Site Sucker Blocker
 

Can someone please teach me how to adjust my member area's htaccess files to block site suckers? I don't mind members downloading everything, but I'd like them to work a little harder for it ;-)

thanks in advance

Oh that's not easy and has very little to do with .htaccess :) I would suggest buying a fully functional script that will manage the download quota for your member area,but make sure it has the ability to set smaller quota for trial members. I wouldn't suggest making it harder for members to download contant, that way you'll probably decrease retention and trail => full conversions.

You should check with the guy who wrote Strongbox. He has some anti leeching features with his scripts. I think Steve is his name?

Ray Morris is his name.

Check this thread http://www.greenguysboard.com/board/...ight=strongbox

I have always worked directly with Ray

We wont keep people to daily limits, as a surfer that irritates me. I don't feel that blocking site suckers is unreasonable. If they need a few days to download the site instead of an hour, then they will have the opportunity to see our updates, and be more likely to rebill. I find that the ones who suck down everything, tend to cancel immediately afterwards. (We don't offer trials).
What I am looking for is similar to what is described in #2 on this page http://www.amateurcoalition.com/mast.../htaccess.html
(I'm just not comfortable with htacess files and dont want to mess up my members area protection scheme)
thanks!

That scheme is relying on blocking specific user agents and since that info is provided in the HTTP header by the user, this method isn't all that effctive these days. Most of the site download software in use today allow the user to specify what the program displays as the user agent.

I concur with what the others have already said, Ray's Strongbox is the most effective way to go, for what you are trying to accomplish.

ok- thanks guys!
that page is indeed a few years old, and I know it used to work for me-lol

is there a server version of strongbox? We're running a good 20 paysites and paying per domain just seems a little crazy.

If you looking for something server wide, you could try Squid

http://howtos.linux.com/howtos/Bandw.../install.shtml


-

Ray will give you a discount on multiple copies of Strongbox. I use it on all my sites and it is an incredible piece of software. Although now you have to go through a third party that is helping him out and it will take you a bit longer to get it all up and running. http://www.strongboxxx.com. Good luck.

Wow that new site is pretty nifty compared to his old site!

http://www.bettercgi.com/strongbox/index.html (old site)

Mythumbnails.com uses some sort of script which detects if someone is downloading too much within a certain time frame. If it detects it, it basically blocks further downloads for something like 60 seconds. Once that time is up, then it allows you to proceed downloading again. You may want to email thier WM and ask him.

One way that is fairly effective and costs nothing is to make some of the links to say the galleries, a form submit link, because to my knowledge bots don't submit forms... However, it may be easier just to get a script that protects it... |thumb