The thing about peace

[Blitzy]

I should remane my profile name to 'Controvesy'

I have looked around a wee bit and see a bit of a split,
obviously you all have seen this better than me, a lowly Telegram dweller.

Now, this little rumble is something I would like to clarify,
Look, by clarify I mean, a proper discussion with facts out forward on the descitions made as they are,
In Laymans terms, a cool calm discussion, an argument won't bring the facts we need ok?

What I understand is there is a conflict of ideology here with the way things are run and thus this had lead to the creation of another SA furry forum.

Could we begin by exactly stating what these differences are? If any?

I will not appreciate a "But he/she said" ragefest, I want the facts.

(This might be clarified properly somewhere else, if so, just link then lock this,
otherwise, let't get this started?)

[Raven Song]

I cannot tell you how or why these things happened, only that, in my personal opinion, they are neither bad nor good. monopoly's never work out in the peoples favour, but competition can be damaging. That does not mean that competition isn't good, it simply means that the people need to be aware of WHAT they are getting with the two different competing places/things/etc.

Here, I have all the old people I know and love and have grown up with in the fandom. Here I have yiff. Here I have most of my art saved away for a rainy day...

There I have new opportunity for making new friends. There I have more opportunity to rack up more posts and again become leading poster because I am competitive as shit yo..

Furries tend to be a fairly intellectual and educated bunch. Wherever you have that, you have debate. The difference between debate in real life and on a forum is no one can read your tone and so everyone tends to take everything a little heavier, a little more personally than it probably was meant. I am the worst with that trust me but I know it and accept it.
At the end of the day the reasons it was made shouldn't define how or why it gets used. I don't particularly like the one guy there (Tetsudra, and he knows, everyone knows ) but we still had a banter and I don't let it affect my using it. Heck Leeward and I fight! Leeward and I didn't see eye to eye for a fair amount of time, but it is a furry initiative and I will support it, as a furry friend and as someone who would like to see these things grow. I don't see it as a rival, I see it as a screen door on my patio... it opens a little different to my main door but they lead to the same place... the furry fandom.

[Galahad]

Are you attempting to introduce logic, civil discussion and rational thinking into this specific topic?
Shame on you!



The Furnace seems to be the response to what Leeward believes to be defects in ZAFur, primarily in its administration. The Furnace serves the same function to the same community (currently, anyways), and it is also a forum. In that sense, it is very similar. However, the forum aesthetics and features are a little different, as are the ambitions of the staff. In my opinion, the two have not diverged enough to become significantly distinct just yet, but pay a visit and have a look around, and you will notice a few minor differences.

That being said, I view the entire issue as inconsequential at the moment. Some people like it; some don't. But at the end of the day, the day-to-day affairs continue as normal. There has been a spike in comparisons to Hitler, though, which has done wonders for local comedy.

[Leeward]

I've been watching from a distance just to see what happens here, and before I respond I just want to make the observation: do you notice how the type (and origin) of response you get changes when you ask for facts as opposed to opinions?

Honestly, I don't have much to add to what Raven and Galahad have already said. But to address your question directly, those differences in ideology aren't as simple as a conflict of opinion. I've explained it before though and I'd really prefer to avoid starting another flame war by repeating myself. However, Blitzy, I'm completely open to discussing this, so feel free to contact me via PM or Telegram or whatever medium you prefer. I believe your AnthroCulture forum credentials were ported over to the Furnace, so you're welcome to PM me there too.

[Vulpest]

Could we begin by exactly stating what these differences are? If any?

Through extensive research solely consisting of me making an account I can safely say that the main difference between the two communities are as follows:
Whereas zafur let's anyone join, furnace requires administrative approval of applicants.
The members of furnace are required to be experts in identifying grass and road signs, while zafur demands the ability to read misshapen text.

Overall it seems to be roughly the same community, the same topics and the same fandom. or perhaps under the veils of guest access there lay a myriad of hidden topics that have reached a new height of furrydome. Topics that transcend yiff, topics that trancend drama. The very evolution of the fandom itself!

Who can really say blitzy? Certainly not me, I'm still just a mere applicant. Why not explore the differences yourself? I mean can you really ever trust what others tell you about things anyway?

[Leeward]

Whereas zafur let's anyone join, furnace requires administrative approval of applicants.

Actually no, they both require admin approval, which is standard, to avoid spam and such.
However, approval here can take up to two weeks, yet on the Furnace I approved you already.

The members of furnace are required to be experts in identifying grass and road signs, while zafur demands the ability to read misshapen text.

Choice of CAPTCHA system is personal preference, but picture-based ones tend to both work better against bots and be more human-friendly.

[Vulpest]

Well that certainly explains why I was never sent a verification email from zafur But how do they then know what is spam and what isn't? The support ticket when you ask them to resend the verification email? I find it really bizzare, this administrative approval thing.

I'm really bad with those misshapen text ones so the grass tests was indeed better but why so many tho? Or does that only happen when you forget to click the "agree to terms" the first time?

Anyhow Yay! Now I can gase upon the hidden splendours and become enlightened to the wonders of ascended fur-ness!

[Valerion]

I look at the IP you register from, the email addresss and username you choose, your profile information, and compare it to some known blacklist, and then make a call on whether I should approve it or not. It's a really low bar, though, and new users do get watched for a while.

I also send a notification to the CRs so they can handle some welcoming and so on.

[Leeward]

Oh you meant the email verification... yeah that's largely a bot check. Not sure how reCAPTCHA works internally or why it asked you twice, though.

For the admin approval thing, it's more about common sense than anything else, which is something computers aren't good at (yet), which unfortunately means there is an element of human error... but I mean it's kind of obvious when you get a sign up using an email that's a known spammer or from an IP that's a Tor exit node that it's probably a troublemaker.

[Vulpest]

That sounds like a lot of work. I mean I know being an admin involves, well... Admin, but why add to that by checking members manually? Or is there some unseen war of infiltration going on?

I had to do 3grass tests and one road sign test the second time, where I only had to do one sign test the first time.

[Valerion]

That sounds like a lot of work. I mean I know being an admin involves, well... Admin, but why add to that by checking members manually? Or is there some unseen war of infiltration going on?

I had to do 3grass tests and one road sign test the second time, where I only had to do one sign test the first time.

To protect the forum from spammers. CAPTCHAs filter out the basic ones, the real humans that are paid to spam or more advanced bots are what I try to stop. And, of course, people ban-evading, or duplicate accounts, or such, althought that is not quite so easy to spot off the bat. It's not a war, but I consider it part of my duty.

[Leeward]

You generally only see manual approval on smaller forums, or ones that are easy or appealing targets. Larger platforms that get hundreds, thousands, or more sign-ups a day can't afford to do that (or rather it's not worth the effort) and rely on user reporting instead, which is why you see lots of spam on those. Then there are the trolls, who just do random annoying things because they find it amusing and/or have nothing else to do. Then you get miscellaneous undesirables such as people trying to run social engineering, individuals with vendettas, scammers/con artists, or even predators. There's little to nothing we can do about those though because they tend to have a knack for being inconspicuous, which is why all platforms have disclaimers and safety guidelines.

[Vulpest]

the real humans that are paid to spam or more advanced bots are what I try to stop.

People get paid to spam!? At what dingy tavern can I find that quest?
I guess that makes sense. I still don't envey you the task but keep up the good fight, noble wolf guy and cow girl.
Speaking of duplicate accounts, I may be ever so guilty of doing that. I thought my gmail was busted when I didn't get the email nor response to the support ticket, so I made another gmail and another account as vulp3st to see if that works. When I checked back some time later, I saw both were activated. I really should learn to be patient, sorry about that.

[Valerion]

the real humans that are paid to spam or more advanced bots are what I try to stop.

People get paid to spam!? At what dingy tavern can I find that quest?
I guess that makes sense. I still don't envey you the task but keep up the good fight, noble wolf guy and cow girl.
Speaking of duplicate accounts, I may be ever so guilty of doing that. I thought my gmail was busted when I didn't get the email nor response to the support ticket, so I made another gmail and another account as vulp3st to see if that works. When I checked back some time later, I saw both were activated. I really should learn to be patient, sorry about that.

No one would put in the effort to spam if there was no payoff.

https://www.quora.com/How-do-you-get-paid-for-spamming
http://www.zdnet.com/article/how-email- ... eir-money/

As for your duplicate, I DID pick that up, and complained about it to the CRs. Then I deactivated one of them, as it clearly wasn't an attempt to circumvent the rules.

But this is off-topic, let's return to the thread topic.

[Leeward]

Honestly, I found this far more constructive and relevant than the technically more on-topic discussions from before.