Re: Strider: U.S. violation of UN charter

On 15 Nov 2005 15:02:56 -0800, "Grey Mouser West"
<calvinthecat@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>
>h...@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>> On Tue, 15 Nov 2005 13:40:17 -0800, "Evil Shaman" <me@xxxxxxxxxx>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >> You would only using projection as an explanation if you presumed I
>> >> was wrong. Facts do not support that contention.
>> >>
>> >
>> >What does right or wrong have to do with it. I brought up projection
>> >because the things you complain about other people doing actually represent
>> >your trademark style of debate.
>>
>> Wrong, because I repeatedly bring up issues, and invite the right
>> wingers to deal with that issue. They never can.
>
>
>Hello?!? Earth to Hal. Are you listening?
>
>Lets try this again. List the issues I can't deal with. You won't do
>this yet you act as if you do. Lets see the list. You have nothing to
>lose if you are right. Of course if you are wrong . . .
>
>
>> Instead, always
>> resort to the ad hominem _first_.
>
>
>No that comes last after you have been given ample opportunity to
>defend yourself and you fall flat on your face.
>
>
>> To point out the failing of their
>> illogical argument does not make that an ad hominem, only a statement
>> of fact based on observation of their answer.
>
>
>Hal, you saying this is clasic projection. You are the one with the
>illogical claims and the few times you try to defend them all you can
>come up with are fallacies.
>
>
><snip>
>> >When someone brings up phsycological projection, then you dodge it by
>> >bringing up Iraq, and then you complain about people dodging you represent
>> >projection in action my friend.
>>
>> You have nothing to support your contention of psychological
>> projection.
>
>
>Except of course *your words*. It's an open and shut case. Your guilt
>in this matter is self evident.
>
>
>> It is only an excuse, and an ad hominem in itself. I am
>> the one that has attempted to objectively debate the facts.
>
>
>No Hal that is something you run from.
>
>
><snip>
>> Oh, and you do understand the definitions of "ignorant" (means not
>> knowing, NOT stupid),
>
>
>Yeah you demonstrate that all the time.
>
>
>> conservative, and you understand the
>> metaphorical reference to a lemming, right?
>>
>> So, in other words, "ignorant conservative lemming" is not an insult,
>> only a factual statement of observable attitudes. One you cannot
>> defend.
>>
>> Hal
>
>Hal defending against your accusations are child's play. They as so
>silly it is comical.


Come on, guys. Hal is not all that hard to figure out:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll

"In Internet terminology, a troll is a person who posts inflammatory
messages on the internet, such as on online discussion forums, to
disrupt discussion or to upset its participants. The word, or its
derivative, "trolling", is also used to describe such messages or the
act of posting them.

Etymology

The contemporary use of the term first appeared on Usenet groups in
the late 1980s. It is widely thought to be a contraction of the phrase
"trolling for suckers," itself derived from the sport fishing
technique of trolling. The latter can be compared with trawling, of
which it is a near homophone.

The word likely gained currency because of its apt second meaning,
drawn from the "trolls", which are portrayed in Scandinavian folklore,
and children's tales, as often ugly, obnoxious creatures that are bent
on wickedness and mischief. The image of the troll under the bridge in
the "Three Billy Goats Gruff" emphasizes the trolls' dislike of
outsiders within its physical environment, particularly those who
intend to graze in its domain.

Vicious circles

Users may have various motives for trolling. A common factor for many
is the desire to draw attention to the troll. Inflammatory, sarcastic,
disruptive or humorous content is posted, meant to draw other users
into engaging the troll in a fruitless confrontation. The more
attention the troll's activities draw from users, the more persistent
the troll's behavior in the forum. This gives rise to the often
repeated protocol in internet culture: "Do not feed the trolls."

Often, a person will post a sincere message about which they are
emotionally sensitive. Skillful trolls know that an easy way to upset
them is to disingenuously claim that the person is a "troll". On other
occasions, a person may not instantly understand, or fit into the
social norms of a forum where most users have similar characteristics.
As a result, their acting just slightly out of the norm (often
unintentionally, and for legitimate reasons) garners them the label
"troll". It can sometimes be difficult to distinguish between a user
who is merely unfamiliar with the social protocols of a forum, and a
user who is intentionally trolling; unfortunately, many users react
aggressively on a first impression to a perceived troll, which
sometimes leads disgruntled newbies to become legitimate trolls.


Troll culture

This culture seems to have gone beyond the vague Scandinavian
mythological identification, and includes some elements of Celtic
culture, including a sort of status for the more effective poets and
rhetoricians among them. The "Wikipedia red faction" was a notable
group of this sort, employing largely Marxist rhetoric. The
Anarchopedia similarly employs some anarchist rhetoric, and seems to
actively encourage self-identification and factional expression among
trolls. To a lesser degree, so has consumerium.

The long history of trolling, and the strong support for anonymous and
pseudonymous discourse on the Internet, suggests that the story of the
"anonymous troll" is only beginning. Whether there can be a "culture"
consisting of people who do not know each other, except through a
common experience of being bounced from Internet forums, is
questionable, but some do claim it is possible and already occurring.

There is strong evidence for this in the existence of forums that
claim to exist specifically to support trolls and trolling, to
exchange troll tips, and to identify targets that other trolls might
fruitfully bait or debate.

Trolling culture is best observed in trolls, who do not know each
other, working together. Because the common methods of creating
inflammatory posts are well known, and a subject of jokes in many
places on the Internet, it is sometimes possible for a troll to
identify another troll at work. A troll, trolling another troll, often
creates massive amounts of pretend drama between them that are taken
seriously by non-troll observers (especially if they take sides). The
end result is that the two trolls can work together to force a
conversation to go off topic, or center a forum's discussion around
themselves, more effectively than on their own.
[edit]

Trolling as identity deception

Pre-history

Prior to DejaNews' archiving of Usenet, accounts of trolling were
sketchy, there being little evidence to sort through. After that time,
however, the huge archives were available for researchers. Perhaps the
earliest, although poorly documented, case is the 1982 - 83 saga of
AlexAndJoan from the CompuServe forums. Van Gelder, a reporter for Ms.
magazine, documented the incident in 1996 in an article for his
publication. Alex (in real life a very shy 50 year old psychiatrist
from New York) pretended to be a highly bombastic, anti-religious,
post-car-accident, wheelchair-bound, mute woman, named, "Joan", "in
order to better relate to his female patients". This went on for two
years, and "Joan" had become a hugely detailed character, with an
array of emotional relationships. These only began to fall apart after
"Joan" coaxed an online friend of hers into an affair with Alex.

"Even those who barely knew Joan felt implicated ? and somehow
betrayed ? by Alex's deception. Many of us on-line like to believe
that we're a utopian community of the future, and Alex's experiment
proved to us all that technology is no shield against deceit. We lost
our innocence, if not our faith." (Van Gelder, 1996, p.534)

Trolling in the 1990s

One early reference to "troll" found in the Google Usenet archive was
by user "Mark Miller," directed toward the user, "Tad", on February 8,
1990 [1]. However, it is unclear if this instance represents a usage
of "troll" as it is known today, or if it was simply a chance choice
of epithet:

"You are so far beyond being able to understand anything anyone
here says that this is just converging on uselessness. The really sad
part is that you really believe that you're winning. You are a
shocking waste of natural resources ? kindly re-integrate yourself
into the food-chain. Just go die in your sleep you mindless flatulent
troll."

The more likely derivation can be found in the phrase, "trolling for
newbies," popularized in the early 1990s in the Usenet group,
alt.folklore.urban. The usage was somewhat different from the current
notion of trolling; it was a relatively gentle inside joke by veteran
users, presenting questions or topics that had been so overdone, only
a new user would respond to them earnestly. Others expanded the term
to include the practice of playing a seriously misinformed or deluded
user, even in newsgroups where one was not a regular; these were often
attempts at humor, rather than provocation. In such contexts, the
noun, "troll", usually referred to an act of trolling, rather than to
the author.

Some long-time Usenet users continued to insist on these earlier
definitions, even after the term was applied more generally to
inflammatory actions, previously characterized as "flamebait".
[edit]

Identity

In serious literature, the practice was first documented by Judith
Donath (1999), who used several anecdotal examples from various Usenet
newsgroups in her discussion. Donath's paper outlines the
ambiguousness of identity in a disembodied "virtual community" [2]:

"In the physical world there is an inherent unity to the self, for
the body provides a compelling and convenient definition of identity.
The norm is: one body, one identity. ... The virtual world is
different. It is composed of information rather than matter."

Donath provides a concise overview of identity deception games which
trade on the confusion between physical and epistemic community:

"Trolling is a game about identity deception, albeit one that is
played without the consent of most of the players. The troll attempts
to pass as a legitimate participant, sharing the group's common
interests and concerns; the newsgroups members, if they are cognizant
of trolls and other identity deceptions, attempt to both distinguish
real from trolling postings, and upon judging a poster a troll, make
the offending poster leave the group. Their success at the former
depends on how well they ? and the troll ? understand identity cues;
their success at the latter depends on whether the troll's enjoyment
is sufficiently diminished or outweighed by the costs imposed by the
group.

Trolls can be costly in several ways. A troll can disrupt the
discussion on a newsgroup, disseminate bad advice, and damage the
feeling of trust in the newsgroup community. Furthermore, in a group
that has become sensitized to trolling ? where the rate of deception
is high ? many honestly naïve questions may be quickly rejected as
trollings. This can be quite off-putting to the new user who upon
venturing a first posting is immediately bombarded with angry
accusations. Even if the accusation is unfounded, being branded a
troll is quite damaging to one's online reputation." (Donath, 1999, p.
45)[3]


Usage

The term troll is highly subjective. Some readers may characterize a
post as trolling, while others may regard the same post as a
legitimate contribution to the discussion, even if controversial. The
term is often used to discredit an opposing position, or its
proponent, by argument ad hominem. Likewise, calling someone a troll
makes assumptions about a writer's motives that may be incorrect.
Regardless of the writer's motives, controversial posts are likely to
attract a corrective or patronizing or outraged response by those who
do not distinguish between real physical community (where people are
actually exposed to some shared risk of bodily harm by their actions),
and epistemic community (based on a mere exchange of words and ideas).
Customs of discourse, or etiquette, originating in physical
communities are often applied naively to online discourse by newcomers
who are not used to the range of views expressed online, often
anonymously. Hence, both users and posts are commonly, and sometimes
inaccurately, labelled as trolls when their content upsets people.
Also, people may be more inclined to use epithets like troll in online
public discussion than they would be in person, because online forums
may seem more impersonal.
"Please do not feed the troll" images are meant to tell others not to
encourage trolls by reacting to them.
"Please do not feed the troll" images are meant to tell others not to
encourage trolls by reacting to them.

When appropriately applied to purposefully disruptive online behavior,
the word troll economically converts an abstract code of online
manners into a concrete image. Experienced participants in online
forums know that the most effective way to discourage a troll is
usually to ignore him or her, because responding encourages a true
troll to continue disruptive posts to that forum ? hence the
often-seen warning, "Please do not feed the Troll". Posting this
warning publicly, in reply to a troll's behavior to discourage further
replies, may discourage the troll. However, it can also have the
reverse effect, becoming itself food for the troll. Therefore, when a
forum participant sees an apparently innocent answer to a troll as
potential troll food, it may be more prudent to deliver the "Please do
not feed the Troll" warning in a private message to the answerer
(e.g., by email, or to the answerer's wiki Talk page).

Trolling in different internet media

Trolling takes distinct forms in different media; it started on
newsgroups, and as the Internet has evolved, so has trolling.

* Usenet ? hierarchies of newsgroups limit trolls' exposure, but
crossposting can overcome this. Some Internet service providers
implement limits on the number of newsgroups a message can be
crossposted to. In one notable example, alt.net, instituted a
cross-post limit after the trolls on the system had become so
notorious that Peter da Silva instituted a campaign for other systems
to cease exchanging news with alt.net until they did something about
the problem.
* Mailing lists ? usually controlled by moderators, so unwanted
contributors can quickly be banned.
* SlashCode ? based forums use a rating system so that readers can
moderate a post up or down from its initial rating. Readers can then
choose to ignore posts that others have "modded down." Timing of
trolls is particularly important, since earlier posts are more likely
to be read than later posts. An ideal troll would generate much heated
discussion and posting without further intervention from the troll.
* Wikis ? the flat, asynchronous and open model allows anyone to
post anything; users work to undo negative changes using the built-in
reversion tools, but this requires hundreds of volunteers to monitor
large popular sites. Trolls tend to be more subtle than in discussion
groups, often posting material that could be legitimate, but will
cause controversy by challenging the current power structure.
Difficulty is compounded by the impossibility of discerning whether a
user is simply espousing a controversial opinion, or trolling.
Sometimes Wikis get Vandalized.
* Weblogs ? in their most common form as a personal soapbox with
the ability for anybody to leave comments, popular weblogs often make
effective springboards for trolls, either as inflammatory comments or
provocative entries. The ease with which weblogs can be linked
encourages troll propagation.
* IRC ? the open nature of most IRC channels on popular networks
enables any potential troll to enter and utilise any of a range of
techniques, ranging from simple crapflooding to subtly irritating
remarks which trigger angry responses. The relative ease of evading
bans from channels and servers and the volatile nature of many IRC
users can allow trolls to perpetuate indefinitely.
* Multiplayer first person shooters ? online gaming attracts a
large number of teenage males, who take advantage of the combative
atmosphere and their general anonymity to disparage other players. See
pwn or noob for more information. Team killing and griefing --
breaking the social rules of the game to harass other players -- can
also be considered similar.
* Online Fantasy Sports ? A troll will infiltrate a free, online
league with multiple teams from different identity accounts and then
attempt to make lopsided trades of players to improve one team. The
troll will leave numerous messages on the league bulletin board from
different identities to give the appearance of legitimacy to otherwise
illicit behavior. Players that object to the obvious complicity are
usually showered with insults and other attempts at evasion.
* Web forums ? Forums of all kinds will attract trolls. Their
behavior does not differ much from the above examples. There is nearly
no forum free of trolls except with a few exceptions of very small
sites and those with exceptionally strict policies on trolling.

Examples

One-shot trolls

One-shot troll messages are intended to be disruptive, and tend to be
very obvious to ensure that they will receive annoyed replies:


Disruptive trolls

* Off topic messages: "Can anyone help me make a web page?" "No,
this is a music forum."
* Page widening: Filling up fields with large pictures or
characters such as "W" to make previous posts unreadable.
* Offensive media: Include media such as annoying sound files or
disturbing pictures in a message, or linking to shock sites that
contain such media. Often these links are disguised as legitimate
links. (One of the most notorious instances of this was a troll who
repeatedly inserted autofellatio videos into Wikipedia.)
* Inflammatory messages: "You are an idiot for including this type
of message in your list."
* Racist comments: "People of skin color X are racially superior
to people of skin color Y."
* Deliberately revealing the ending of a recent popular movie or
book, such as the latest Harry Potter novel, as a spoiler.
* Bumping an older discussion, or rehashing a highly controversial
past topic, particularly in smaller online communities.
* Deliberate and repeated misspelling of other people's nicks in
order to disturb or irritate them in a conversation.


Attention-seeking trolls

This class of trolls seeks to obtain as many responses as possible and
to absorb a disproportionate amount of the collective attention span.

* Messages containing an obvious flaw or error: "I think 2001: A
Space Odyssey is Roman Polanski's best movie."
* Asking for help with an implausable task or problem "How do I
season my Crock Pot? I don't want everything cooked in it to taste the
same."
* Intentionally naive questions: "Can I use olive oil instead of
pasta water, when cooking pasta?"
* Intentionally posting an outrageous argument, deliberately
constructed around a fundamental but obfuscated flaw or error. Often
the poster will become defensive when the argument is refuted, but may
instead continue the thread through the use of further flawed
arguments; this is referred to as "feeding" the troll.
* A subclass of the above is the flawed proof of an important
unsolved mathematical problem or impossibility (e.g. 1 = 2); however,
these may not always be troll-posts, and are sometimes, at least,
mathematically interesting.
* Politically contentious messages: "I think George W. Bush is the
best/worst President ever."
* Posting politically sensitive images in inappropriate places.
* Pretending to be innocent, after a flamewar ensues.
* Off-topic complaints about personal life, or threats of suicide:
sometimes, this is the "cry for help" troll.
* Plural or paranoid answers to personal opinions expressed by
individuals: "I don't believe that all of you really believe that, you
are teaming against me."
* Any combination of the above: For example, a troll will combine
inflammatory statements with poor grammar and AIM-speak (which is also
known as "netspeak"). "lmfao u are so weak minded and predictablei
thought i wan iggied i play ya like a card"

Other examples

Some trolls may denounce a particular religion in a religion
newsgroup, though historically, this would have been called
"flamebait". Like those who engage in flaming, self-proclaimed or
alleged internet trolls sometimes resort to innuendoes or
misdirections in the pursuit of their objectives.

A variant of the second variety (inflammatory messages) involves
posting content obviously severely contradictory to the (stated or
unstated) focus of the group or forum; for example, posting cat meat
recipes on a pet lovers forum, posting evolutionary theory on a
creationist forum (or vice versa), or posting messages about how all
dragons are boring in the USENET group alt.fan.dragons.

The "sock puppet" troll often enters a forum using several different
identities. As postings from one identity attract increasingly
critical comment from other forum members, the troll enters the forum
using a second identity in support of the first. The troll may even
use postings from the second identity to criticise those from the
first in order to develop credibility on the forum.

Cross-posting is a popular method of choice by Usenet trolls: a
cross-posted article can be discussed simultaneously in several
unrelated and/or opposing newsgroups; this is likely to result in a
flame war. For instance, an anti-fast food flame bait might be
cross-posted to healthy eating groups, environmentalist groups, animal
rights groups, as well as a totally off-topic artificial intelligence
newsgroup.

An example of a successful troll is the well-known "Oh how I envy
American students" USENET thread which had 3,000-odd follow-ups. A new
USENET newsgroup, "alt.genius.bill-palmer", was created by Igor Chudov
for the purpose of creating an outlet for discussing a controversial
USENET personality, Bill Palmer, himself an alleged USENET troll who
managed to make his personality the center of all discussions. A swirl
of messages attempting to disprove his alleged status as genius,
cross-posted to hell and back, made "a.g.b-p", the most popular new
"alt.*" newsgroup of the year. Its creator was nominated for the
"Troll of the Year 1996" award.

Motivation

Self-proclaimed "trolls" may style themselves as devil's advocates,
gadflies or "culture jammers", challenging the dominant discourse and
assumptions of forum discussions in an attempt to break the status quo
of groupthink ? the belief system that prevails in their absence.

Critics have claimed that genuine "devil's advocates" generally
identify themselves as such, out of respect for etiquette and
courtesy, while trolls may dismiss etiquette and courtesy altogether.
Most discussion of what motivates internet trolls comes from other
internet users who claim to have observed trolling behavior. There is
little scholarly literature to describe either the term or the
phenomenon. The comments of accused trolls might be unreliable, since
they may, in fact, be intending to stir controversy, rather than to
advance understanding of the phenomenon. Likewise, accusers are often
motivated by a desire to defend a particular internet project, and
references to an Internet user as a troll might not be based on the
actual goals of the person so named. As a result, identifying the
goals of Internet trolls is most often speculative. Still, several
basic goals have been attributed to internet trolls, according to the
type of disruption they are believed to be provoking.

Proposed motivations for trolling:

* Trolling can be described as a breaching experiment, which,
because of the use of an alternate persona, allows for normal social
boundaries and rules of etiquette to be tested or otherwise broken,
without serious consequences. This may be part of an attempt to test
the limits of some discourse, or to identify reactive personalities.
By removing identities and histories from the situation, leaving only
the discourse, some scientists believe that it is possible to run
social engineering experiments using troll methods. However, few
believe that troll organizations are engaged in science, and a few
scattered individuals, with no particular method or thesis, cannot be
described as scientists. They might however be engaged in research.
* Anonymous attention-seeking: The troll seeks to dominate the
thread by inciting anger, and effectively hijacking the topic at hand.
* Amusement: To some people, the thought of a person getting angry
over statements from total strangers is entertaining.
* Anger: Some people use trolling to express their hostility to a
group or point of view.
* Cry for help: Many so-called trolls, in their postings, indicate
disturbing situations regarding family, relationships, substances, and
school ? although it is generally impossible to know whether this is
just simply part of the troll. Some believe that trolling is an
aggressive, confrontational way by which trolls seek a sort of tough
love guidance in an anonymous forum.
* Self-proclaimed trolls, and their defenders, suggest that
trolling is a clever way of improving discussion, or an alternative
method of viewing power-relations.
* Setting oneself a challenge, simply to see if one can do it, and
be successful: One member of an online forum, for example, joins under
an unrecognizable identifying name to see if the other members of the
forum can be fooled and, if so, for how long.
* Wasting others' time: One of the greatest themes in trolling is
the idea that a troll can spend one minute of time posting a troll,
causing multiple other people to waste several minutes of their time,
catalytically affecting others. Most trolls enjoy the idea that they
can waste others' time at comparatively little effort on their behalf.
* Domino effect: Related to amusement, but in a more specific
fashion, it starts large chain reactions in response to one's initial
post. Achieving a disproportionately large response to a small action
is the general theme. This is similar to how a young child that goes
"missing" (but is actually hiding) may act with glee, seeing a large
number of people conducting a massive search in response to the
supposed disappearance.
* Suppression of information: A particularly nihilistic troll
often aims to curb the sharing of helpful information between forum
participants. For example, the skilled troll can turn an informative
discussion about tips and techniques on coping with disease X... into
a completely useless flame fest. This can keep essential information
out of the hands of those who need it most, thus proliferating human
suffering.
* Effect change in user opinions: A troll may state extreme
positions to make his or her actual beliefs seem moderate (this often
involves sock puppeteering or duals, where the bad cop is a
sock-puppet troll) or, alternatively, play the role of the devil's
advocate to strengthen the opposing convictions (with which he or she
actually agrees).
* Test the integrity of a system against social attacks or other
forms of misbehavior: For example, blatantly violating terms-of-use in
order to see whether any action is taken by the site administrators.
* Overcome feelings of inferiority or powerlessness by getting the
experience of controlling an environment.
* Self-promotion.
* Fight "groupthink": Many trolls defend their actions as shocking
people out of entrenched conformism.
* Satire: In these cases, the individuals do not think of
themselves as trolls, but misunderstood humorists or political
commentators.
* Satisfaction gained from personal attacks.
* Harassment: following a person ? who has been targetted for
harassment in one forum, but who has chosen to escape being victimized
by moving on ? and trolling the forum as a means of making that new
"home" an uncomfortable place for that person to be online.
* Lowering signal to noise ratio: On Slashdot, moderation points,
that could be used to moderate up alternative posts, are wasted on
moderating down things like ASCII pictures of the goatse man. At
certain thresholds, this lowers the quality of comments.
* Anonymously testing an alternate persona.
* Emptying a forum: this is usually only feasible if the forum is
small.

It is difficult to gauge the motivations of trolls, since most of the
justifications offered by alleged trolls for their behavior are
nothing more than ruses concocted to continue whatever mischief they
imagine themselves to have started. This is unfortunate because, as
the above list supposes, there are legitimate reasons for engaging in
the sort of actions for which trolling is known. Still, etiquette is
simple and straightforward enough that most people can advance the
aims professed by self-exculpatory trolls, without actually resorting
to these methods. Since there is a wide spectrum of possible
motivations for trolls, some of these functions being benevolent and
others, clearly malevolent, to typecast users as trolls in the
negative sense is often rash.

Some users of internet forums are considered to be "trollhunters", or
"trollbaiters". They willingly enter into conflicts when trolls
emerge. Often, trollhunters are as disruptive as trolls. A single
troll-post may be ignored, but if ten trollhunters "pounce", following
a troll, they will drive the thread off-topic.
[edit]

Resolutions and alternatives

In general, popular wisdom advises users to avoid feeding trolls, and
to ignore temptations to respond. Responding to a troll inevitably
drives discussion off-topic, to the dismay of bystanders, and supplies
the troll with the craved attention. When trollhunters pounce on the
trolls, ignorers reply with: "YHBT. YHL. HAND.", or "You have been
trolled. You have lost. Have a nice day." However, since trollhunters
(like trolls) are often conflict-seekers themselves, the loss usually
is not on the part of the trollhunter; rather, the losers are the
other forum-users who would have preferred that the conflict does not
emerge at all.

Literature on conflict resolution suggests that labeling participants
in internet discussions as "trolls" can perpetuate the unwanted
behaviors. A person rejected by a social group, both online and
offline, may assume an antagonistic role toward it, and seek to
further annoy or anger members of the group. The "troll" label, often
a sign of social rejection, may therefore perpetuate trolling.

Better results normally ensue when users take the moderator role and
describe more constructive behaviors in a non-judgmental,
non-confrontational way. Trolls are excited by trollhunters, and
frustrated by "ignorers", and neither of these emotions produce
positive results for the forum. Engaging trolls results in "flame
wars". Trolls frustrated by the "ignore strategy" may leave the forum
(and either troll elsewhere, or become constructive users) or may
become progressively more inflammatory until they get a response.

Novice trolls may experience serious "troll's remorse", a feeling of
great regret after losing their account (whether it be from an
Internet service provider or from a website) as a consequence of their
reckless trolling.
[edit]

Usefulness of trolling

A major debate on the Internet is whether or not trolls perform any
useful function. Because troll is such a broadly-applied term, if all
definitions thereof are to be accepted, the answer must definitively
be "yes and no".

Users performing many useful, but controversial, functions are often
decried as trolls, and in these cases, so-called trolling may actually
benefit the forum in which it occurs. For example, the presence of a
radical right-winger, described as a troll, may allow a conservative
lurker to feel more comfortable expressing his or her viewpoints,
which seem very moderate in contrast. On the other hand, if
trollhunters mount a flame war against this right-wing troll, the
conservative bystander may feel less comfortable in expressing her
views, to the detriment of the forum. As much as trolls claim to fight
groupthink, they may actually encourage it by solidifying opinion
against them.

Trolls can also, in some circumstances, be a source of genuine humour,
which depends entirely upon whether the troll is a good or a bad
troll. It is usually fairly easy to spot the difference between such
actions: a bad troll resorts only to weak uncreative arguments,
whereas a good troll will create a subtle set of arguments which draw
people in, with cunning twists to provide a thread of non sequitur
humour.

Trolls may also provide a valuable service by making people question
the validity of what is read both on the internet, and from other
sources. Trolls show that expressing any opinion is as easy as
expressing an informed and considered opinion, and may get as much
visibility. It has also been argued that shock jocks, and newspaper
columnists, often track public opinions by trolling. John C. Dvorak,
and Slashdot, have often been cited as examples.

Even though useful content and productive users are sometimes decried
as trolls, the consensus is that pure "trolling" benefits only the
troll and trollhunters, and has no place in any forum. Most forums
reject the claim that pure and intentional trolling serves any useful
purpose. Some trolls have been known to try to troll threads into
deletion, serving as a form of negative reinforcement to "newbies",
but also helping at the same time to reduce the clutter of spam
threads on a large message board. In many cases, trolling can lead a
forum administrator or moderator into implementing features to the
site to prevent trolling. Although this could be regarded as improving
the website itself, it remains that the features would not have been
needed, had the trolls not been there.
[edit]

Behaviorism

Precise definitions of "troll" are difficult because such definitions
rely on assumptions about internal motivation, which cannot be
conclusively proven without reverse-engineering the details of the
human mind. Some behaviors, such as "name-calling" are obvious
candidates for a "troll" classification, but often, what is considered
"trolling" is more subtle and disputable. (Name-calling, perhaps,
would fall under the classification of "flamer" instead.)

Some have suggested that instead of calling somebody a "troll", they
should focus on specific behaviors that a group finds uncomfortable,
and enforce behavioral rules to consistently and fairly prevent such
behaviors. The idea is to focus on the undesirable behavior itself,
rather than on the motivation for the behavior. If such behaviors
cannot be identified, then perhaps the alleged troll should be
tolerated out of fairness. Some call this, the "If you cannot identify
it, then tolerate it" plan.

An alternative view

While trolls and trolling are, by and large, considered a negative and
undesirable presence on a forum, some claim a belief that trolling is
inherently bad can have damaging consequences. The use of the word,
"terrorist" is often cited as an example of stepping over the line.
However, anything that is labeled with the word "terrorist" rallies a
feeling of an "us versus them" mentality, which are helpful both in
ostracizing trollish behavior, and in strengthening the 'need' for
anti-troll tactics, thereby consolidating the webmaster's support.

In most cases, the latter is an unexpected bonus in dealing with
trolls. However, a pertinent question arises: "What if this is the
only goal, and that the webmaster merely wishes to silence a variety
of criticisms, ranging from poor moderation and too much advertising,
to restrictions on discussion topics?" Playing the 'troll' card may
therefore be the webmaster's weapon of choice.

The polarizing effect that the issue of trolling has on online
communities has lead to several schisms. Wordforge, for example, was
created as an alternative to Trekbbs, touting itself as a general
discussion board, designed as a place where rules are limited so that
the 'troll card' cannot again be played in a self-serving manner. Such
boards are very much in the minority, as compared to a usual board
where "trolling = bad", an accurate and useful descriptor.

Many (perhaps most) people, labelled "trolls", are simply being called
thus by someone else in the course of a religious, political or other
ordinary type of dispute; in other words, they are labelled as one for
acting as a dissident or heretic. To characterize systems
administrators or moderators as "the troll who got there first" is not
entirely inaccurate. Many debates, between those with and without
administrative or legal powers, seem simply to resemble a heated,
personal, argument. On the internet in particular, the holding of
technological powers (such as the power to ban users or block IP
addresses) is not necessarily a sign of any superior political or
moral judgement.

As with similar pejorative labels, a group of people who are assigned
the label can turn it around to create group identity, and the power
to collectively resist. Individual outsiders, using the label on
someone, become targets for a collective response. Insiders, however,
may use the label without consequence, usually in a joking or
disarming way."

Strider
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Subtleties
    ... > Steve Carroll wrote: ... > troll v.,n. ... > individuals chain constitute trolling? ... "Definitions of Internet troll on the Web: ...
    (comp.sys.mac.advocacy)
  • Re: JF Mezei issuing rogue cancels again
    ... What makes him such a malicious troll? ... >>His trolling is constant, repetitious, relentless. ... JF trolled the circumcision newsgroups for years. ... What's his interest in child sexuality? ...
    (comp.os.vms)
  • Re: J F screws up again
    ... > rec.travel.air and various other usenet newsgroups. ... How long has he been trolling? ... What makes him such a malicious troll? ... JF trolled the circumcision newsgroups for years. ...
    (comp.os.vms)
  • Re: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS - "funk49"
    ... >>>> Montreal, Quebec, Canada ... >>>> His trolling is constant, repetitious, relentless. ... JF trolled the circumcision newsgroups for years. ... >>>> doesn't troll. ...
    (comp.os.vms)
  • Re: American Airlines discloses personal data
    ... He's too busy trolling with one hand and wanking with the other: ... If you participate in the same newsgroups he does, ... What makes him such a malicious troll? ... circumcision, the sex lives of Americans... ...
    (comp.os.vms)
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