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It's time to stop being polite and start being real. Farcaster is a super cool open protocol, but Warpcast, the main client 95% of us use to engage with it, is a closed sandbox with a lot of unwritten rules and culture that you have to figure out to do well. 91% of you failed to figure it out and got a spam label and now you are invisible. No one see your tags. Only your followers see your casts. Few people see your replies. You feel ignored and don't know how to get out of this purgatory. You must understand why you got this label and how to avoid it in the future.
We all know spam when we see it: viagra ads, a Nigerian prince who just needs a small favor, constant repetitive text. We, and algorithms, are pretty good at detecting this. But Warpcast isn't looking for Spam, they are looking for users who are being SPAMMY and this is a key difference. It's not about if you are a Bot or Not. It's not about proof of humanity. It's about if the algo thinks you are being spammy and labels you as such.
This is the million dollar question. Here is the official cast about making spam labels public and the definition of Spam and Spammy behavior by the Warpcast team. The Github contains a JSON file of all the FIDS the team has labeled. At first release, the raw data set says: { likely_spammy_users: "236865", might_spammy_users: "200705", unlikely_spammy_users: "44054" } which means 91% of active users on Warpcast are labeled as spammy (This data was from January 23, 2025 when the labels were first made public).
Note: The algorithm was run again on February 20, 2025 and the new numbers are:
Likely spammy users: 232,867 (Level 0: Worst Label)
Might spammy users: 171,103(Level 1: Limbo Label)
Unlikely spammy users: 90,653 (Level 2: Best Label)
~82% of casters are labeled as spammy. This is MUCH better than a month ago! Almost 40,000 casters got upgraded to Level 2!
From the Warpcast Team:
Warpcast's spam models predict the probability that an account might exhibit spammy behavior. Spam is defined as behavior that intentionally generates notifications for other users in a way that benefits the author and annoys users who receive them. Some examples include replying with generic llm generated responses, bulk following accounts, posting irrelevant or generally offensive responses to other people's posts. Spamminess is not related to whether an account is being controlled by a human. There are many bots that are not spammy and many humans that are.
Our models make these predictions based on the combination of a number of factors including the account's historical activity, social graph, message content and the moderation actions that other users have taken on their account. No single factor will get an account labelled as spam.
There isn't ONE single action you can do to be labeled as spam. It's a combination of many factors, but the above text is purposefully vague. If we know the exact mechanisms the team is using in their model, the spammers will learn to avoid them. The best way to see what the algo thinks is spam is to look at a sample of accounts that are not spammy and a sample that have spam labels.
I choose to look at the Top 100 OpenRank accounts by engagement, the Top 100 Organic FarScore (FarRank) aka Airstack accounts, the top 100 accounts by Neynar Score, and the top 500 accounts on the Warpcast Rewards Leaderboard. All of these data sets are publicly accessible and give us great insight. While the Warpcast Spam Algorithm is secret, these public data sets are a good approximation for high quality accounts and correlate highly with each other.
You can look up your FID directly in the GitHub JSON file linked above, or you can use one of these two frames on Warpcast:
Compez's Frame is beautifully designed and let's you check friend's spam labels as well. He tries to make it a little more user friendly by color coding your status, but his language does not match 1:1 with the JSON file in the GitHub causing some confusion on the timeline. Your goal is to see Green on his frame and be labeled as "Low Risk: Unlikely to engage in spammy behavior." Anything else means you have a Warpcast Spam Label.
MVR's frame is an exact pull from the Warpcast data. Level 2 means you are "unlikely spam". Level 1 or 0 is a Warpcast spam label.
If you have a spam label you need to stop what you are doing immediately and completely change your behavior on Warpcast right now. Spend the next hour cleaning up your feed. Think of your personal feed as your Warpcast resume. Make it look good and cast differently going forward.
Most spammers feeds are full of frames. Allowance frames, game frames, whatever the new Farcaster meta is. Frames are fun and viral but you are overdoing it. Oversharing frames looks Spammy. If you are casting mostly frames or casting the same frames everyday, you look spammy. Top Casters rarely cast frames. When they do cast them, they usually write about why they chose to cast the frame and tell you why you should use it/try it out or give a shout out to the person who built it. They are sharing something cool, but they usually share it once and they are overly cautious in sharing. You can share frames, but your profile should not be littered with them.
The best way to see what the algo loves is to study the Warpcast Rewards Leaderboard and draw your own conclusions. Look at the Top 10 on any given day. Look back 7 days on their casts. How many frames did Top Casters share?
*@V aka the CoFounder of Farcaster shared some clarifications: "Posting frames is not bad"
Most spammers feeds are also full of recasts with very little original content. Your feed needs to be mostly original content. When you hit the recast button 100 times a day, you look spammy. You can recast others cast, just not excessively.
Top casters quote cast. They add color, insight, or shout outs to the things they cast. They layer their own original content on top of the cast to make it more relevant to their own followers. They promote others, but with context. Quote casting is the HIGHEST honor on Farcaster (and the Original Caster gets notified about the quote cast in a way that stands out in their notifications) so sharing this way is a great way to get others attention.
**@V aka the CoFounder of Farcaster shared some clarifications: "Recasting is not bad"
80% of your timeline needs to be original content. Don't steal content from the web and post it as your own. If you do this in highly curated channels, Top Casters are going to block and mute you and NEVER interact with you. It's better to not cast at all than to cast slop. 20% of your casts can be quotes, recasts, and the occasional frame thrown in, but most of it must be unique on the network. Your home feed needs to be engaging and I need to be able to make a judgment call on you in one minute. When people look into your feed to decide to follow you, this is what they see. Make sure its good. Quality is key.
If you have a spam label, people who don't follow you don't see your tags anyway. You are wasting your time. Do not cast a frame that excessively tags people. Do not cast a top level cast and randomly tag people. The algorithm hates excessive tagging and punishes it swiftly.
Tag your friends all you want. But anyone who doesn't follow you is a stranger. Do not tag them. They don't see you tag and therefore don't reply. When they don't reply, you look even more spammy.
Use channels to your advantage. Engage with people who don't follow you in channels and respond authentically to your content. This builds trust and they may start replying back. Once you have a rapport, you can engage with them more if they keep engaging back (likes OR comments). If they don't respond, move on or try again once your spam label is upgraded.
If you see a cast on your home feed that doesn't have a channel tag and the person who casted it doesn't follow you, skip it. DO NOT REPLY to it. The person who casted it won't get a notification of your reply anyway. They most likely will never see it. Your reply is orphaned: it gets zero likes or comments and looks like SPAM.
You shouldn't engage with Top Casters who don't follow you back, unless you see them casting into a channel that you are also a member of. Engaging with them outside of channels will probably get you a spam label. It's not worth it to try to get their attention. Join their hypersub or a channel they moderate. Unfollow them. Do not engage with people who don't engage back.
But, the rules are different in channels. If you are a member of that channel, everyone will see your comment. You have an equal shot of being seen. Use this to your advantage. Find well moderated, well curated channels who are building community. Spend most of your time in these channels. Engage authentically with other members of the channel and slowly build your network. YOU CANNOT GET A SPAM LABEL PARTICIPATING IN CHANNELS. Lean into channels. Find topics you are interested in and contribute.
Most Farcasters WANT authentic connections, but they are hesitant to interact with people who behave in a spammy or bot like way.
Many people with spam labels are non native English speakers. Many use Chat GPT and other AI tools to "fix" their English. Do NOT do this. It makes you sound like an LLM Bot. It's way better to say something in English and also say it in your native language to give English speakers a heads up that you aren't a native speaker. I don't care that your English isn't perfect. I care that you are genuine. If people think you are am LLM bot, they will ignore you. If they are unsure, they will ignore you. When people ignore you and your comments are orphaned with no engagement, you look like SPAM.
When interacting with a stranger on Warpcast (aka someone who doesn't follow you), you need to use full sentences. gm, hi ser, and random emojis look like spam and are not appropriate. Do this with your friends (aka people who follow you) not with everyone else. Automated accounts engage in this behavior, so most casters ignore them. The more your are ignored, the more you look like spam. It's better to not reply at all than to reply with low level slop. Do not attach some random photo or some AI generated nonsense to a reply to stand out. This just makes you look even more like a bot, and everyone will ignore you. When no one engages with you, the algorithm thinks you are spammy and will label you appropriately.
You can use the Dune query below to find out who YOU follow that has a Level 0 Spam Label. You will need to sign up for a FREE Dune account and then add your FID to the box on the left hand side to run the query.
https://dune.com/jkavithamahesh/farcaster-followers-and-following-with-spam-label-by-fid
Scroll to the bottom and you'll see your following and who you follow. You can't do anything about who follows you, but you can investigate who you follow and take action. On the bottom right you'll see : Farcaster - Following with Spam Label - By FID; click the "label" heading to sort the table and go through the Level 0's.
Who are you following with a label? Are they honestly being spammy? Check their account and look at their recents casts. If they are being spammy, unfollow them. If they are marked incorrectly, help them get out of Spam Jail using the resources below.
The spam algorithm runs daily, but we only see public updates on Thursday evening (US Pacific Time). If you change your behavior today, maybe in a month you will be re-labeled. We don't know. This is the first time the labels have been made public, but all hope it not lost. Change now and hope for the best. You can also create a new account and start over following these rules.
There is a small chance you are labeled incorrectly. The algorithm is far from perfect. If you believe you haven't done any of the above and shouldn't have this label, get a Farcaster friend who is willing to stake their reputation on this and have them plead your case to the Warpcast team. Remember, the Warpcast team won't see your tags or comments because you have a spam label.
If you want to participate in Warpcast Rewards, you have to avoid a Spam Label of 0. You aren't counted as a follower and your comments are basically invisible to most casters. More developers are going to take these labels into account over the next few months, so it's important to do everything you can to stay in the god graces of the algorithm. Being "a real human" is not enough. You need to respect the culture of Warpcast and cast in an authentic way.
This is @V's original thread about the Warpcast's Teams thinking about the spam labels and how they built the algorithm. It is required reading IMHO.
PiChi
Please guys . I’m currently toy backed spam from the very first day I joined Farcaster which was just last week. . I’ve tried all I know to get out from this jail but nothing is working . Please can anyone help me out ? Please 🙏
Thank you Pichi, we always learn from you..We followed your rules but the problem remains in synchronization. My last synchronized L is 28 December.
Давно столько не читал! Даже интересно было, спасибо!
Great analysis and advice, OiChi. Will share it in the poetry channel to help people be more effective and fun casters.
My pfp plushie gets to go on so many cool adventures thanks to @nato-san!!
This summer, your alter ego is going out to many places! There are a lot of photos of adventures that you don't know on my smartphone!😆 But she got a little dirty😂 I have to do maintenance!
She is living her best life! 6700 $HUNT 50000 $BETR
@nato-san, you just received 6,700 applause from @pichi for being a based builder 👏 🏆 Today's Current Rank: 7th 👏 Claps to Next Rank: 1,400 The Hunt Town Grant is a daily competition that rewards the top three builders with $HUNT backed NFT grants. Learn more at /hunt. Allowance will be reset in 19:29:23 ⌛️
Omg!! I love that!!
Adorable Pichi!
Ah it sucks being accused of spam and shadow banned again.
I got notified on The Base App!!!!
Whoa you did?! Yey! So there’s no such thing as shadow ban on the Base app? I’m still desperately looking for an invite. Btw thanks for sharing the story on ham in the previous cast. Got me inspired
Adorable adventures
@procoin curate mini
This cast has been curated to MINI on the Feeds miniapp @pichi you have been issued MINI shares Feed Market Cap: $8,867.57
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Whaaaaaat??? She made this herself? She is really talented
How does farcaster determine which comments are shown and which get banished to “show more replies” jail
i think spam label
https://paragraph.com/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels If this is in a channel, you probably don’t have a spam label but the channel owner has to turn that off.
@raneovie this might be helpful. Take time to read this
Based on spam labels - there is a metric per account. Click on the 3 dots in your or any profile “…” -> about
Little comment mostly go to jail
you have to make or complete a /poidh bounty to not be banished
Kenny Knows
niceone 😎🤜🏽🤛🏽
I’m noticing that the spam that is filtered out of my farcaster comments are now showing up on my TBA feed.
I don’t know the answer but I still go down into those depths to respond to people who reply to me Hope it doesn’t affect our “standings” cause I just want to make sure I respond to people who take time to message me even if they are a bot (since I can’t tell lmao) 25 $tipn
Yeah I see responses in there from what seems to be real people — the classification seems kinda arbitrary?
Definitely some real people in there, not sure why they get put there tbh, the whole “spam” flag thing has always been kinda nebulous
Doesn’t impact you
Thank you for clarification lol
i sit and sort them out everyday for merkle
Because some people are not members of the channel! In case of channel cast... And if a cast is on feeds only, so in that cast, the user is spam!
This!!!!
Surely the algorithm has marked you as a spammer, check the profile of our friend @pichi There she has a very good cast explaining how to get out of that status, good luck!
Most likely a channel setting. Channel owner needs to update it or you have to join as a member.
Thank you so much for your continued support!
What’s “spammy” on Farcaster is very subjective and doesn’t fit the traditional definition of “spam”. The nuance is really difficult to understand and I appreciate when the team clarifies their thinking. Maybe spamminess is as simple as interrupting other’s experience on the app. I need to chew on this for a while. https://farcaster.xyz/dwr.eth/0x83a52a8e
Pichi I’m team @dwr.eth here I think crash landing into someone’s mentions to promote your ai porn frame is blatant spam — like what’s the defense for this?
That’s definitely and absolutely being spammy and obnoxious.
I don’t think either of those are controversial. A reply is a conversation. Topic of conversation is the original post. Just do a top-level cast and tag the person if you have a different topic.
I agree with the sentiment, but the nuance is harder to convey. I can’t imagine all the notifications you get every hour and it must be frustrating when people add off topic stuff. I’m guilty of this because I assume when something is recently casted the OG caster is paying attention and online. I’ll add this to my article.
In my opinion, a lot of mini-apps offer to share results/information/promotion, and it looks like spam. I try to skip such posts, and I don't know why, but it reminds me of spam frames. If necessary, I can share some examples.
It can get spammy fast. I mute many of them after I add them to my app. Especially if they have notifications :)
we gotta let go of worrying about being spam. Live your life, who cares what the algo says
Everyone I onboarded got marked as spam in the summer of ‘24. I don’t want a repeat of that in the summer of ‘25. If we want new people to thrive who find their way here, we need to guide them.
I am concerned that I am being SPAMmy when I use Mini App to get scores or Share game results. For example, Leaderboard requires share each time to get a score. Also, this is not always necessary to Share, but after you hit the ball to everyone in Kickback, it is a case of mension everyone and sharing the results. I am concerned that it may be SPAM-like when I play games in a row.
I don’t share anything that forces a share or tags anyone. I never see top casters do this.
I knew it. I wonder if I should not participate in such Mini Apps, or if I should participate but not Share, like in the kickback game...
Dan means: deviation from the main topic toward something unrelated.
I’m working on an update to this article and I’m going to make this more clear. https://paragraph.com/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels
The first mistake is that most people always use short comments like "GM" "GN" because they are trying to grab other people's attention, trying to get more attention is good, but it need to be genuine and it's not about attention, we are creating more connections here , so we need to chat like normal way and not only for attention grabbing
Absolutely. I write about this a lot. https://paragraph.com/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels
Everyone knows every rules but still don't care about that, after while they complain about I'm in spam
I'm also starting to get confused with the algorithm, just because we greet more people we don't know, it's immediately considered spam 🙃🙃
I always tread lightly with people who don’t follow me. https://paragraph.com/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels
This is my favorite notification.
Ahahaha just you being you and I love it😂🖤
I have a certain skillset and I use it often :)
A fellow bot destroyer 🥹 Most I've got was 5 successful reports in one notif so far 👀 I am extra satisfied when I get to add one to @rec 💜 Keep up the great work, soldier 🫡
We don’t mute these! 🚩
What exactly entails spam content?
It’s subjective. You know it when you see it. https://paragraph.com/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels
Sometimes that would be helpful! How do you not let a valuable person go under the knife? (I hope I don't fall into this category.)
I have a certain set of skills. I can smell them a mile away.
Ha ha ha. You certainly do @pichi
What can you say about that? https://farcaster.xyz/saratov/0x33feafc8
lately I also report accounts that carelessly mention... I don't know why they do it... do they think it can prevent accounts from being labeled spam? even though it's worse.
Now it’s even easier to help your friends in spam jail! You can check directly from the app. You may need to force close the app 5 times, spin in a circle 3 times and give a small blood sacrifice to get this update.
And please check the label! More than 50% of people are simply replying with usernames that are not in spam.
They are confused. 1. We didn’t get an updated set for 11 days last week and many people don’t understand that their labels change daily but we can’t check it until we get a public data set 2. There were many many people who got the upgraded good label but who were still being hidden in show more replies on non channel casts and weren’t getting any points on the leaderboard even with a level 2 label. 3. They are still seeing themselves as show more on channels and not understand why. I assumed opening my channels to everyone would help but it didn’t. 4. Add this all together, and now people are just confused.
Was just confirmed this is from the same dataset so confusion will remain with slower updates. Biggest confusion I guess is still caused by channels /farcaster hides a lot in show more. Even see level 2 casters there Although it's open for public casting
Also what doesn't help is that there's level 2 accounts that are different than other level 2 accounts which adds to the confusion. These accounts don't earn leaderboard points and can't cast videos. I don't know the exact details but @akshaan fixed a bunch of those last week
Videos are officially not tied to spam labels at all but still not public as to how to get them. Adds greatly to the confusion.
@akshaan can you check @sari1996 You fixed a lot a while ago but there seems to be more, is there anything possible to help all that are a 2 but bugged in the leaderboard causing them to feel like they are still in spam?
Is it really easier than from a mini app in the feed? Or using the share extensions?
No. But I’ve shared that hundreds of times and it’s still not clicking. People have to remember the name of the app or install it. Too much friction for the average person. I can’t even get people to read the entire article on how to help people in spam or not be spammy. I also can’t get most of my cast actions to work anymore and I can’t grab a mini app link while I’m responding to a cast so…
😂 Yeah so true, but they also will not remember how to find the about dots on the profile page But I guess I should spin up a new mini app called spam check, then at least you don't have to know you have to look for tipopolis to get to the spam label check
How to Save Others from Label Spam
user is not spam but going into more replies why is that?
Channels are defaulting to who is a member and those replies are prioritized. You can also be uplifted if the algorithm likes you very much. I set the channel where everyone can post but that doesn’t override replies.
Help me plz
https://paragraph.com/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels
Sir i just collecting daily strake from farcaster channel Its day 96 so here i need cast everyday And I post like Hi, GM , GN And i post everyday on my home too Also share many frame last few days Now what i can do?
Rule 4 Don’t mass tag people. Maybe @rodeodotclub posts are an exception because artists actually love when you share our art. If you are tagging 10 people, why should I look at it? Do even matter? Why am I being tagged? Remember how this looks in notifications. It looks spammy. https://paragraph.xyz/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels
yes, @rodeodotclub is an exception because they are intentional - you're sharing someone's art and want them to know. i love when i am tagged in a rodeo post.
Super important. Verifications are great to do, but you still can’t be spammy. Verifications alone won’t save you from a spam label! What is spammy? https://paragraph.xyz/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels
spammers are more willing to do verifications
I think so too. They are hella motivated.
What’s a verification
How do I finally get rid of my spam label. Never behaved spammy and don’t have any clue why I even earned it, besides playing farville and therefore sharing their frame
I added two new monsters to my collection
Need more 2083 $degen
So cuteee 😍 50 $degen Hi dear, quick question I just Labeled as a spammer by mistake or maybe because I was engaging with spammers do you have any idea what should I do or How can I remove this label? Thanks 🙏 @elisabeth
TY! I don’t know much about getting rid of the new spam label. I know that @pichi made a few casts about it. The best advice I can give you is to check out her profile and casts. I hope that you get rid of your label asap 🤞🏻 100 👏
Thank you so much dear😍
https://paragraph.xyz/@pichi/the-unwritten-rules-of-warpcast-avoiding-spam-labels
Hi gorgeous @pichi I just labeled as a spammer mistakenly and also I was on leader board for a month what should I do? My verification is level 1 as well:)
My account was on top 200 :) Can you help me how should I remove it please? @pichi
So beautiful 😍 50 $DEGEN
Thanks! ☺️
How many of these folks cast consistently? (5 days in a row!) 11,558 How many of them are considered quality casters? (Level 2 spam labels) 2,110 https://dune.com/queries/4742322 Epic query by @mvr
Good Starter Pack idea right there
Oooo! I will think on this!
Cast everyday yet still my engagment is SHIT
I don’t think we really have the numbers we need and even with notifications on for people I still feel like I miss their casts and miss notifications!!!! I feel crazy some days. And I can never tell if people see my posts.
i see you pichi 👁️ 👁️
mine too, it's worse than ever and I can barely even make it in the top 1000 for rewards anymore 😂🙈
I feel that for sure it’s so segratated again and back to reading/audo book for @cdixon.eth honestly it seems that /warpcast is moving to the corporate models vs the web3 concept. TLDR this book is taking me forever to listen to
And you are a rockstar so wtf over? Ur not alone
it's even worse for smaller accounts (like mine) unless they're doing it on purpose that you really need to reply guy 24/7 to be seen also different timezones makes it much more difficult
pretty much yea replying and engaging yet honestly I’m lucky to get 5 likes or 2 comments on a cast these days and that is saying something. Mainly my cohort has moved on or found many pain points here when I keep trying to reach out engage find new circles to met folxs and continue to do my usual routine it becomes so hard and way more effort than I have time for these days.
This is how a lot of people feel like on this app. It's gatekept as a mfer
The algo is harsh. It really likes text based posts the most and that’s not my style at all.
Been fighting and working for visability for myself and others since I came back to this app so at this point I want to say it’s been almost a year. I’ll be like that cockroach that wont quit. https://heroes.fandom.com/wiki/Cockroach
U are not alone
Sounds like a good starter pack!
Farcaster seems to be using DAU as a KPI, but if they don’t continuously analyze the data while filtering out bots, they might misinterpret the actual situation. The most important thing should be the user experience. Lately, the home feed feels off. I wonder if they’re tracking impressions.
It feels weird to me but I changed time Zones so I blame it on that.
Tbf FC is the only social media I use and I don’t cast everyday.
That’s a harder use case to track!
Recently 3 of my friends who joined new got spam level of 0 but they inly joined here few weeks ago .How can I help them now ?
https://paragraph.xyz/@pichi/save-farcasters-from-spam-jail-a-how-to-guide
I’m at 269 on /appreciation channel! Trying to get to 365! 😊
So I’m 1/11,558. Thanks for that stat. I’ve Been wondering bout this. I know we got rid of some bots but followers dropped and engagement at lowest levels for me at least 🤷🏽♂️