Fake profiles

Perhaps this project is protected somehow, to prevent people from removing themselves from the project? If they could the whole point of it would be mute.

Has Geni explained what happens when you "report" a profile or tree? I didn't see this in the Blog posts with the recent updates. I see a use now with a different thread (http://www.geni.com/discussions/89048) where reporting a tree as Abandoned would be a possible option, but I'm not sure what that does.. so I'm hesitant to recommend it to the user.

The "report" link puts it in a queue that is monitored by our Customer Service team. It's basically the same as emailing help@geni.com and asking them to look at it.

so the "report" option is a much easier way to get help?

that it says which manager reported it and does it matters?

also I'm not sure I understand reporting abandoned tree and how that helps?
would this prevent us from taking over management on such profiles?

thanks

Shmuel: I don't think this project is protected more than any other project.

And you can remove YOURSELF from this project, as with any other project. That people don't means the point of it is not mute.

The issue with this project is that most of the profiles got added as project collaborators rather than subjects. You can't generally remove another collaborator from a project - though perhaps curators can.

Dear all

Reporting

A) Please add to all Reporting systems Choice "Other" as sometimes is needed to report Blocking (User Blocked all who sent him/her collaboration requests, after he/she added itself to discussion/project Collaboration Pool) etc actions.

B) I'm not American and my mother tongue is not English - please explain meaning of abbreviation "SEO" in SEO Profile.

C) All these Reporting Choices shall be given for translating (currently they are in English only) also.

Thanks

Lauri

Ofir Friedman -yes it makes us easier for us to address those types of reports in one place and at a single time. The process by which we will handle such issues has not changed- merely the way users report them.

Lauri Kreen - thanks for letting us know about the translation keys for those. We will turn those on.

Also, SEO stands for "search engine optimization". There are times when you may run across a brand name or x-rated sales pitches on our sites (i.e. "Jane Smith all nude pics") -these are obviously not real Geni users and therefore can be removed quickly from the site.

To add to Ashiya's comment about the "SEO" reporting item.... As she points out, SEO stands for "Search Engine Optimization". Web site owners will get ranked or placed higher in search engine results like Google if numerous 3rd party web sites link to them. When spammers come in and add fake profiles or projects, they don't really care that the occasional geni.com user will then click through to visit their website. What they really want is to post a link to their website on numerous 3rd party web sites so that Google or other search engines will think that they are popular and thus place their web site on the 1st page of search results.

I wish all of these link spammers would go away.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spamdexing

Randy Stebbing Thanks for going into that. :) Much appreciated.

can we also report discussions in which people are advertising something?

Randy the great irony in all this is that we mark all user-generated links to external sites with "rel=nofollow", making them useless for SEO / link-farming. It doesn't stop the occasional moron from thinking he's boosting his site's SEO when in fact all he's doing is annoying the rest of us.

onlinehdmovielover onlinehdmovielover

On 16 Mar I submitted a help request as below. On 14 Apr, Private User closed the help request by referring me to this discussion.

Can anyone help me understand how this discussion answers the help request?

The text of my help request was as below:

These days you can report a profile as a
- Claimed Historical Profile
- Abandoned Tree
- Fake Profile
- Spammer
- Deceased
- SEO Profile

1. It is unclear in what timeframes or in what priority such reports are processed. Can that be improved? For example, do reports by PROs get priority over reports by non PROs? Do some categories of report get actioned before others?

2. Does the reporter get notified when action is taken?

3. Once a profile is reported, a second person cannot also report. This has implications:
(a) You can't also report your interest in being notified when action is taken.

(b) You don't know in what category the profile was previously reported - you may have in mind another category. For example, a claimed historical profile may also be a spammer.

(c) You may have more information than the first reporter provided, which you cannot now provide. And you don't know what information the first reporter provided.

(d) If PROs get higher priority action, you can't get that as a PRO if the profile was already reported by a non-PRO.

Can these issues be looked at as possible feature enhancements?

The main problem with reporting profiles and discussions is that over 6 million users have access to hit that link, so even sorting out which issues that should be looked closer into is a big job.

Gene have however hired more staff to CS lately and new routines and more staff will probably make things better over time.

There is by the way a public page telling more about some of the Geni Team: http://www.geni.com/corp/the-geni-team/

So, if I found a historical profile as its own manager, and the manager of other profiles, and the Report link stated it had already been reported, I can't do anything else, right? No way to track it, and no way to know if it has been addressed, right?

Private User fyi

Anita: there are lots of other things you can do - like raise the matter in a public discussion, etc.

But you are right - "No way to track it, and no way to know if it has been addressed". That just about sums it up. Among other things, that was what my help request sought to address before it was closed by Ashiya who referred me here instead.

Now that Geni's Customer Service Manager Private User has been referred here - hi Charles! - maybe we will get a Geni team response?

David

This is on our list of things we want to improve. Right now we have a few thousand that we are working to get through and a very limited number of people in cs.

As of yesterday all the reported abandoned tree issues have been addressed.

Thank you Charles! I am sure others will be pleased to hear that. Can you explain in a bit more detail how the reported abandoned tree issues have been addressed? I think a lot of people listening here would like to hear that.

"Inquiring minds want to know!"

It's not just curiosity. We report profiles because they are roadblocks to our activity on Geni. So we like to know when and how those roadblocks are cleared, in order to enable us to drive forward.

(I *know* that David. It's frustrating for me, too. I was just trying to keep it light. :-) I do think they're working on it.)

Jenna - yes I know you know. And you know that I know that you know, and I know that you know that ... :-)

While it's good to have a light side to discussions, it's also good to put serious points across, and to explain why things are important, in a non-confrontational way.

It probably also helps those hard-working Geni staff to know what are priority items for large numbers of Geni users, and not just one person's pet topic of the day.

We have looked at all the reported abandoned tree profiles and if they were reported correctly and they have been inactive they will no longer have management of any profiles. Management of any profiles will be moved to the closest active relative.

Charles - What is 'reported correctly?"

Accurate that they've been inactive for x period of time? Reported from the manager's profile or a profile they manage? Done in a certain format?

What is the correct standard?

Mary HOWLAND

Joshua Howland

@Charles Edmonds
The managers of these profiles appear to have abandoned their trees. These are incorrectly listed as children of Mayflower Passengers John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley. They did not have children by these names and their 10 correct children are all on the tree.
I have been trying to correct this historical tree, but have gotten no where with these two profiles, and the other incorrect profiles attached to Joshua Howland. Please disconnect. Thanks. Mary

Joshua Howland
This profile is managed by
Private
He was on Apr 23rd 2011
Mary Kathleen did you mean to post this one?

Joshua Howland
This profile is managed by
Private
He was on Apr 23rd 2011
Mary Kathleen did you mean to post this one?

Private User
I would say that anyone that has not been on the site for 12 months is abandoned.
We had thousands of profiles reported as abandoned but the user or manager of the profile is active and we still had to look at each one.

It is easier for us when you report the manager of the profile,