3 message limits per day

Basic (free) Members are allowed to start up to three messages (or other types of direct communciation) with other members in a 24 hour period.

In addition to Send Message, other methods of direct communication include:

• Add to Network
• Introduce to a Friend
• Give Referral
• Send a Compliment

90% of our spam issues are people who join and send spam messages to the top three people in the directory. (Sorry, Howard, Molly & Kiomi - that's the price of being at the top!) When they hit the fourth person, they're stopped and usually flagged within 24 hours before they can send more.

Does this clarify? Are you reporting a bug, Jessie - were you stopped from sending your three?

Again, the 3-limit was not implemented to punish Basic Members (nor to provide incentive to upgrade your membership for $10/mo), it's to control the spammers.

We used to limit only the Send Message feature, until people complained that they were getting spammed through the Invitation, Add to Network and Compliments tool too. If there were another way to stop bogus members from joining at 3am and sending out as many invitations to their porn site as they can before they're caught, we'd do it.

I noticed that too when I was briefly a non-paid member. Kinda makes the biznik site rather retarded (classic definition: slow) for direct communication and biznik-online-connection with that limit impacting all the above-mentioned categories.

pro's and con's and the almighty dollar I suppose and spam... of course

Those spams kind of suck though if you've ever received one. Art T.

Lara,

Are these spammers using bots? Chances are, yes because it is not cost effective enough to spam manually. Assuming that is the case, we can implement a manual step to weed out bots. When someone has sent 3 messages, he will receive an email through the registered email address with a link. By clicking on the link, the member will be allocated another 3 messages. Spam bots will need to be modified quite a bit to handle such a manual step. Again, not very cost effective and they will turn else where.

Frank

They can't use bots on Biznik - at least we've never yet had an instance of someone successfully doing that yet. The only way someone can spam you via Biznik is by first creating an account, and then using that account to contact you.

There are apparently spam farms in low-wage places like Africa where people get paid next to nothing to sit behind a computer, join social networks and send out scams and spams.

Like Howard, Molly & Kiomi, I'm currently on the first page and just got a spam message the other day. I guess that is the price of "fame." I just wish these spammers could be more creative in what they write.

Couldn't they ask me to train them in QuickBooks or properly set up their spammer business financial records in the software, smile?

As for the basic membership, being limited to three messages a day isn't that much. That comes to nearly 1,095 in a year and gives a free member an incentive to be active each day or avoid the hassle by coughing up $10 tax deductable bucks a month (you deduct it under dues and subscriptions).

When you think about it, most of us do list a web site or a phone number so you can make personal contact outside of the site and use your three e-mails for people who don't.

However, if you are going to be a basic member which is your right, I personally think that if you are limited to three messages, you should focus on compliments or add to networks rather than messages per se.

The reason is that for compliments about another member's services, you help them in that some folks need to see some endorsements before they will do business with someone and you can reference back how person "A" helped your business (describe your business) which is a form of guerrilla marketing for yourself.

In the case of networks, you get to plant two crops in one row by being able to send a message and ask someone to join your network. Sometimes, I like to see who is in which member's profile.