This thread has been quite an eye opener. I cursed and swore about the convoluted process to join this forum when I was doing it, thinking it to be just ineptitude. Ongoing I see and appreciate the selfless efforts expended for the benefit of all. I recall a time when this was a moral norm, but alas not so prevalent anymore. Sincere thanks.
I'm glad you now understand why we do what we do, and I'm sorry if it was a troublesome moment but as you can now see, it certainly was not from ineptitude. When you join most forums today, the process is typically automated and as long as the applicant's IP address or email address doesn't raise a red flag due to being on a watch list of some sort, they get automatically approved. All you have to do to get a glimpse of how the other forums work is go to one of them (particularly those owned by the same huge corporation that owns our previous home and at least 1500 other forums, strictly for the ad revenue and
not for the community well-being) and take a look at the most recent new member list. Nearly every day at forums like that, you will see new "member" usernames that make no sense and have zero personal information associated with their profile
When we opened VHT in June of 2020, we decided that we would manually vet each and every new member using as many research resources we could find to expose scammers and spammers and it has paid off for the most part. Sometimes we get fooled briefly and allow a bad guy in, but it doesn't take much activity to see how they behave and what their obvious goal is. In addition, I watch the Who's Online list the entire time I'm online here each day to see what new members are doing so I can expose them if they've slipped past us somehow.
To date, VHT has had almost 3000 applications for membership and over 500 of them have been fraudulent. Of those, only 5 have gotten past us long enough to actually start their scam attempts and fortunately, as far as I know only one person ever lost money. He fell victim to the pressure of needing a part and the so-called seller wouldn't accept any other payment than an equivalent to cash (money order IIRC). The others were outed by simply watching their behavior closely, seeing them sending PMs (private messages) to members almost immediately after joining and before ever introducing themselves to the community. And for those who might complain about having to do an introduction, this is one of the main reasons we require it - if a new member is willing to talk about themselves to some extent, it's less likely they have ulterior motives.
So yes, while there was a time when good morals and ethics were the norm, I think we all realize that era is gone and coincidentally, it was about the same time our favorite vintage Honda twins were new and current models. Back then you could go to a local Honda dealer and buy a replacement key from the number easily visible right on the ignition switch, and no one thought you were going to steal someone's bike. Even back then, it didn't take too long before the powers that be at Honda realized that method was too easy and was being exploited. In hindsight it doesn't sound surprising at all, does it?
