I'm leaving soon for some more fieldwork in Japan and won't be able to maintain this blog on a daily basis as before. One of the time-consuming tasks that I do each day is checking through the comments and getting rid of the dozens of spam comments that are posted.
I'm implementing on an experimental basis a CAPTCHA type spam filter for comment posts. Before you post a comment, you'll now be required to type the word 'camera' in the anti-spam comment field. Most spam robots won't know how to do this, and their junk spam will get filtered out automatically.
Please give it a spin -- please add a comment to this entry saying whether you like it or not! If I don't get any comments, I'll know it's either broken or stinks!
This is a test to see if it works....
A few months ago I got spammed badly on my own blog and I re-wrote the code to allow previous users to make unrestricted comments, but I hadn't thought of the solution you use here. It sounds like a workable solution. I may take this idea an implement a version of it on my own page, if only I have time.
Jerry - I used the Comment Challenge Plugin by Jay Allen: http://jayallen.org/projects/comment-challenge/
Configuring it was a cinch although I did have to "update" the Preview Comment template because the old templates used a MT comment code shorthand that wasn't compatible with the plugin.
Since implementing it, I've had 0-ZERO-ZIP-NADA spam comments, whereas before I had twenty or thirty a day. It's working so well that I'm turning off having to screen each comment before they get published.
Karen