I know dumb*explicitly deleted* Moogle *explicitly deleted* advertising via PM is nothing new; however it does get rather old after a while.
My proposition: Suspend the Gnome rank from sending PM's or really having any PM priveledges what-so-ever, then once they get thier 10 posts in and become a Member they will able to PM.
It has the potential to discourage people from advertising via PM; however, on the flip side I realize this means that people may just resort to advertising in topics or perhaps even spamming the forum to get thier 10 posts to then PM advertise.
I'm just kind of throwing this idea out there and I want to see what everyone else thinks about it.
I like this idea as it is logical, however upon checking my post count it would seem I'm lacking a few myself.
I haven't been here long but just the other day I was told of a new forum re-opening or redecorating or something along the sort via pm.
People who come here to advertise and find out about the ten post limit (maybe edit the rules... which whilst on the topic I noticed a few old things on there that need updating), they might make their ten posts, decide it's a good place after all and stay and advertise within this forums idealistic way of promoting websites.
Thinking of any negative points... Well, you say people may be spamming for their ten posts, it could bring some sort of additional temporary activity for the forum. And if the posts are a complete waste of time then they are deleted (which I believe lowers the post count of that person everytime a post they made is deleted). The only other negative thing I can think of (which shouldn't be too much of a problem as long as there is some form of active moderator keeping an eye out), is the fact that they may resort to creating multiple spam topics in various places to catch they attention of the forumers.
I think overall this idea should be given some form of trial period, which would have to be a lengthy time, for example a month. Estimate the average amount of spammers a month, then compaire with the results from TheMissingCloud's idea.
Nice suggestion, Ill get the code and have it up and running soon.