So, due to recent link stealing activities made it neccessary to deny the access of the Upload Services from the public. Currently, there is a 50 post limit before one can access any of the Upload forums.
An alternative option would be one sort of in-between the public and private methods. Access to the Upload Services would be made free again, however, a similar area would be created, which is only accessible to select members. Admittance into this special usergroup would NOT depend on post count, but rather that the person in question should upload something, in the public area. After he has done so, he only needs to request membership to this group, and the group leader will grant it, if he (or the usergroup in its entirety) sees fit.
In short:
Public uploads
- Accessible to anyone, links are not protected from stealing.
- Free, you don't have to upload anything to download from here. In exchange, no requests.
- Downloads are not as recent as those in the private area, subject to timeout (if applicable) in a few days.
Private uploads
- Accessible to the usergroup only, links are protected from outsiders
- You have to upload to gain access here. Feel free to make request for new stuff or re-uploads.
- Fresh downloads that'll time out later, or possibly even downloads exclusive to this usergroup.
The links from the closed section could be posted in the free section after some time, but this would prevent bandwidth abuse initially. (i. e. stealing the links and putting them on other sites, thereby shortening its life span)
Leechers are happy, because they get stuff for free.
Uploaders are happy because their links don't get stolen.
Other members are happy because people aren't spamming to get into Upload forums.
Administrative requirements:
- Make a new, free upload area.
- Remove the automatic promotion to the Uploader usergroup at 50 posts.
- Instead, make it a public usergroup, so anyone can join.
- Appoint a leader to said usergroup (might even be a moderator of the Upload forums)
- Have the forum leader process the join requests.
Also, vote on the poll, please, and provide opinions. What I'd like to see is what members who aren't regulars on the forum (in this case, most likely below 50 posts) think.