4 ms·

Blocking bots can improve the user experience of the end users.

johnklos 2y ago
Designing a site to not be affected by bots is fixing the problem. Blocking things that are bot-like, poorly, with no technical understanding, is a kludge, not a fix.
- chii 2y ago
  > Blocking things that are bot-like, poorly, with no technical understanding, is a kludge, not a fix. a kludge might be better than none. And it's an easy kludge (for the site owner - a checkbox in cloudflare). The fault lies with cloudflare implementing a lazy bot detector.
- thephyber 2y ago
  > with no technical understanding WTF? Building a WAF that has zero false positives and zero false negatives is impossible. All we can ask is that the companies that build WAFs be responsive, but they also need accurate bug reports with sufficient information to identify the variable.
  - csomar 2y ago
    I don't think you understood the parent. > Designing a site to not be affected by bots is fixing the problem. Bots footprint is minimal and shouldn't affect your site performance.
    - andsoitis 2y ago
      Bots have negative impacts beyond potential performance impact: - scraping & content theft - spam & fake engagement - DDoS attacks - Ad fraud
  - rcxdude 2y ago
    I would ask that the companies that build WAFs please stop, honestly.
- charcircuit 2y ago
  That is not always possible, may not be affordable, or may degrade the overall user experience.
  - johnklos 2y ago
    > That is not always possible It is definitely always possible. > may not be affordable You hired the wrong person / people, then. > may degrade the overall user experience Which is exactly what Cloudflare does, although most people would make a distinction between degrading an experience and outright causing something to not work at all.
yjftsjthsd-h 2y ago
And blocking users can make the user experience worse.
- charcircuit 2y ago
  That's already been established. My point is that there exists a tradeoff. Blocking a small number of legitimate users can be worth the benefits blocking the bots.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 2y ago
    Maybe, but it has to be a really sharp ratio.
csomar 2y ago
Except the Cloudflare firewall is just so goddamn dumb. It considers all of Asia a "bot", anybody who uses Linux or has a tracker blocker. I've had this complaint from several regular people who don't even have an adblocker.
8n4vidtmkvmk 2y ago
I just put my content behind a paywall. If the bots want to pay $50/mo I guess I don't mind. No cloudflare!

Designing a site to not be affected by bots is fixing the problem. Blocking things that are bot-like, poorly, with no technical understanding, is a kludge, not a fix.

chii 2y ago
> Blocking things that are bot-like, poorly, with no technical understanding, is a kludge, not a fix. a kludge might be better than none. And it's an easy kludge (for the site owner - a checkbox in cloudflare). The fault lies with cloudflare implementing a lazy bot detector.
thephyber 2y ago
> with no technical understanding WTF? Building a WAF that has zero false positives and zero false negatives is impossible. All we can ask is that the companies that build WAFs be responsive, but they also need accurate bug reports with sufficient information to identify the variable.
- csomar 2y ago
  I don't think you understood the parent. > Designing a site to not be affected by bots is fixing the problem. Bots footprint is minimal and shouldn't affect your site performance.
  - andsoitis 2y ago
    Bots have negative impacts beyond potential performance impact: - scraping & content theft - spam & fake engagement - DDoS attacks - Ad fraud
- rcxdude 2y ago
  I would ask that the companies that build WAFs please stop, honestly.
charcircuit 2y ago
That is not always possible, may not be affordable, or may degrade the overall user experience.
- johnklos 2y ago
  > That is not always possible It is definitely always possible. > may not be affordable You hired the wrong person / people, then. > may degrade the overall user experience Which is exactly what Cloudflare does, although most people would make a distinction between degrading an experience and outright causing something to not work at all.

yjftsjthsd-h 2y ago

And blocking users can make the user experience worse.

charcircuit 2y ago
That's already been established. My point is that there exists a tradeoff. Blocking a small number of legitimate users can be worth the benefits blocking the bots.
- yjftsjthsd-h 2y ago
  Maybe, but it has to be a really sharp ratio.

csomar 2y ago

Except the Cloudflare firewall is just so goddamn dumb. It considers all of Asia a "bot", anybody who uses Linux or has a tracker blocker. I've had this complaint from several regular people who don't even have an adblocker.

8n4vidtmkvmk 2y ago

I just put my content behind a paywall. If the bots want to pay $50/mo I guess I don't mind. No cloudflare!