Curiosity question of the week: at approximately what number of members does a toplist start to go viral (grows wihout help from owner) and why is it so?
Hard to say. Usually goes good once you have a few big sites listed, at least it has been like that for me.
Many webmasters tend to do what other big sites of the same niche do, so they might also get listed on the same toplists.
Basti hit it right on the head, get the big members and the rest will follow. I got lucky with a couple lists in the past and got some leaders who joined early, after that I never did any marketing and 2-3 new members a day would join.
With that said, how do you keep non-legitimate websites from joining your topsite? I review and approve all websites that join because I try to keep my list as clean as possible. What's that saying? An ounce of prevention is a pound of frustration saved?
Defenetly approving members is a must, though i must say i never once used that feature.
usually kept ssi.php?a=new&num=20 in my bookmarks to check new sites and delete if needed
OK, my site is small but I have had unwanted visitors and the bann ip function worked like a charm for me. In my case I believe the spammers were using same ip but different html and usernames
Yup, also a very usuable feature.
StopForumSpam plugin is also very usuful for this purpose. Basicly the same thing, just that you also help other webmasters who use this plugin