Ten months on the attack site list for TAG

[rp]

Many are missing the point here. It's not so much the PITA to us hold outs, but to peeps searching google and new blood showing up. It's supposed to be a world wide forum not a private social club. Need to keep things interesting and more questions more I learn.

Anyways, the definitive check, ie it's not your cache, settings, etc, is to just google e.g. marshall ampgarage, click on a hit and see if you get the deathvirusapocalypse harm will rain down upon you warning.

BTW what is the damn google "this is not an attack site" that you must click through to get here???? Google wankerness? You'd think it would be keeping tabs, after several hundred or thousand? click thoroughs it would light up an indicator light on the big control panel, initiate a re-scan of the site? Lower the threat level to orange???

[JazzGuitarGimp]

I haven't lost sight of the big picture. I realize newcomers are likely being scared away by the warnings. All I am saying is I realize I cannot do anything about it, and so it doesn't make sense (for me personally) to get stressed out, pissing and moaning, and otherwise wasting negative energy about something that has been given to me at no cost out of pocket. There is a huge database of very useful information here - so much, in fact, that usually, one needs to refine a search a good number of times before the desired information is unearthed. And if the site goes down in flames - hey, it didn't cost me anything to participate and enjoy the comradery while it was here.

But it's funny: This forum (as a whole) seems to have a hard time deciding whether it wants newcomers. Before the google fiasco, I recall people whining about all the newcomers, saying things like "TAG will surely devolve into TGP" and the like. Now that the newcomers can't get in, people have flipped on that position and now are pining for fresh blood..... Fickle

[R.G.]

BTW what is the damn google "this is not an attack site" that you must click through to get here???? Google wankerness? You'd think it would be keeping tabs, after several hundred or thousand? click thoroughs it would light up an indicator light on the big control panel, initiate a re-scan of the site? Lower the threat level to orange???

1. It's not google's fault. Google does the world a service, for free, unlike some of it's money-making stuff. As it scans the web, it scans web sites for known malware. When it finds a site like that, it makes a note in a list it keeps - period. It does not keep you out of those sites.
2. Web browsers use this list. They consult it and warn their users that they're stepping into a snake pit. This is highly valuable, as some of the latest malware is ransomware. Ransomware encrypts all of the files on your computer and demands money. If you don't pay, the files are effectively lost. This (and many other attack softwares) is a Bad Thing. Web browsers' using the attack page list is a Good Thing.
3. Google provides a simple, effective way to get off the attack list. I have personally used this when my site was attacked. You remove the malware (and google even tells you what they found to help you remove it) and request a re-scan. When that happens, the site is removed from the list. Takes about 24 hours.
4. Google found malware on the server for TAG back in June 2015.
5. Google put the site on the list.
6. It's up to the site owner/administrator to clean the site and ask for a re-scan. This has not happened for reasons that are not completely clear. It's been explained AT, but it's not clear.
7. Links to malware sites, or at least sites that were malware sites, are still in the tree of links on TAG. I found these in saving off a "scrapbook" copy of the site. I did not follow them to find out if they're still attack sites, for obvious reasons.

So - google is not doing this to you. They're doing this FOR you. Your browser is not doing this to you, it's doing this FOR you. What's missing is the behind the scenes work to get the site re-scanned and off the list.

[drew]

2. Web browsers use this list. They consult it and warn their users that they're stepping into a snake pit. This is highly valuable, as some of the latest malware is ransomware. Ransomware encrypts all of the files on your computer and demands money. If you don't pay, the files are effectively lost. This (and many other attack softwares) is a Bad Thing. Web browsers' using the attack page list is a Good Thing.

http://arstechnica.com/security/2016/06 ... n-3-weeks/

[HeeBGB]

I was just answering a PM about the state we are in and was thinking.....

The truth is that FB and other social media are taking the place of conventional forums like TAG. Is it really worth the time, effort and cost to repair the site in order to attract new people? Or is it better to just leave the site the way it is for reference to info and move on?

Please don't misunderstand this. Allyn has not stated anything like this to me so I don't know his feelings. As far as I know he was trying to make repairs but was just busy. The last time I spoke with him anyway.

[Leo_Gnardo]

The truth is that FB and other social media are taking the place of conventional forums like TAG. Is it really worth the time, effort and cost to repair the site in order to attract new people?

I'm not impressed at all with the Farcebook world takeover. I find their site hard to log onto, and they try to sell me all sorts of crap & sell me on all sorts of crap, for instance becoming Farcebook friends with their founder. Besides trying to redirect my attention to this that & the other thing, and send me how many annoying emails each day telling me that so & so has "changed their status", "posted a photo", whatever. I really don't need to know when some FB correspondent has indulged in a bowl of cheerios, gone for a walk with their dog, tuned their guitar, etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc et blimmin' cetera, etc!

Much better to fix TAG; let's get on with it already!

What's the 'cost'? Finding the lost password? Crikeys....

Or start up "The NEXT Amp Garage", don't lose the almighty password, put everything you got already on the wayback machine or other accessible archive website.

[JazzGuitarGimp]

Information that flows through facebook is fleeting at best. Something that someone posted just one week ago takes an amazing amount of patience to find again - if it's even still there... And I agree with Leo, there is way too much distraction on facebook - amp garage discussions would be about 80dB below the noise floor!

[xtian]

Reminding you we already have an alternative that RJ set up: http://diyguitaramps.prophpbb.com/

[martin manning]

I agree Facebook is nowhere near as good a platform for this type of information exchange.

[M Fowler]

Nope FB is not as good as forums for many reasons.

[R.G.]

A couple of observations.

- the site is a trainwreck I can't quite look away from.

- the warnings are almost certainly permanent; as I noted back in January 2016,

Sadly, this site has been on the warning list for - what, seven months now? - so it is likely that the condition is permanent. It's not very likely that getting THIS amp garage off the warning list will ever happen.

For whatever reasons, the site has limped along in its current state, proving that it *can* limp along. So it's unlikely that the warning will get removed. Maybe as a happy side effect of something else, but the warnings are not enough of a motivation to fix the root cause.

- and more generically, whenever what is happening doesn't make any sense, it's a red flag that you don't know all the rules.

- FB is useless for the kind of content here

I think that what you see is what you get. It's extremely unlikely that the site will ever be fixed. It's on autopilot.

[HeeBGB]

My comments regarding FB and other social media weren't about arguing the merits of forums such as this as opposed to social media. It was a statement of fact that other types of social media have put us in a very low traffic situation. My question was is it really worth it to update this site for such a low traffic situation? Or should it just be left as is?

[JazzGuitarGimp]

My comments regarding FB and other social media weren't about arguing the merits of forums such as this as opposed to social media. It was a statement of fact that other types of social media have put us in a very low traffic situation. My question was is it really worth it to update this site for such a low traffic situation? Or should it just be left as is?

Have you considered the possibility that the "low traffic" state of this forum has been caused by nearly a full year on the attack list? Was participation already on the decline before google listed TAG as hostile?

[martin manning]

If you look at the member listing you can see that a steep drop in new members occurred at the same time as the warnings started. It dropped from around a 150 per month down to around 15, and has remained there. So far July 2016 has 11.

[R.G.]

Have you considered the possibility that the "low traffic" state of this forum has been caused by nearly a full year on the attack list? Was participation already on the decline before google listed TAG as hostile?

Or that someone might see that as a good thing?