Test Post

[PJW]

Anon1 posted:

I think the option to remove one's name from one post is a good one,
however, there is the risk that it leads the forum open to spam, and certainly it increases the burden on the moderators as effectively nothing gets posted unless it's been vetted.

That said I couldn't see how to post to this without being logged in, as the sub forum disappears from view without being logged in, which is counter intutitive to anonomous posting.

Do I take then that this addresses the spam issue, and the ID data is effectively 'stripped' in the wash as it were?

Time for another XKCD.com

Hope this has worked

Thanks for the trial
I wasn't suggesting making the whole forum like this- just as an interim mailbox for post, that could then be placed on correct forum by the moderators. I'd have hoped that most would be happy to post directly to the forum, but offering this for those that some may feel particularly sensitive about exposing themselves to public humiliation.
It is the only way I have thought of; perhaps Peter may have a better idea......
Take your point re needing to be logged in to see the anonymous sub-forum- whereas I could change this so that it didn't disappear I don't think I could (or would want to- as you realise re SPAM) permit anyone to post.
The fact that anyone on the internet just browing won't even see the sub-forum exists, seems like a good idea.
Doesn't seem unreasonable for Peter and myself to know from whom the post came; the issue is that we can protect your identity from others. We can only tell user name and the email address you gave when initially registering on the site- if these do not give identity away then we won't know either.

[Peter]

To be clear how I think it would work - those who don't want to be identified post to the sub forum, for which, like any posting, you need to register so that it is not open to spam posting. Those posts are not visible until they have been moderated. However, we don't intend moderating them in the normal way - that would mean that your post (and ID) would appear like a normal post. The idea is that we (the moderators) take your text and any attachments and post them in the appropriate forum just as Peter has done here "Anon has asked ....." . You'll need to trust Peter and me on possibly knowing who you are, but to be honest, with 300+ people registered, I haven't got time to bother figuring most of you out! As for extra work, yes it is, but if that is what it takes.....

Peter

P.S. You could all just register with variations of the name Peter and it would then just be too confusing to work out who was who.