eHam.net - Amateur Radio (Ham Radio) Community

Call Search
     

New to Ham Radio?
My Profile

Community
Articles
Forums
News
Reviews
Friends Remembered
Speak Out
Strays
Survey Question

Operating
Contesting
DX Cluster Spots
Propagation

Resources
Calendar
Classifieds
Ham Exams
Ham Links
List Archives
News Articles
Product Reviews
QSL Managers

Site Info
eHam Help (FAQ)
Support the site
The eHam Team
Advertising Info
Vision Statement
About eHam.net


QSL Managers
     

Ham Links
     


eHam.net Forum : Elmers : New Group Please Check It Out Forum Help

1-10 of 15 messages

  Page 1 of 2   Next


New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by AB4VV on November 2, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
This is a new group for new hams. I set it up for new hams to find help with the questions they have, especially on ham radio antennas. I also set it up so the older more experienced hams could help 'Elmer' new hams. Please check it out.

73, Sonny...AB4VV

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ham_Radio_101_Antennas/
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by KB1KGA on November 2, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
Good luck with your new group. It gives me an opportunity to publicly ask a question to you and other Yahoo Group admins and I guess go on a bit of a rant :-)

I went to the URL and noticed that, like many Yahoo Groups, your message archives are private. i.e, I have to apply to join and then wait for your approval before I can read the archives.

Why do you make the archives private?

I've asked this question of several ham related Yahoo Group admins recently when I've applied to join. I've received polite replies from admins who think they have answered the question but none of their answers have made sense to me. By the time I get their reply they've usually approved my membership and it doesn't seem polite to nag them further about it so I haven't pushed anyone to really THINK about it and explain WHY.

Everyone seems to think that they're helping to reduce spam by keeping the archives private but I don't understand how it achieves anything other than frustrate the casual visitor. An important point is that Yahoo obscures the email addresses in the archives. Spammers' robots won't read anything useful from them. I don't doubt that spam is a problem but hiding the archives from casual visitors does not help.

There has been many times when I have been searching around and discover an interesting group and would like to see the messages and ... there's the roadblock, I have to jump through hoops and wait for approval before I can read anything. Why can't I read what people in the group are saying and decide to join when and if I want to post something?

I haven't been a Yahoo Group admin myself so apologies for the rant if I'm missing something.

I'm not talking about allowing non-members to post. That would be a spam disaster and I doubt if Yahoo even make that an option.

I have a feeling that private archives is Yahoo's default when you create a group and most admins leave it that way and never really think about it.

73
Ross
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by KB5ZXM on November 2, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
I think if you don't "Join" Yahoo has less opertunity to infect your browser with trackin cookies, but I know less about soft ware ,than I do women, and I been single for 30 plus yrs.
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by KB1KGA on November 2, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
I think it's true that Yahoo want you to join for various reasons mostly to do with advertising but they do give admins a choice or private or public archives. I just wish more would make them public.
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by K0BG on November 2, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
I want to know why as well.

It seems to me, if you REALLY want the maximum input, then you'd make the posts public. Yes, I know, Yahoo wants you to keep them private, as this means they have more folks to send spam to, but that is just the point. In fact, this is why I block ALL yahoo.com messages, as about 85% of the spam comes through Yahoo.

So, until all of these special interests groups decide to make their posts public, include me not!

Alan, KØBG
www.k0bg.com
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by KB1KGA on November 2, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
Just because spam has a yahoo.com address doesn't mean that it's coming from Yahoo or has anything to do with them. Spammers use fake addresses. It's trivial to set the "from" address on an email to anything you want it to say.

Yahoo do send "special offers" but you can opt out of all that when you sign up or do it later in your membership profile.

Yahoo Groups is a pretty good free service especially since you can use it either as a mailing list or web forum.

I don't have any problem with Yahoo and I don't mind joining a group when I want to post. I just wish more group admins would let me read the archives without joining.
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by VA7CPC on November 2, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
I believe that, if the messages are public, a robot searching for e-mail addresses (to be used in spam mailing lists) can access the e-mail address of every person who posts.

I just Googled my own e-mail address. It's on the web in two places. One of them wasn't a surprise.

But the other place was a _Russian-language_ ham radio discussion group!

Someone on that site was a member of a Yahoo group I belong to, and copied a message I posted on that Yahoo group to the Russian-language group.

And my e-mail address was there, copied from Yahoo, in plaintext.

So there _is_ a reason to keep those posts "members only".

Charles
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by VA7CPC on November 2, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
Sonny --

Did you think about starting the "New Hams" group _here_, as a Forum on eHam.net?

I know the "Elmers" discussions get a bit technical for new hams sometimes.<g> [They get a bit technical for me, and I've been at this for a few years.]

Charles
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by KB1KGA on November 3, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
Thanks Charles but that doesn't explain it. The domain part of email addresses are obscured in the Yahoo Group archives to prevent spammers' robots doing what you describe.

If you are a member of the group and choose to receive messages by email rather than reading on the web site then you receive the messages in plain text including email address. That's normal mailing list behavior. This is probably what happened in your case. A member of the group simply forwarded a message to another group which has plain text archives. Keeping the original list's archives private would not have prevented that.

If anything, private archives makes your experience MORE likely to happen. If someone on one forum wants to refer to another then if the other has public (email obscured) archives then they might well just include a URL and say "take a look at this". They can't do that if the archives are private. Then they are more likely to forward a message which includes addresses.
 
RE: New Group Please Check It Out Reply
by N1LO on November 3, 2009 Mail this to a friend!
Sonny,

What...this Elmers forum is not good enough?

There is a huge wealth of knowledge already set up *right here*, open to public reading.

I'm curious Sonny, why did you think you needed to start over with your own group?

Mark
 

  Page 1 of 2   Next

 
Next Topic:   160 meter dipole, insulated wire, and high swrs
Previous Topic:   End fed antennas ....any good ?
Email Subscription
You are not subscribed to this topic.

Subscribe!
My Subscriptions
Subscriptions Help


Search Elmers:

Check our help page for help using Forum, or send questions, comments, or suggestions to the Forum Manager.