GrabCAD Community User Group

Created by Anna Skopenko on 10 January, 2018

When is grabcad going to clean up its act with all the fake accounts and zero contributors ?

I noticed that there are many (as in thousands) of 'obvious' foul language accounts and place-holder ZERO contributors that exist and need to be purged from the system to show *real* demographics and *real* users who are interested and who can make a contribution to the community.

However, there are way too many accounts that may have been started for good intentions but are dead from lack of interest or simply used for spamming or data collection of others work and never to return.

So what is the current policy for dead, foul-language accounts, ZERO contributions (over time), and nefarious people who are just lurkers that have no intention of getting involved (zero comments) or contributing (zero models).

I mean - REALLY - what is the purpose of keeping these garbage accounts ? Is this simply to make even more outrageous claims of over MILLIONS and MILLIONS of subscribers ?!? [even when over 50% are junk]

So will someone please enlighten me when the janitor is coming to purge the toilet.

Or am I the only kid that is saying the 'king has no clothes on' ?
http://compassionspeaksout.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-beauty-of-truth-metaphor-of-life.html

Accepted answer

There are thousands more DEAD accounts that serve NO purpose what-so-ever or are placeholders for pariah.
https://grabcad.com/engineers?query=pariah&sort=score&time=month


7 Other answers

If you have seen accounts that have violated our Terms of Service please send a report to our Community Support. Our Community Support deals with thousands upon thousands of reports everyday so they may not get to the issue as fast as possible but please rest assure that everything is being checked.

Best
Kesa
GrabCAD Community Manager

Does GrabCAD have an incentive to clean up accounts?
I voiced similar concerns about thousands of fake, zero activity accounts for the One Million, Four Million, and Six Million member celebrations. I believe GC wants a high user account. I see they celebrated 10 million members in August 2022. Yay.

10,000,000 members but only a few questions posted each day? A similar number of Group posts. Maybe 300 models uploaded in a day? But dealing with "thousands upon thousands of reports everyday"? It does not add up. What are millions of users doing on the site? Downloading models? Reading the blog?

Is GC still "fixing" the badge system?
I propose if this site can't repair an automated badge system in years (a terrible idea to encourage quantity over quality btw) they are not going to fix more important issues, ever.

I used to check this site daily. I even have GC t-shirts. Now I pop in every few months to see if things have improved. My last model upload was July 2020. I've not seen anything to indicate the site has improved in those 2.4 years.

Yo soy uno de los novatos, muchas veces los trabajos que puedo hacer me parecen tan simples que no se justifica ocupar espacio que otros grandes participantes del grupo suelen subir, la mayoría de las veces me sirve de guía en mis proyectos, por eso no participo con mis trabajos

How DEPRESSING to come back to this thread, with so many good points raised, after two years and see that absolutely nothing has changed, except maybe for the worse.
Where the F*CK is GrabCAD Community Support? Do they even exist?

For a minute I thought you were a Spambot too. They have typical text with a link at the very end. :D :D

Yes GrabCAD is too slow in handling the bots. It is an extreme nuisance these days :(

The same question in multiple ways along with other issues has been directed to GRABCAD staff for over 5 years with the reply always being that they are working on it but it seems to be stuck in the "Too Hard" bin with no resolution as yet. Personally for the past couple of years I have adopted to only posting renderings of my models to maintain a showcase of my modeling skills. I don't mind sharing but not until GRABCAD addresses the concerns as raised. Present GRABCAD site structure ends up benefiting those that are not contributing or parasitic in nature. Regards M.Bruton

Steven,
1/ I understand your frustration, as I, myself have been in this frame of mind regarding the GRABCAD website. The contributing members have their grievances regarding the unscrupulous members abusing the site for their selfish interest with no obligations but resolution to these matters will not happen until such time it is in GRABCAD’S management interest to do so.
2/ The GRABCAD website is applauded as a means to gather engineering & CAD persons to interact but should be recognized firstly as a marketing vehicle for STRATASYS systems and their printers. Further to this, the Terms Of Use are set up as a means to legally protect the organization and not the contributors to such. The site is just a host for members to interact but holds no obligation for strict policing and relies on members to self-regulate and act as informers. As an example, by chance 2 days ago I came upon 1 of my GRABCAD models from 2018 that was re-uploaded by another member in 2020. It would sure be nice to have the recognition for 40 Likes & 1330 downloads that they received. This piracy happened on GRABCAD, not to mention the other CAD sites where I have found some of my other models for sale.
3/ As much as one desires the stricter administration of regulatory controls and clearing of non-contributing accounts, the organization is probably limited by its own resources in its recourse to reprehensible members actions. The site will only change if it has a massive decline in active contributors and a deterioration of its online standing. This could be through creating smaller groups where member inclusion is by ensuring members adopt to proper standards. Presently there are no incentives issued by GRABCAD other than the points and awards which basically have no tangible value other than bragging rights.
4/ It has been said to myself in previous dialogues on GRABCAD that if I am not happy to have models stolen then not to upload them. Thus of lately I have only uploaded renderings of my models. It is not that I am unwilling to share but the desire is to share with persons that show due respect & appreciation.
5/ At the end of the day, venting your frustration here may help to reduce levels of angst but grievances should be sent to GRABCAD management.