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That might work for a site with a small memberbase, but when you talk about big ones (like pennies by email with almost 16,000 members), it would be an impossible job.
Maybe the idea could be built upon somehow, however....

seems like a lot of work for the webmaster... and the user as well

what's so hard about not clicking a link that says 'do not click - you will lose money/points/account'?

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Many have implemented the 3 strike rule....if you click a cheat link 3 times then you will have consequences.
For those absent-minded people who "accidentally" click a cheat link now and then, this should be good enough.
I mean, an accident or mistake is one thing......but if you are clicking those cheat links repeatedly then you are OBVIOUSLY not being careful, not reading, etc....at all.
I think 3 times is sufficient to get the point across while being fair at the same time.
This is REALLY EASY everyone.
And if you have so many windows open at the same time that you can't keep track of what you are clicking on....that's too bad....your loss.

3 strikes and you are out. My links are CLEARLY marked. If you click every single time you either can't read english or you are using cheat software. If some one clicks once accidentally then that's fine...if they click 3 times they are NOT reading.... My links don't deduct money....I just view the click logs to see who the repeat offenders are

Why do it once a month......it's on going to keep the database cleaned out.

Active members who FOLLOW the rules are the ones that make a program.

Amy

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Depends on which software as there are more than one and webmasters have ways of telling different things lol There is more than one way to catch cheaters.....we just don't announce it so they know HOW to get around it.

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In all seriousness there always seems to be a few who find ways to get around everything, but evetually they are caught lol

There are quite a few less than clever "cheaters" who are very well known to webmasters....in fact if they don't appear in your program you ask "am I not good enough" LOL

My goal is to try my best to run a good, honest program.

Amy

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doh!
replying is pretty annoying for doing it each month...
and do you imagine 15000 mails in yyour inbox?
can you read them all?

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I can see a few hole in your idea.

First sometime email got lost in the cyberworld so an honest member may never receive the email or reply to the email but the webmaster never receive it. Then when you think of giving 2 weeks to answer because of vacation, well for a lot of program the link are good only for 1 week so they will probably delete the email anyway. And finally if members didn't notice the clearly mark DO NOT CLICK link do you think they will pay more attention to this?

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the problem with saying "on x day i'm going to send an email with no links, you need to read it and email the address in there with your username from the email address you use" is that once word gets out, everyone will know on x day that email comes in. so they'll look for it, look for the address to mail to, and send the email

then the rest of the month they're either not reading or using cheating software. even the ones that can't understand english will be able to get around it, because they'll know which day that email comes out, and to look for it on that day.

even though there's a few holes in the idea, i'm gonna go ahead and say this as a program owner: thank you. the fact that you're taking the time to think about something to try and help out the industry is commendable. there might be a way to tweek the idea up and come up with something that will work. don't throw in the towel. keep thinking, keep trying, keep posting.

for now though, i think personally the tracking link, with a three strikes and you're out rule, is the best way to go. that way, if someone accidentally hits it, they can go "oops" and just be a little more careful, without actually loosing anything (no loss of earnings, no loss of points, account isn't auto deleted)



oh, and amy? about your comment here:



i would much prefer to be saying "i'm not worthy! i'm not worthy! i'm not worthy!"

I was wondering why I don't see a security certificate when I log into my ACCOUNT. It seems like SendMoreInfo, and some other good GPTR have security certificates.

Why don't more sites do this? Would this help in cutting down on "hacker" attacks? It would make it a lot less trivial a challenge to hack your site (well, it's harder to hack 128-bit encryption than none at all).
There doesn't seem to be any protection against someone with a packet sniffer getting my information on a post from me to you when logged into your sites (just ones without security certificates).

Just a thought.

SendMoreInfo went that way after they got hacked by someone I think was from Russia. There are a few threads on here about it.

I think it is a good idea but too much work for the WMs.

Hmmm... Didn't know that. I haven't heard of any problems since. Are there any other sites that DO use SSL and or security certificates? It would just make my information feel safer.


Hmmm... I can't vouch for GPTR on this one, but without that little yellow lock at the bottom, they're just asking crackers to attack them. I'm not saying it's right, but I'm saying that if they had it, it might detour would be crackers from the attempt. I've just seen a lot of complaints about people's info being stolen.
It's true that anyone with a bone to pick, or really wanted to could crack in could, but it is less likely using secure certificates.

Your resident forum networking experts could even tell you that installing SSL or even using the security certificates isn't that much more work, and would save a lot of headache in the end.

I've seen good certificates for $30/year (It's been 3 months I've had to lock down a site (I've used mine to sign ActiveX controls. It uses the same certs as sites). The hosting company said it only needed the certificate, then you could code it to use https://)

Well, not so much too much work, so much as a) the upfront cost of getting a real cert from a decent CA, and the extra cost most hosting companies put on a secure site.

And of course the fact that 99% of program owners wouldn't know how to install them.....and the idea probably hasn't occurred to the few people who actually are technically capable of doing this for said owners.