Hi,

I'd like to know why members have to register in order to post topics on this and other forums? Is it to stop just ANYBODY posting messages so that the number of members doesn't get too huge, or is there some reason why the administrator wants to know members' e-mail addresses and other details? Are member details like e-mail addresses ever given to anyone else like sales people?

My apologies for the delay in this reply.

The reason why this forum and many others ask for registration is mainly to stop or slow down the activity of spammers. Every day even with the registration procedure in place spam containing porn sites, viagra sales etc has to be removed by the mods from this forum.

By asking for your email address we are able to send you an email to confirm your registration and ask you to validate it. If a spammer uses a false email address then they never receive the registration email.

Some spammers are persistant and will register with us. At least then they are not anonymous and we are able to put a ban on a particular email address so they cannot post spam in the future.

The email address you submit when you register is only seen by the admin of the board and is never given out to third parties.