I’m getting hammered with spam on this site all of a sudden. It’s overwhelming Akismet, and the spam program I just installed, Defensio, is still on a learning curve about what constitutes “spam.”

For now, so that I can get something done (other than deleting email notifications about waiting spam), I’m *temporarily* disabling comments on all posts. I’ll look at this further tonight and see if I can find a better solution, though! See updates below.

(And for my random thought of the morning –”spam hammered” could actually be spammered. And this is a spamergency!)

Update #1: An online pal — who’s about to become a BELOVED online pal if this works — just sent me a link to a different plugin with a glowing recommendation. So I’m re-enabling the comments and trying Cookies for Comments instead. Yay!

Update #2: Just tested that plugin. I didn’t see anything amiss as a regular user on the site when I posted a test comment to this post. I’m hoping the solution is this simple — it blocks the spammers without hassling commenters. *crossing my fingers*

Thank you, Donncha, for the tip!

I’m pulling out of the Entrecard system for several reasons, but this blog has got an accumulation of 3,967 credits that I need to distribute before I go. So here’s the deal of the day:

I’ll give you 100 Entrecard credits just for signing up for this blog’s RSS feed or email feed, until I run out of credits. That should make 39 new readers happy, and the 40th will get a tinier slice of the pie (67 credits, or more, depending on how many dropped cards I get in the meantime). Use one of the giant orange buttons in the top right corner of my site to sign up. And please leave a comment on this post with the name of your Entrecard blog so I can send you the credits!

My leaving isn’t an indictment of the Entrecard system — I like many of their recent improvements, such as the ability to link multiple blogs. (But I do *not* like their weird new ad pricing system. FYI.) I just am trying to pare down my computer-facing time, and clicking through a promotion system like this just isn’t as fun or profitable as other projects I could be doing. So I’m spreading the EC love with this giveaway before I go.

Note to current advertisers: I will leave the Entrecard widget in place until your ads have run their course, don’t worry. I won’t back out of a deal! :o)

Thanks, Entrecard visitors! :o)

Technorati Tags: free Entrecard credits, Entrecard giveaway

I’m calling an early end to the Entrecard experiment. I’m disappointed and tired of the system’s glitches. I’ll continue to use the system as a useful way to find interesting new blogs to read, but no more clicking through hundreds of blogs to rack up the points and to raise my blog in the category ranking to — my ultimate goal — drive more traffic to my blog.

If you’re an interested Entrecarder, you can read the rest of my post on this topic on my other blog. The good news is that the blog will continue (and I’ll have more time to do it). Just no more yammering about Entrecard on a regular basis. :o)

Technorati Tags: Entrecard, powerdropping