wow there's a lot of spam here. what's up with that?

Indeed. there seems to be more here than I’ve seen in the other sites.

When I was running a garden site a few years ago, we were spammed by these @$$ #**!s to the point where I decided to shut down the site. It would be a shame here because there are some good postings here, but lately it seems that the idiots are outweighing the serious posters.

Surely there must be a better way to moderate.

-- jroot

There is a better way to take care of the spam. However, people must understand the difference between spam and comments given as legitimate answers and in turn trying to get a link. For example, if I find a source and feel like saying there are other superior writing sources that would help in understanding a topic better – then, would it hurt the integrity of the post? Will it hurt the website? No. There is a reason for allowing comments and the website administration should understand what is good and what is bad.