Gaming the EEVBlog forum? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: rolycat
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2016, 01:02:13 pm
content: Over the past few days anold forum threadwith just four posts has been steadily climbing thelistof the top ten forum topics by views. It currently has over 600,000 views, although the only regular viewers seem to be an ever-present "2 Guests".So is this the work of a bored script kiddie, an insidious cabal of T-shirt manufacturers intent on world domination, or just a bug in the forum software?

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 05, 2016, 01:06:00 pm
content: I don't even know how I'd check for that.

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 05, 2016, 01:07:36 pm
content: Puzzling

author: XOIIO
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2016, 01:08:40 pm
content: Interesting, I'd like to hear what this turns out to be.

author: krivx
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2016, 01:09:30 pm
content: Quote from: EEVblog on April 05, 2016, 01:06:00 pmCan you check referral details on the traffic to see where it's coming from?

author: Maxlor
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 05, 2016, 01:10:19 pm
content: Or maybe just some web spider that's been misconfigured? Aggregating the logs for hits per IP or user agent might give insight.

author: station240
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 05, 2016, 09:11:39 pm
content: Maybe it's the Batteriser Apes trying to send Dave negative feedback again.

author: Smokey
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 12:27:28 am
content: Shhhhhhh!!!! You are breaking the first two rules of Negative Feedback Tshirt Page View Club....

author: crispy_tofu
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 04:37:59 am
content: I just saw it gain 7 views in the matter of 5 seconds, what is going on?

author: RJFreeman
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 04:48:11 am
content: Quote from: crispy_tofu on April 07, 2016, 04:37:59 amThe OP put a link in his message, and now everyone is clicking on it to see what the mystery post is.....

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 08:16:26 am
content: Maybe I should just delete the thread?

author: amyk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 10:49:05 am
content: Doesn't look like it's anything but an unusual glitch, or maybe someone somewhere else far away on the Internet made that T-shirt popular and people are searching for where to get one... either way, I wouldn't be too bothered.Would be interesting to see how high it climbs though.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 11:49:57 am
content: Quote from: EEVblog on April 07, 2016, 08:16:26 amThat might send a negative message.

author: Rutger
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 01:44:09 pm
content: I would start deleting this post, because it is probably the cause of the problem.

author: rolycat
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 01:58:02 pm
content: Quote from: Rutger on April 07, 2016, 01:44:09 pmI'm not sure I understand what you are suggesting. The rogue topic already had 600,000 views and that figure was climbing by thousands every daybeforethis thread existed.Deleting the original thread might fix the immediate issue, but it would leave the question of what caused it unanswered and potentially leave the forum vulnerable to a repeat occurrence.There seems little point in providing statistics on the most popular threads if those statistics can't be trusted, or are open to manipulation.

author: rolycat
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 04:15:54 pm
content: Quote from: amyk on April 07, 2016, 10:49:05 amI don't think so. There are too few viewers and the numbers increase far too regularly for the figures to be generated by humans.It's clearly the work of the T-shirt Illuminati, and Dave is in it up to his crew neckThe truth is out there.

author: miguelvp
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 06:21:21 pm
content: It could be just a link referral to some popular post or something like that. Have not found it though, but didn't search too hard.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 07, 2016, 10:19:18 pm
content: Probably a high traffic referrer. Reddit? Slashdot? Google? (At a glance, I don't see that thread on the first page of a couple obvious searches.)Thrashing one thread "for fun and profit(?)" wouldn't be much use, considering the forum gets, how many tens of thousands of hits (page accesses) per day? It would take quite some traffic to DDoS this place by viewers alone.Tim

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 08, 2016, 12:35:58 am
content: Quote from: wilfred on April 07, 2016, 09:02:47 amYes, no problems.There is an option to "Recount all forum totals and statistics" but I've never run that and am hesitant to do so. I don't want it to reset 5 years worth of stats or something dumb.

author: Rutger
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 08, 2016, 03:25:01 pm
content: you should be able to open the database and manually reset the counter to a more realistic number

author: crispy_tofu
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 19, 2016, 12:13:47 pm
content: Apologies for the bump, but it looks like the views have stopped growing (hasn't changed in the last minute or so).(yes, I know that bumping this thread will increase the views again, sorry)

author: Sonny_Jim
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 20, 2016, 03:02:25 pm
content: Just out of curiousity, but which sites are 'allowed' to sell that design, as I see it in quite a few different places. I'm guessing the design is Daves originally?https://www.spreadshirt.co.uk/t-shirt-A20819420http://www.amazon.com/Only-Give-Negative-Feedback-Quality/dp/B00IYSLSR4/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8http://www.redbubble.com/people/utomo/works/14400989-i-only-give-negative-feedback-funny-geek-nerd?p=t-shirthttp://www.amazon.com/Mens-Only-Negative-Feedback-T-Shirt/dp/B01E8TNO2O/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1461164409&sr=8-2&keywords=negative+feedback+t-shirtUnfortunately there's not a lot you can do to prevent this, although I know a few 'tricks' you can do on Amazon to get the other sellers. Basically it revolves around getting brand registered with Amazon Brand Registry, then you can get the duplicate T-shirts removed under counterfeiting rules.

author: crispy_tofu
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 21, 2016, 05:28:22 am
content: I also found these:http://www.amazon.com/Womens-EEVblog-Negative-Feedback-T-Shirt/dp/B01E2RCTPK/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1461216303&sr=8-6&keywords=eevbloghttp://www.amazon.com/Mens-Tee-Negative-Eevblog-X-Large/dp/B01B4KXDUI/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&qid=1461216303&sr=8-9&keywords=eevbloghttp://www.amazon.com/Custom-Shirts-Negative-Eevblog-Ringer/dp/B01BBSUPRM/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1461216303&sr=8-10&keywords=eevbloghttp://www.amazon.com/Sleeve-Negative-Eevblog-Fitted-Shirt/dp/B01B1FOCJW/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1461216303&sr=8-11&keywords=eevblogandhttp://www.amazon.com/Eevblog-Negative-Feedback-Tshirt-Baseball/dp/B01A6U54TK/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&qid=1461216303&sr=8-12&keywords=eevblogwhich hasQuote

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 21, 2016, 06:11:05 am
content: Quote from: Sonny_Jim on April 20, 2016, 03:02:25 pmNone of the above are legit.I don't know who runs them, and I certainly don't get a cent from them.I only sell on Teespring and Zazzle.

author: Sonny_Jim
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 21, 2016, 08:43:28 pm
content: I used to work at a custom T-shirt printers and it's *very* common for this to happen. Since the rise of 'cheap'digital garment printersyou'll find people looking at the top 100 best sold T-shirt lists on Amazon and stealing the designs for their own cataloguesIf you dispatch your product with 'EEVBlog' branded packaging then it may be able to get Amazon to force the unauthorised sellers to remove their product, but tbh in my experience it just turns into a giant game of 'whack-a-mole'.

author: rolycat
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2016, 12:13:56 am
content: It would appear that whoever or whatever is doing this has shifted their attention toanothernegative feedback T-shirt thread.This is currently at number eight in the top ten topics by views, which are climbing rapidly with just one "Guest" viewer.At this rate within a few monthsallof the most popular topics on the forum will be about negative feedback T-shirts.

author: Smokey
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2016, 01:58:21 am
content: Could it be related to someone linking an image? Not sure how that would work but given there are other people selling that same design, could they just be using part of that page in their site somehow?

author: ade
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 27, 2016, 02:37:15 am
content: I thought about that, but the images are actually on CloudFlare and should not increase the # of thread views??Normally one can check the web log for http referrers but I don't know if that's available...

author: Red Squirrel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2016, 02:42:26 am
content: Apache logs might point somewhere, ex: if you see an odd user agent that keeps accessing that link. Can probably grep it so you only see the log entries of that thread. It might have a referrer too.I don't think this could slow down the forum much though, depends how hard they are hammering that thread.Seems odd someone would do this though, Hmmm is one of those batteriser topics in a top 10 page somewhere, maybe it's batteriser just trying to get other threads on top to get rid of the batteriser related threads from top 10, as it might cause it to show up higher on google or something.

author: rolycat
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2016, 07:55:17 am
content: It could conceivably be an aggrieved former forum member trying to send a message - some 'negative feedback', perhaps?There is at least one banned individual capable of writing simple scripts and given to childish acts of attempted retribution.

author: miguelvp
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 27, 2016, 08:00:57 am
content: Quote from: rolycat on April 27, 2016, 07:55:17 amI will doubt they ( figuratively ) will promote Dave's products.Embedded images on the forum do use the URL of the thread FWIW so I think it's just image linking.Edit: didn't check but are there images with a lot of views? even guest external views seem to count to the image view count.Edit2: only a few of the images are attached (that's what I meant btw) but only one has over 4000 views, so that might not be it.

author: rolycat
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 22, 2016, 09:29:05 am
content: If anyone is still interested, the "Negative Feedback T-Shirt Design Contest" thread has passed a million views, still with no satisfactory explanation for its popularity.It is currently the second most viewed topic on the forum, and looks set to reach the number one spot.

author: Galenbo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 22, 2016, 09:54:12 am
content: Quote from: rolycat on April 05, 2016, 01:02:13 pmMy guess is a tread on some forum for voluntary and professional victims of a self-declared minority.

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 22, 2016, 10:37:37 am
content: Quote from: rolycat on June 22, 2016, 09:29:05 amPerhaps it is because the audience googling for "T-Shirt Design Contest" is way larger than "Question about analog oscilloscopes vs digital oscilloscopes"Or perhaps it is because of the answer to this quote:Quote from: c4757p on May 12, 2013, 02:59:35 pm

author: GEuser
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 22, 2016, 10:46:47 am
content: And there i was about to ramble on about me playing the S.T.A.L.K.E.R game and after reading the thread realizing I'd be way off topic .But since I'm here the new electrical power/consumption meter says when I'm in a very active map (plenty of zombies and mutant/monsters) the computer pulls nearly 700 Watt , lucky i have a 1KW power supply in it ! , multiply that by many many hours over years .No wonder i get large (for me) power bills .

author: crispy_tofu
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 22, 2016, 01:01:27 pm
content: Sorry for the bump, but theNegative Feedback T-Shirt Design Contesttopic is now the highest viewed in the forum, with 1 428 366 views at the time of posting. Weird...

author: System Error Message
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2016, 03:10:55 am
content: considering the web is filled with bots could they be messing up stats? Infected computers browsing the web looking for emails and so on.

author: rolycat
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 05, 2016, 09:15:39 pm
content: Threeof the top ten topics by views are now bogus - and amazingly enough the latest addition ("My take on the DIY pnp smt feeder") isn't about T-shirts:

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 05, 2016, 09:34:44 pm
content: Perhaps someone is loading an image in the thread or something?BTW, I have reported the T-Shirts on amazon, as I have registered as the owner of the EEVblog brand on Amazon I should have the power to do that now.

author: ez24
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 05, 2016, 09:36:09 pm
content: Quote from: rolycat on September 05, 2016, 09:15:39 pmMy theory is that it has something to do with three words: T shirt contestwho doesn't like themAnd "DIY pnp smt feeder" sounds nasty