This is a petition for SpaceHey/Tibush Labs to change/implement a new policy for displaying new accounts to users of the site in regards to the "Cool New People" and "Browse > New People" sections.
Currently new accounts show almost immediately after creation in the "Cool New People" section as well as the "New People" section when browsing profiles. Spammers have hijacked these sections to display NSFW materials and promote hateful ideas. Mods are having to work harder to keep these accounts off the site which has placed a large burden on their shoulders and prevents them from being able to keep up with bigger issues being reported due to the influx of reports on these spam accounts. The problem with the current way they're removed is the mod team can only know about them once the account has been featured and reported, and by that point the spammers have already done what they've set out to do - cause a disruption.
The intent of the "Cool New People" section is a double-edged sword in this manner: You want new profiles to get the instant-gratification of getting friend requests/interactions so they come back to the site, however this also gives spammers instant gratification as they're able to exploit this feature. As a result some users have begun using extensions like Stylus to completely remove the "Cool New People" section from their profiles.
What we are recommending is the following:
Implement a 3-day wait period for new accounts to show up in the "Cool New People" sections as well as the "New Profile" section on the Browse page. This would remove the instant gratification the spammers get, keep the NSFW content off of user's pages, lighten the load for the mod team so - instead of having to perform active monitoring of spam - they can perform occasional sweeps of new accounts to remove the problematic ones before they become a problem, and allow for new users to have time to set up their profiles to actually show how cool they really are before being shown on everyone's pages!
With this change we can remove the ability for spammers to cause disruption on the scale they're currently able to, free up the mod team by having fewer reports on spam accounts, create a safer space for everyone, and foster better communities as a result.
We hope this change can be taken as a recommendation not out of anger but rather love for the site and the potential we all see it has.
