Category: the Rant Board
I went to MySpace this morning, entered my log-in info, and was promptly ordered to fill out a captcha to finish logging in. I'm officially at the end of my tether with MySpace's captcha fixation. It's inconsiderate and discriminatory.
I can understand the need for a captcha at sign-up, even if it's a pain in the arse. I wish someone would take it upon themselves to come up with a better way of preventing auto-registration, but that's beside the point. Once you're registered, there should be no further captcha requirements. I know that fakes still often manage to get past the captcha at registration, but (1) there are other ways on MySpace to deal with fake accounts. , and (2) if their stupid captchas aren't preventing the creation of fake accounts, why even have them in the first place? Their faulty security measures shouldn't give them the right to make the MySpace experience hell for their visually impaired users! At that point, it becomes discriminatory.
Now that I'm doing work for SEVASA, MySpace isn't just a hang-out place for me anymore. I need it for networking, otherwise I might consider not using it anymore.
But instead, I'm going to send a message to Tom. Obviously just talking to customer service isn't doing a damn bit of good, so I'm taking it to him, and then I might just start a petition and an all-out war. Who's with me?!
Becky
Hmmm, just signed on.
And did not run in to that!
Hmmm,
Well, I'm not a MySpace user, so can't actually claim to care especially, however I was just struck by a point as I read your rant. That point being that, if there capture doesn't filter out the more sophisticated spamming bots around, then what makes them think that it is going to be any more effective second time round against a bot that has already proven that it can beat it once?
In short, not only are such things an irritation to people such as yourself, but it would seem, at least to my way of thinking, to be a completely illogical safeguard anyway.
Hmmmm, I have not run into that problem, but I will try logging on in just a few minutes, and if it asks me to do that, I am with you. And agrees with Harp on the last post. Also have you tried webvisum?
I've seen better ways to confirm a user's "humanity" if you will, asking them a virbal question that is simple for a human user but tricky for software, such as "what do you get if you add the number 5 to the number of fingers on a persons hand, please write in letters" to which you'd write "ten" and thus confirm that you arenot a bot. I realize bots might find a way around this but, in general, I think this is a more accessible and not necessarily less secure way of verification. For one thing if any piece of software allows us to read captia that piece of software, or one based o the same principle, can be used as part of a bot, the whole point of these captias is to prevent software registration. So basically saying this situation with captias can be solved by software inherently open up a loop hole that could be exploied by bot writers, ironic but true. Therefore we must fight for an alternative solution to verify a user's authenticity, not a software solution to allow us to read captia.
Like I demonstrateed above, these things are possible, and I have seen something like I described, although I can't recall exactly which web site it was. The audio versions of numbers with a lot of static, I find, are not much better than the captia, I hardly ever get them right. If someone can make the Facebook one work for them I have to say I'd be extremely impressed.
Cheers
-B
Ok 1. Tom isn't gonna do a damn thing. He always has his away message on, so good luck getting through to him
2. Use web vissum, captcha problem solved.
lol, yeh, he had his away message on this morning. As for Webvisum, does that work with IE, or is that the Firefox captcha solver? I'm on my parents' computer, so I'm a bit limited as to what can go on here, although when I get my own laptop, I'm thinking of having Firefox as my browser, for a number of reasons including the captcha-solver.
Becky
tom does not care.
Omg becky, the same thing happened to me a few days ago, I couldn't believe it! It's like they try to make these things accessable, but they only make it worse!
Making things more accessable begins a whole new topic, which I'm sure many of us could start on a whole new board.
OK, to assuage your anger a bit, have you considered using Firefox? If this has already been suggested I appologize.
Firefox has an add-on called Webvissum which will solve the CAPTCHA for you and even paste it onto your clipboard.
All you need do afterward is paste the text intot he edit box.
If you need help in any of this, i'd be glad to help you.
However, I will say that it is unfair to have a CAPTCHA and then not provide an alternate means of accessing it. Don't htey have an audio version on the site?
Seriously guys, do u read these posts? Their have been about 3 suggestions of her using firefox now. SHe says she can not use it because she's on her parents computer. HOw hard is it to read through posts before posting?
grrrrrr! I am 100 percent behind you. I can't do anything with my myspace anymore. I can't update my info without running into a dumb capcha, I can't edit my profile, and worst of all, I can't even log in! No. They don't have audio at all. I'd use ff but my quicktime won't be removed from my machine therefore I can't have sounds. I really don't know what I can do to get ff sounds to work. I've written time and time again to myspace and have not gotten any response back. Who wants to sue them? :p Or better yet, who wants to take the time out of their precious day to help me figure ff and quicktime out?
I say... somebody sue them! Seriously, if it is at all possible, I would not object to someone suing them, right along with some of the other popular websites that don't provide an audio captcha. So what if others provide a captcha solver, it shouldn't be necessary, especially for myspace!
Also, I saw a forum post on CaptchaKiller.com a while back that said that the myspace owner had forbidden people from using things like captchakiller or webvisum to solve captchas on his useless piece of resource-wasting crap website. So I definitely would love to see someone knock some sense into him, especially.
ANd that reminds me, CaptchaKiller.com is another good one, only problem bein that it takes a bi longer, and in order to upload the captchas you have to find the graphic, which sometimes requires turning graphics verbocity to all, root jaws to pc for those who use jaws, right click, save as, and upload it to captchakiller. It's what I used though, before webvisum came out.
I think myspace refreshes their captcha so by the time you get your result it would change.
Evil myspace. It crashes my internet every time I go on it.
I think they do that for the purpose of not wanting people to use things like captcha killer or webvisum. I wonder what sounds in firefox you are talking about? Webvisum has sounds too but I turn them off. I dont think they are absolutely necessary either. I think if the nfb got a hold of this, it'd be a really good start! Lol!
O well, i've broken myspace''s terms then. Like I really care. MOst of my friends have the captchas turne off, I've only had to use it maybe twice to solve the captchas.
Well, here to announce that you're not crazy after all! Lol! One of my friends ran into that captcha problem today! We really need to do something or just not get on there anymore. I have webvisum, but if those images refresh too quickly, it would be hard to crazk with that, so lets hope I dont get it! Not like I log on there much anyway though...
firefox doesn't like my PC, and the audio (if it works,) sounds like crap so hard to understand it.
I totally agree with everyone on here that thinks something ought to be done. I've been a Myspace user for three years, and when I first signed up it was at least marginally accessible. Oh I needed someone to help with the Captcha at sign up and I needed help to change my password, but I could at least edit my profile. But then they started requiring Captchas. I myself have written to what they laughingly call Tech Support and, while I got responses more times than not, they were formally polite but riddiculously unhelpful. One time the yactually started telling me how to add color to my profile when I'd clearly stated that I was blind and suggested ways to make Captchas and things more accessible. THe other times I got a vague "we're working on something." response. Needless to say when I found out about Web Visum I was only too happy to switch to Firefox just for that. I've used it ever since and no trouble from Myspace about their TOS. Granted they have taken a step in the right direction since then by allowing you the option of no more Captchas once you log into your account, but you have to be willing to provide your mobile number and service provider. I realize a lot of people may not want to go that route. It seemed worth it to me though. All you do is provide your number and provider and within a moment or two Myspace will send you a text message with a five-digit code in it. You enter that code into the edit box on the web page and submit it and you won't get anymore Captchas once you're logged on. Obviously this doesn't apply to people who've got their profiles set up to use them, but that's where you break out Webvisum. But I'm still behind everybody who wants something done about this. Whether it's maliciously done or not it's still not fair that we're almost totally excluded just to weed out spammers that still manage to find ways into the castle, so to speak. The really sad part is that they don't seem to realize that their precious Captchas aren't really that effective anymore when it comes to dealing with that.