I think that unless you have a good reason, the best thing to do is:
1) Ban the poster
2) Physically remove the thread
... instead of posting in it and simply deleting the contents. Even if the links are gone, having all those spam threads listed in the thread lists isn't great...
Particularly in some forums, there are a whole bunch of spam threads there, but because people then posted in the threads, I don't want to delete them... sure the links are gone, but most of the thread titles are still there!
Banning their IP would help, I think blocking all of the users of the former soviet block would also work.
On the issue of "trolls and spammers", I feel I must say a few things being a paroled former menace myself.
Ryan is a incredibly forgiving person, He pardoned me when I didn't deserve it and he also forgave Bounty hunter when he hacked and hatcheted his old site and infected his computer with a virus.
Ryan is Jesus!
Since being allowed here is a privileged in itself and I know that what I did in the past was shameful and a huge betrayal of my friends, Before all that me and Ryan used to correspond on AIM. Depression can really make you do stupid shit that and immaturity.
The bullying I received during high school was a big factor to explain my erratic schizophrenic behavior, I felt rejected and misunderstood in my real life and it crossed over into my "net life" as my low self esteem during those days made me so impatient and desperate for social acceptance that I went postal the moment I felt the slightest bit of rejection, Allot of by behavior was inexcusable and I am just trying to explain myself and get this off my chest.
I kept coming back like a Stray cat meowing for attention, Since I had nowhere to go since all the cool people went over to tendocity and the TC people who didn't know me from CS didn't like me so I flipped out,Then all the CS people I knew got angry at me and then I felt so hurt by that I went mad and made a fool out of myself alienating all my friends from CS.
CS my old online community was deserted and left inhabited by mouthy trash talking cunts , Since CS was built around being a debating club largely on the subject of video game consoles,Unlike the old gang were there was mutual respect and even close friendships with the opposing side, These newbies that remained SMBM and co would engage in personal attacks and verbally abusive speech and at the time I just didn't have the maturity to just move on and leave the place behind, So the "newbies" finally broke the straw with me especially the part were that one ass hole told me to go "kill myself" so I attempted to close down the forum but hesitated and aborted the process of deletion halfway as I immediately regretted the hasty decision as I still had attachment to that site.
Being bored and having nowhere to go I hoped to start again and pretend I was a new person and restart the old relationships under a new identity, Ryan eventually caught me but still had the mercy in his soul to grant me yet another pardon.
FUBAR!
I guess you guys domesticated me :D
Thank y'all for the years of fun