Big SPAM problem

[PhysBrain]

Ok.. the latest round of spam afflicting this site is making it difficult for me to want to keep checking in on a regular basis. I would rather not have to wade through a dozen spam messages looking for a real message. I also think that it is possible that alot of people have stopped posting all together because any message instantly gets lost in the flood of spam.

Is there anything that can be done to limit this problem? Perhaps it would be helpful if we could slow down the rate at which a person can post to the forum after their threads get a certain number of warnings (bad post reportings). Perhaps the reputation system can be expanded to fulfill this purpose. Users with high reps can pretty much post unlimited, but the worse the rep, the less posts a user can make in a day. The default for new users might be something like one or two posts a day. As their rep increases, then their post rates may also be increased.

These are just my thoughts. I'd like to be able to do something besides watch this forum slowly die.

(And by the way, the ignore filter doesn't seem to be working. I'm still seeing new posts by mine99.)

[SEDShead]

If the more active members would like the administrate capability to block/delete the spam posts, that would be much appreciated. I'll look into more inherent ways to stem the tide. I tried one already (probation period), but don't seem to have done it correctly.

[JediJosh]

There is only so much having the power to delete individual messages will do.

Moderators need the power to ban accounts and IP addresses from using the forums if we're going to stop it.

Every morning I log on there are at least another 10+ spam messages, and I delete them most days, but the next day they're always there.