W3bbo wrote:
CompGuy101 wrote:
Simple math problems...but instead of text, use a captcha number.
On the contrary, I proprose incredibly hard math problems (stuff like integrals, hyperbolics, or catastrophe theory if I'm feeling evil). This has numerous advantages:
Requiring CC payment kept the kids out of SA, I don't see why a little degree level CAPTCHA can't keep the idiots out of technical forums
- It means only intelligent people are members
- Not even OCR software would work, since OCR fails terribly at reading complex typesetting. It's going to get confused with greek letters, large operators, and all that
- The site could make a bunch of money by putting proper math problems as the CAPTCHAs. The site could use the user-generated solutions as an income source as it submits them to the problem's organizers.
- Although one saying "Prove (or disprove) that the complexity classes P=NP" is a little too far.
- No, no jokes about N=1
That is (I would say) an incredibly bad idea. It might be useful to ensure that the people on a forum have a certain level of Mathematical knowledge, but it is rather pointless for anything else (I believe). (If one aims to limit [severely] the number of members [on a forum] then this might work [as the sub-set of the people who could actually solve these problems would be very small {proportionally}]).
I do like the idea of a challenge (personally), and therefore I might like to attempt to solve something (of this manner [merely for fun]). It is still a very bad idea (in the vast majority of cases).
Angus Higgins
