The way I've done it is to use U/G promotions. Once a user meets the criteria he is automatically added to another U/G which has additional privileges. If it becomes necessary in future, I can even set it so users can't post URLs until they have proved themselves, though hopefully this will never become necessary.

That's the thing I like about vB forums, all the bells and whistles you need to control the forum come as standard. It's well worth the cost of the licence.

SMF is the best OS forum S/W IMO and would be my choice if I was looking for a free solution. I would never use phpBB though because it's like a pheromone for every spammer and hacker on the net. The amount of attention that S/W attracts from undesirables is ridiculous.

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Lawrence