Creeped out
I'm getting a little creeped out. It's been happening for a couple of months now, but every week or so I get a nonsensical comment on the blog in Chinese. I don't mind that someone from China is reading the blog or looking at the pictures, but it's weirding me out because the comments don't make any sense. (I've been running the comments through Google Translator, and the comments look to be half-proverbs.) And the profiles associated with the comments are all just empty blogs. Not real people, it seems.
So I'm considering making the blog only open to people that email and ask for an invite. I hate to do that because it makes it harder for people to bookmark the page and come back to look often, but these are my kids I'm posting about.
Should I keep the blog open to everyone and just start watermarking the pictures? Does anyone have any idea how to disable the right-click function on my pictures?
Or should I require everyone to get the email invite from me?
Or, third option, should I shut this one down and change the blog address? I might lose some people, but if I put up a notice and tell people to email me for the new blog address, I could filter that way. At least for a little while.
What do you all think?
I would do the invite...too many weirdos out there!!!
Krissy, I wish I could give you good advice, but we've been struggling with this for some time. (Not the weird comments, just the concern about posting pictures of the kids up on the internet, creepy people, etc.) Obviously, I've gone ahead and watermarked our photos, not because I'm some sort of great photographer, but because I've read too many stories about people finding their photos somewhere else. We're certainly going to change our blog address (mostly because it uses our daughter's name -- what was I thinking?), but we've gone back and forth about making the blog invite only. I don't want to add another hurdle for people we know and love, especially some of our older, less internet-savvy relatives. Plus, there are blogs I like to check on, where I don't really know the people (you know, like MSB's blog, since you and Marie know her, but I don't really -- if you're reading, MSB, I think you're awesome!) and if they password protected I'd feel too weird about asking for an invite...
Anyway, none of that was helpful, really. Sorry. I'll be praying for you -- and for us.
Oh, and I really, really miss you, by the way. I've been meaning to call again. It'll happen sometime. Probably before my kids are old enough to drive.
I would do the email invite thing.
There have been some times that I get a little nervous because I put a ton of info on our blog...the one thing that I did was to take it off of the "public" blogs. It will not show up on any search engines and when someone hits the "next blog" link on blogger, my blog will never show up. That means that for someone to view my blog that they either have to type in the address or come from a link on a friend's blog.
Do you have a tracker? You could actually see where this person was commenting from. You could also report abuse to blogger and they could see why someone with so many dead links is commenting.
And, thanks KG, I think you are pretty awesome, too!
so far, i've enjoyed the private blog thing. you can invite up to 100 people, so that probably covers most people who do read your blog. You could also change the settings on your comments so you verify any comment that comes through, and then you can just not post those random ones. It's a popular spamming thing- they get people to click on their profile and it's either empty, or take you to bad places.
i've been comtemplating the same thing...leaning toward going to private.
I did the invite only blog because I couldn't take having too much info out there. It has worked well though I'm sure it's more hassle for those who read it.
I say go private - it's not difficult for readers and you know who's looking at your kids.
Hmm...I was getting spam like that on mine a long time ago and i don't remember what I did, but it stopped. Probably what MSB said to do, that sounds familiar. I guess I take comfort in the fact that we move around a lot so no one could really find us? And, since I'm so bad at putting photos up, I've never thought of someone stealing our photos. But maybe I should think about this more. I haven't the slightest idea how to put a watermark on a photo. I'll be making changes to the blog when we move anyway...it needs some renovations. Good luck!
I've had some of the same concerns with my blog and I think that is why I was so unmotivated for awhile. I don't want creepy/bad people reading up on my family and seeing our pictures. I had a weird comment from a creepy old man once who told me I had a "beautiful family" or something like that. Eew! I have no idea how to watermark pictures, but I noticed that Kristen Golby did and I always thought that was a good idea. I hardly ever visit password protected blogs because I'm super lazy. But it does make sense in this crazy internet to do something to protect your family.