"Only 1 comment allowed per 15 seconds; timer reset." is not working [closed]

Question

When the popup

"Only 1 comment allowed per 15 seconds; timer reset."

appears it is not living up to its claim. It does not allow me to comment after 15 secs.

Is it bug or feature?

Answer 1

As you can see it says "Timer reset". It means that when you see that message you have to wait again 15 seconds.

The reasons for that implementation are unknown, one of those "Jeff said so" things. It used to be 30 seconds and used to be very annoying.

Answer 2

This is a dupe of: "Only 1 comment allowed per 25 seconds; timer reset."

Which is a dupe of: Really Long Comment Wait Time?

Which was deleted by Jeff Atwood.

Here is what it said, though:

So, I go to comment on someones answer, and then go to comment again on someone else's answer. I get stopped by the comment timer thingy. I stop, I refresh the page a couple of times to check how long it is until I can comment again (looking at the time stamp of the old comment)

30 seconds come along, I try to comment. Doesn't work. I come back 15 seconds later, because I thought I might be off by a few seconds. Nope, still doesn't work.

Kept up like this for a minute. Then just decided that it wasn't worth it to comment.

Is this the intended purpose, to just make people so frustrated that they just don't comment? Or is it a bug in the system?

And this was Jeff's answer:

Two modifications:

1. Message changed to be more clear

   Only 1 comment allowed per {n} seconds; timer reset.

2. Multiple comment rate limiter reduced from 30 seconds to 25 seconds.

And like the 15 character requirement, yes, the intent is to discourage rampant adding of multiple low-value comments.

If it isn't worth 25 seconds of your time to compose that second comment, is it worth 2 seconds of my time to read them both?

And it doesn't end there, of course. That question was a dupe of: If I can't comment for 30 more seconds, why is the Add Comment button enabled?

and

Please return the comment rate limit to a flat 30 seconds

Answer 3

The timer is reset every time you see that message. So if you jump the gun by one second, you must wait another fifteen.

This is another one of many protections against spam-bots and malicious users. Basically, it prevents a bot from repeatedly trying to comment because it will continually have the timer reset. If the timer did not reset, then the spam-bot would just repeatedly post until it worked (once every 15 seconds).

Although I've run afoul it in the past, it's not too terrible of an imposition. Just use the extra 5 seconds to stretch your arms or look out the window.