Reset Average Reporting Time

[kwdavids]

I'd like to be able to reset my average reporting time statistics.

I switched to quick reporting, and the tens of thousands of spams I reported over the years make it impossible for me see how I'm doing now.

[Unclenick]

Either a reset, or higher resolution (show hours and minutes), or have two average reporting time numbers, one being your lifetime average and the other being a running average for the last year or six month period. Allowing the user to specify a running averaging period in options would be nice, whether this replaced the currently displayed number or was a separately displayed second number.

Whatever approach is used, the point is to give the user the ablility to tell whether their reporting habits are trending their reporting time up or down? Currently, if you have much of a reporting history, you can't tell until you get lucky enought to see the number flip.

Nick

[StevenUnderwood]

This is actually asked quite often, but I just searched the titles of the first 4 pages of topics and did not notice any that jumped out at me so I am leaving this topic in place.

That count works for many, but also does not work for many. My paid account currently shows me:

Welcome, Steven P. Underwood (Home).

Your average reporting time is: 8.8 days; Not bad.

Yes, DAYS, even though I report throughout the day and rarely have any report older than the 8 hours it takes me to sleep at night. I have reported many thousands of spam since that happened and every month or two it drops another 0.1.

The worst recorded time I have is from June 2004 at 17+ days: http://forum.spamcop.net/forums/index.php?...post&p=9332

[Wazoo]

Another one of those items that never seems to get a good Title/Subject line used ... for instance, in this Forum section, the last 'great' Discussion about this can be found at Idea to help keep people reporting spam

And of course, there is also newsgroup traffic galore still available in the archives.

[agsteele]

The problem with the average reporting time is that the maths is quite basic. Once you have submitted exceedingly large quantities of spam then it becomes harder and harder to affect the average reporting time. So really, the average time thing is pretty meaningless after awhile. It would make more sense to remove the information altogether but some folk like to see it :-)

Andrew

[Unclenick]

. . . Your average reporting time is: 8.8 days; Not bad. . .

Steve:

O.K. That's an interesting difference? I get whole hours:

Welcome, unclenick.

Your average reporting time is: 6 hours; Great!

Since the system considers anything over 2 days to be too old to report, I expect you mis-typed and you are actually getting 8.8 hours? In that case, how do I get the decimal place to display? I'm feeling stupid if I missed that one, having been a member at the time that feature first appeared.

. . .So really, the average time thing is pretty meaningless after awhile. . .

Andrew:

That's why I suggested a running average. Not as easy to do, since it requires remembering the reporting times of each individual report on a FIFO basis for the running interval. A less space consuming scheme would be to maintain an acumulated simple average for today (same math as the current number, but re-zeroed at midnight), in addition to, in FIFO order, the last, say, 99 daily values just before re-zeroing. For display, today's average, accumulated thus far, would be added to the sum of the FIF0 data and the result divided by 100. That would give an approximate running average for the last 100 days that is accurate within 1%.

In any event, it is more programming and server space. Probably not a reasonable expectation any time soon. Since the board gives no awards for best best reporting time, it seems to me that allowing someone to zero their average for display purposes would do no harm. The higher resolution I infer that Steve has will help me out, but I would add another decimal place for long time users, or else go to hh:mm format and resolution.

[Wazoo]

I suspect no typing error involved. My experience was spam reported as it arrived, yet in came one on a HotMail server with bad date stamps .. Boom! ... my 'average reporting time' jumped from 1 hour to 14 days ..... a couple of years later, and it's down to around 8 hours. Then again, I don't report like I used to either.

As suggested by many folks over the years, this is a useless number for most reporters.

[StevenUnderwood]

Since the system considers anything over 2 days to be too old to report, I expect you mis-typed and you are actually getting 8.8 hours

As Wazoo states, this in NOT a typo. The Average Reporting time is useless for many people for various reasons. I am not the only one to experiencethis type of problem.

[Miss Betsy]

<snip> In any event, it is more programming and server space. Probably not a reasonable expectation any time soon. <snip>

IMHO, it was added with good intentions for an additional incentive to report spam promptly, but after it was added, the problems (as detailed in other posts) came up and it was decided that the additional programming and server space were not worth the result. Why it was not deleted is anyone's guess.

I don't see any mention of a FAQ or Wiki entry (but I haven't looked). Perhaps that would be a good idea since the topic titles vary considerably.

Miss Betsy

[nei1_j]

Currently, if you have much of a reporting history, you can't tell until you get lucky enought to see the number flip.

I switched to quick reporting, and the tens of thousands of spams I reported over the years make it impossible for me see how I'm doing now.

Amen. Lots of good ideas in this thread. Reset button (why should SpamCop be averse to this?). 2nd, shorter-term average. More decimal places.

And of course, there is also newsgroup traffic galore

That's true. It's been a popular issue that's been going on for years. But the process hasn't changed a wit. So pronouncing that this issue has been discussed before a million times does nothing to further any improvement.

And until there's improvement, you can expect to see intelligent people bringing up the subject again and again.

Aside from contributing to the "good side of The Force," there's not a lot to keep a person spending time dealing with this slimy spam. The Average Reporting Time is one of the few mechanisms that exist to make this slightly interesting -- to track our own performance. But the way it is now, it doesn't help.

For at least a year, I've been submitting spam that's only 0 hours old, and occasionally 1 hour. Yet, my Average won't go below 3 hours. Might drop to "2" tomorrow. Or maybe the sytem is broke? More decimal places would help to make the determination. I've heard it said that computers are good at that kind of thing. Give me a couple dozen decimal places, and I'll take care of the rounding-off, myself, no problem.

[turetzsr]

<snip>

(why should SpamCop be averse to this?)

<snip>

...Just guessing but perhaps because it just isn't important enough -- not a core feature of the product. The important stuff is keeping up with all the spammer tricks to make sure the SpamCop parser works well.

And of course, there is also newsgroup traffic galore

That's true. It's been a popular issue that's been going on for years. But the process hasn't changed a wit. So pronouncing that this issue has been discussed before a million times does nothing to further any improvement.

And until there's improvement, you can expect to see intelligent people bringing up the subject again and again.

<snip>

...Again, just guessing but I don't think that was the point; I believe the point was that if the SpamCop programmer(s) thought this was worth doing, he/she/they would have already done it, so it is highly unlikely that further "bringing up [of] the subject again and again" is almost certainly would be in vain.

[DavidT]

...it is highly unlikely that further "bringing up [of] the subject again and again" is almost certainly in vain.

Did you perhaps mean "it is highly likely" rather than "unlikely"? I'd say that it's highly unlikely that any feature requests will get acted upon...period. Someone want to give a list of those that have actually gotten anyone's attention, without extreme efforts on the part of Wazoo?

DT

[StevenUnderwood]

Someone want to give a list of those that have actually gotten anyone's attention, without extreme efforts on the part of Wazoo?

You could go through this forum as easily as anyone and determine the answer. My guess is that very few of them have been implemented since the IronPort purchase. The average reporting time that is being complained about here was the result of a sugestion for more incentive for reporters.

[turetzsr]

Did you perhaps mean "it is highly likely" rather than "unlikely"?

<snip>

...Yes, thanks! I edited my post accordingly.

[Wazoo]

Too funny ... I ran someone else's spam (from the newsgroup) to show the difference between a MailHost Configured Reporting Account and on that wasn't .... I then cancelled the report, as all I wanted was the Tracking URL of the parse .... so, no reports sent, but my "average reporting time" jumped from the 8 hours it's been at for a couple of years to a new value of 11 hours .... actual 'age' of the spam in questin was less than two hours old .....

Tell me again that this number is worth anything at all ....

[nei1_j]

Tell me again that this number is worth anything at all ....

Let's accept as an axiom that The Number isn't worth anything at all.

In that case, it might as well be removed.

(That is an attempt at reverse psychology.)

[Farelf]

Let's accept as an axiom that The Number isn't worth anything at all.

I think The Number is a recipreversexclusion - and evidently the SC development team is waiting for it to intersect with a Someone Else's Problem Field (as it must when all possible numbers have been fruitlessly proposed as the "correct" number). But maybe that's just me.

[kdq]

I normally report spam within a few minutes of receipt, or not at all. My average reporting time has been "less than an hour". Lately, though, it has been going up. First it was one hour - now it's two hours. None of my reports has been over 15 minutes old. What's the story?

Moderator Edit: Was posted into Discussions & Observations > Geek/Tech Things > Software Issues

I used the built-in search tool, looking for "average reporting time" .... selected this most recent Topic to merge this 'new' post into .... noting there are several others with much more discussion, much older, etc. etc.

PM sent to advise of the move ...

[StevenUnderwood]

I normally report spam within a few minutes of receipt, or not at all. My average reporting time has been "less than an hour". Lately, though, it has been going up. First it was one hour - now it's two hours. None of my reports has been over 15 minutes old. What's the story?

If you read this thread, you will likely find this information...

For some people, that number works fine. However, for many of us at one point or another, it has ceased to be of any use. I report, at most, 8 hours from being received (overnight). My screen currently shows: Welcome, Steven P. Underwood (Home). Your average reporting time is: 8.5 days; Not bad.

How it got to 8 days while only being able to report spams 2 (originally 3) days old, I will never know.

[nei1_j]

wrote:

My average reporting time has been "less than an hour".

Dear kdq,

Gee, I remember when my Average Reporting Time said "less than an hour."

You refreshed my memory. My Average Reporting Time was accurate for at least a few hundred spam reports. Then, it was unable to continue reliably.

A quick fix would be to provide a button to "Reset" the Average Reporting Time. If they can't be bothered to fix the Average Reporting Time, at least they could provide a clicker so we could reset ours to Null when it gets absurd.

Interesting how your Average Reporting Time crept up, apparently just because the Average Reporting Time function can only handle "so many" data points.

Me too. Must be a year that I've been only submitting spams "0 hours old" for at least a year, but I can't get my Average Reporting Time to drop below 3 hours. Mine is due for a reset.

-N-

[shentino]

What may be better than just outright resetting is converting the average report time into, say, a 100 report moving average.

Report count and/or using a time instead of a report count is also a good alternative...

This would keep the lifetime average more relevant as time progresses without getting a skewed result.

[Lking]

All good ideas until you think about implementation (the storage required for each reporter) and what the intent of tracking the average reporting time was.

What may be better than just outright resetting is converting the average report time into, say, a 100 report moving average.

This requires storing 100 times, plus pointers. For some reporters it would represent the average time for the last month or more, for others the last 12 hrs depending on the level of reporting.

Report count and/or using a time instead of a report count is also a good alternative...

Not sure what you mean here. "Using a time instead" of what? The time used now?

This would keep the lifetime average more relevant as time progresses without getting a skewed result.

Assuming correct calculation, which may be at issue, skewed how? A change to a moving average or a report count isn't a lifetime average. Different numbers represent different things. Which calculation is appropriate does depend on what intent IronPost had when the number was included.

[Merlyn]

just to put my .02 in

It really doesn't matter. If it is older than a certain amount of time it cannot be reported. As long a some kind of report gets in and causes the spamming pondscum a little inconvenience then I don't care how long it takes. I think it should be removed.

[nei1_j]

How it got to 8 days while only being able to report spams 2 (originally 3) days old, I will never know.

That took a while to sink in. Finally, I realize, "Good point!"

[Lking]

Assuming correct calculation, which may be at issue, skewed how?