MySpace's ghastly test as to whether you're human enough to create a profile
As if it's not frustrating enough to be told that the user name you've invented is already taken and that you didn't enter a valid zip code, these human tests are sometimes as illegible to real people as they hopefully are to bots and image readers. However, I have a newfound respect for CAPTCHAs (and the other assortment of human tests out there) after taking a tour of Shadows.com today.
Shadows is a social bookmarking site along the lines of Digg and Furl, but with some extra, aesthetically pleasing features like screenshots of saved links. On entering the site, I went to their search engine to see what links people had saved for certain keywords. I didn't immediately take a look at the home page, which lists the ten most recently added links.
Everything loaded awfully slowly and I couldn't work out why. However, upon wandering back home, I saw ten identical links, posted by users whose names varied from "ttru3i2" to "ttj894g5h3ui3ergh625". Apparently, these Shadow members were very interested that the site's visitors know about colon cleansing websites. Later in the afternoon, visitors were treated to a barrage of online casinos.
The invaluable information available this afternoon on Shadows.com
It didn't take long to dawn on me that there were two reasons for this gross display of spamming:
- The Create Account page does not require a valid email address ([email protected] will do). Thus, Shadows does not require new users to retrieve an email and click on a link to verify their accounts.
- There's no annoying CAPTCHA text to retype.
If the Shadows team rectifies this problem, their site will become infinitely more usable, popular, and credible. In the mean time, it's the place to go if you're into online gambling scams and are having problems going to the bathroom.
I simply don't agree that they are necessary. As people have stated beforehand, many times a user with perfect vision fail at those, and vision disabilities is the most common disability!
There's an option that is way more accessible that's based on simply asking the user questions. "What color is water?". Making a list of 100 or so questions like that is no problem, and if you want more there are big dictionaries available.
Emil - I really like that idea. Jim Boykin's blog does a good job with that and I think the new SEOmoz will probably have that feature as well.
I also like your idea Emil. Instead of perception questions there should be a set of questions that only a human could answer. Sometimes people have verifications like "What is the colour below?" What if the person visiting the website is colour blind, or their monitor is messed up? You're right about the visual disabilities too.
There sure are a lot of solutions to the problem... I also think we should incorporate some of the more creative techniques into the SEOmoz site, such as providing questions that only a human could effectively answer. We could have a lot of fun composing those questions, too :)
I discovered Shadows a while back and it was rife with spam then. It's a shame they haven't done anything about it via the signup mechanism, because letting the problem run is akin to endorsing it.
I mean, they're not even using nofollow on the links, so spammers are getting the full benefit of those backlinks.
Unfortunately, it looks like the CAPTCHA system is still required.
Is this your first post on seomoz.org Jane? If so great first post ... Captchas are a necessary annoyance... I just hope Homeland Security doesn't require fingerprints or retina scans in the future.
I think Digg's system where they verify you have a central nervous system only with the first few posts/comments, then relax and don't use CAPTCHAs after that is the best balance of both worlds. It keeps bots from signing up and spamming, and forces the determinded ones to participate in the site some before spamming.
Jane,
Captchas (and especially required registration) are a bit of a turn off for an impulsive surfer like me. They tend to discourage my casual participation on sites, except for ones that I truly trust and feel an affinity towards.
But you're right - it's generally a lot better than having to wade through than comment /blog/tag spam. That is much more of a turn off.
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To G-Man and those in know:
How are the anti-captcha algorithms coming along? It seems like the captchas in use have gotten more visually cryptic and complex, suggesting that the simpler ones have been thoroughly stomped and cracked.
You can't go wrong with toilet humor in your first blog post ;)
Welcome to the bloggin' family, Jane! I'm pleased that not only did you write a good post, but you actually wanted to write one. You can't teach someone to be passionate about his or her job, folks, but thankfully this Kiwi appears to have it :D
Captchas are one of the worst things about the internet. Half the time I can't read them and the other half I can read them but still get it wrong, apparently.
As somebody who knows about how the internet works and who has perfect eyesight I dread to think what the average surfer would think when presented with one of these stupid barriers.
The title includes the phrase "Necessary Evil" because no one likes captchas. I'm certainly not saying that captchas are God's gift to usability (is that a Y or an X? Or a 4?) and I also share your frustration with them. However, after wading through literally countless spam links yesterday, I would rather spend the time to work out the text and be then presented with some real, interesting content. There are other ways to slow the spammers down (admittedly, stopping them completely is tough) and I mention one of them, which can be just as boring- being sent an email with a confirmation link.
It's a little like airport security, but obviously not as serious: we're really REALLY sick of taking off our shoes and unpacking our laptops, but we like flying on safer aeroplanes, too.
I see your captcha and raise you a pwntcha.
They need to impliment your farm animals, Oatmeal, along with tons of cute variables. Nothing's going to stop them, but slowing them down would be nice.
I love the animals but one of the, um, "cute variables" offered by the CrazyMail captcha on the pwntcha site Matt mentioned is terrifying.
Might I add that "pwntcha-pwntcha" seems to be a solid onomatopoetic substitute for "oontz-oontz"
Yeah there sure is one awful one, but I was referring to the family-friendly animals on 0at's site.
Congrats on joining the blog team, Jane!
With regards to captchas - it's very cool to see an example of how a non-captcha-requiring site gets spammed virtually to death. I'm guessing the Shadows folks will be putting something into place in the near future... Let's hope it's like 0at's farm animal system :)