
I don’t know what the exact rules will be but it seems it would be possible for people to continue to use the name they currently use. Anthony is the only one who really needs to know our real names and he will have that with the registration process.
TKS Neil,
Your thankful comment narrows the guilty numbers by one. It was annoying, but soon passed, no damage done.
Charles The Moderator was superb and most deserving of what readers here shall hit the tin with.
Geoff S
$100 sent. Keep up the great work!
Oh, PayPal…mmm is there another way to donate?
That’s what I was coming on to say. Last time I did PayPal I got imposter PayPal solicitations for months. Not doing it again. There are other services…or a snail mail account please.
All that aside, thanks for all the hero work and looking forward to the coming upgrades. Anything that helps you guys and gals educate me on the science is great by me.
– And neither donation button is working for me. I will decide how much I donate, thank you; but the “other amount” button comes-up with “0.00” and will not let me add, subtract or alter that amount.
Put the cursor at the left and type a number, then edit as needed.
Great news (-:
I see nothing onerous in these changes but that is because I am not one of those seeking to disrupt civil discourse.
> One of the biggest problems we’ve had is with trolls that use fake names, fake emails, and fake connections (proxys) to threadbomb.
There has also been abuse of nested replies. I don’t have a good answer but too often people will reply to the topmost post reply to show up higher in the comments stream.
Your efforts are underappreciated and I am not alone in hoping your real life issues are proving rewarding.
Sometimes a reply to one of my comments will seem to have nothing to do with what I said. Maybe I’m not very good at communicating. 🙂 Anyway, I can’t remember any that seemed like obvious trolls. The nested replies make it a lot easier to follow a conversation.
I do appreciate the couple of people who express unpopular ideas here. It keeps us on our toes. On the other hand, it would be nice if they’d provide some evidence to back up what they’re saying.
“reply to one of my comments will seem to have nothing to do with what I said”
If there is a possibility of misunderstandings, I provide a short quote from the post I’m replying to. Also commieBob, using the name/handle of the person replied to can help.
BTW I post under my own name because I’m retired. It reminds me to not be uncivil in what I say, and distinguishes me from trolls who hide the identities behind their despicable comments. However I understand how this would be imprudent for some other people who do not post very unkind comments.
“If there is a possibility of misunderstandings, I provide a short quote from the post I’m replying to.”
And there’s always a likelihood that SOMEONE will misunderstand—or pretend to, so as to get in a “dig.”
Done.
CTM, ‘av a blast, as they say in Yorkshire.
Thanks for the update Anthony,
I’ll be sending a little something and I’ll try to make repeated donations. The site is valuable to me. Quite an education from everyone involved.
Happy New Year
I ran into the User ID Password doesn’t match buzz saw trying to donate with a credit card. I won’t try again, I’ve run into this before and it’s a hopeless merry go round.
Yeah, I’ve run into that too & don’t even think of re-signing into wordpress — I might end up not being able to post.
Yay. I will likely be (at least partially) retiring this year, so I’ll have more time for my neglected duties.
BTW, you never did reply to my Email (and ctm’s followup) about my month and categories summaries were back in my Guide to WUWT and no longer triggering the unencrypted web page warnings. https://4castwidgets.intelliweather.net/enso/guide/
This is a great way to allow for better discourse and to keep control of those under bridge dwellers who think themselves clever.
Can’t wait to register.
Thanks for all that WUWT does for those of us that want to keep informed and help others to see the light at the end of the tunnel is not a train.
Anthony,
Please make “Surface Stations Gallery” available.
Scott Finegan
January 1, 2020 at 12:59 pm
Yes and it would be useful to have a sea level rise reference page too if possible.
The only thing that will keep me from commenting is having to use my real name. I’m retired so they can’t go after my job any more but the Social Justice Warriors (SJW) have me surrounded. Two members of my family have been their victims. One received threats of violence from all over the continent.
The Framers envisioned that it might be dangerous to express unpopular opinions.
Exactly. I live in a remote part of southern Vermont, if my name was published and the eco loons came around it takes 30 minutes for the local police to arrive. I would have to defend myself and my family and it would get ugly. Do not even want to think about that.
Don’t mind registration as long as I can keep anonymous on the Internut.
Same for me.
I live in Blue Oregon surrounded by blue neighbors. One of which even tore down my Trump sign 3 years ago.
Right on!
To ctm,
We, meaning WUWT folks, likely won’t make you
as rich and famous as Marc Benioff, but you are
much appreciated.
Happy New Year all!
Will this be separate from and different than the WordPress login?
Most likely as we do not host on the wordpress.com network.
Happy New Year with $100.
$100 in, thank you guys. I last moderated a dialup bbs and can’t imagine dealing with today’s clowns.
Sounds good to me
but one question,
I use three real different email accounts to send from depending on where I am, home/work/spare-time
?
best regards for the new year
Is there a question or did you want corroboration that your list of three locations does indeed add up to a sum of three?
Good to see you are still an ass hole…
A bit atrophied. Need to flex those muscles every once in a while.
Oooo….dry, very dry! LOL!
Charles,
the question you unfortunately missed . . .
was the potential need to either register three times with WUWT with the same user name or the ability to log three different email accounts on the one registration,
I did a quick calc and found that the locations did indeed add up to 3, they also summed up to 3, I couldn`t find a way add them up to a sum of 3.
my apologies for not including a, or the, question in this response but I hope it clears up your question.
How does that work for your Amazon or Netflix accounts?
Then thou must count to three.
Three shall be the number of the counting and the number of the counting shall be three.
Four shalt thou not count, neither shalt thou count two, excepting that thou then proceedeth to three.
Five is right out.
Nicholas, You have clearly not come across the UKs, Abbott economics in your counting world. 🙂
Welcome Brother Maynard.
Skip a bit brother…..
How was Antioch?
I was just thinking that and then I scrolled down to your comment. 🙂
Once the number three, being the number of the counting, be reached, then lobbest thou the Holy Hand Grenade in the direction of thine foe, who, being naughty in my sight, shall snuff it — The Book of Armaments, Chapter 4 verse 20
Whoa, we can post here via Email? 🙂
Anthony/Charles
My only concern is that although I have a valid email address on file with WUWT,
I’ve haven’t opened my account in over five years… too many web creatures used
it as a point of entry and slipped though my blockers and filters over the years.
Will I have to re-register (and figure out how to get back into my email account)
or might there be there a “grandfather” option for those of us who signed up during
the 2000’s ?
I rarely make substantive comments on WUWT, but occasionally find a news piece
that fits the thread topic and put up a link for other readers to consider.
I hope I don’t end up as a lurker.
Happy New Year/ Decade to all !
No one is “signed” up from years ago. We used to be on the wordpress network, where you likely are signed up. Our current incarnation does not require registration for commenting. We currently don’t even have a way to sign up.
That is what is changing.
You could always open a free email account at any of numerous sites.
Or perhaps use your automatically generated Facebook email address (which hardly anyone knows they have) if you have a FB account.
Google, Hotmail, Live, any internet provider if you pay for an internet service…
There are huge numbers of sites which offer free email service.
And most companies that offer free email will let you have more than one.
I would assume that everyone knows this…except for the fact you feel you need to get into an old account for some reason.
Just sayin’.
“Free email accounts may seem like a dime a dozen, but there are some free services that stand way above the rest. This article will help guide you through the best free email accounts and which features make them the best.”
https://www.lifewire.com/best-free-email-accounts-1356641
Fairly sure I was imitated on this website a while back. But when I looked again to respond the post couldn’t be found Wasn’t sure if mods had deleted it or if I had misread the name (it was definitely a “Courtney” as my CTRL+F found it).
This was back around Easter. I was busy so I forgot about it. It may have been my mistake anyway.
But I have noticed my comments have been slow to come up ever since; often spammed
Registration is a good idea. Best wishes for the New Year to Charles the Moderate, Eric Worrall, David Archibald, Bob Tisdale, Willis Eschenbach, David Middleton, and Kip Hansen and thanks for the solid work in 2019,
“Charles the Moderate”?
I’m curious to see what CTM has to say about that, although the 5th Amendment is also a possibility.
;o)
If it was possible to post graphs and charts etc so they could be seen without people having to follow a link, we could win this battle against the alarmists. Quora seems to be able to do that quite well, but Quora is open to manipulation by gangs of alarmists. Otherwise the debate will go on far longer than it should.
“If it was possible to post graphs and charts etc so they could be seen without people having to follow a link, we could win this battle against the alarmists.”
ya links can show sources and you don’t want anyone checking sources. Hide your sources, win the battle!
(unlikely)
Don’t be an ass (yeah I know that’s akin to asking you to not be you). jaymam’s point was that being able to see a chart as a chart is a lot more effective than providing a link and *hoping* readers will follow it so they can see the chart. The fact is a lot of people, when reading the comments, don’t bother to follow the links that people post for many reasons ranging from laziness to computer safety – IE only clicking on links when it comes from someone they trust.
do strawmen ever shoot back?………..
Once again steve shows how incredibly ignorant he is on almost every subject imaginable.
Doing this does not hide links. Hovering your mouse over the picture will cause the link to be displayed.
Also if you go to the site, your browser will show the link at the top.
Regardless, steve and his fellow warmistas wrote the book on how to hide your sources.
Steven,
For an English major you sure seem to have poor reading comprehension.
And grammar. And indication of sloppiness.
Hi AW and CTM,
Once I get settled from another cross-country move; I will make two; one for site and earmarked for CTM.
Happy New Year to you both and all here at WUWT.
I’ve just tried to make a donation. At the very end I failed because PayPal insisted on ask me for my ID number.
What ID number? I live in New Zealand where we don’t have ID numbers.
What is this?
I am not a number, I am a free man!
#6.
I C UR IP
Eric, I live in GB and PayPal doesn’t ask me for an ID number, it asks me for my PayPal password; but you have to be a member of PayPal to make the thing work.
Open a PayPal account.
Good to hear, Bravo, Anthony!.Happy New Year!
Can we post images again? – it was much better when jpg images opened in the comments.
And can the posting page remember who we are, so we do not have to type in the details each time?
Cheers, R
And can we have the ability to edit. We had it for a short period of time. As someone who all too often makes the occasional typo and usually fails to catch them until after “Post Comment” has been clicked, the edit function is a very nice to have feature.
In addition to edit…
I would love if there were fewer or no pop-ups. I opened the site four times today and twice my virus protection shut it down and once I was hijacked with an ad for virus protection. Maybe something like FreeRepublic has, they don’t have ads, just quarterly fundraising to a goal. Some pay and some don’t but no ads or pop-ups.