Troll Hunting

[livius drusus]

Why do some people get so het up about catching trolls? The recent GoUSA frenzy at IIDB has left me utterly perplexed. I mean, I've seen people rend a troll and eat his flesh before - compared to Genghis on JREF, for example, this latest GoUSA episode is high tea at the Ritz - but what is it that drives people to multiple complaint threads, an avalanche of post reports and countless numbers of PMs to staff over some lame right-wing rhetorical gasbag?

The definition of trolling seems to have shifted from someone posting one-liners to generate fury to anyone who posts in a manner I consider to be unproductive. It's a weird standard and I just don't get it. If I used that definition, a good three quarters of the posters I know on a good dozen boards I know would be screwed.

Besides, every board needs assholes to be interesting. It's a common enemy thing.

[pzmyers]

Besides, every board needs assholes to be interesting. It's a common enemy thing.

Uh-oh. I haven't been posting much. Have I been failing in my purpose?

[livius drusus]

Uh-oh. I haven't been posting much. Have I been failing in my purpose?
Why yes, yes you have. What kind of half-assed chimera are you anyway?

[Ymir's blood]

I avoid PD like a toxic waste dump, always have, and so only know of the person through hearsay. That being said, one of the more common complaints was that he was apparently rather insulting. Feeling insulted tends to lead to a more personal dislike, which no doubt spawned quite a bit of joy when the first ban was announced. However nothing spoils a victory celebration like finding your enemy still in your midst. That is likely to have created the flood of threads and all. It's the old lynch mob again, bound and determined not to let him 'get away' again.

That's the view from the back row, anyhow. :popcorn: <-I like this smiley!

[Farren]

I sincerely tried to engage the guy on a couple of occasions with great care not to indulge in inflammatory rhetoric and was surprised to get polite responses. I'm left with the uncomfortable feeling that he was banned because of unpopularity.

Many of the accusations against him are true, but fall in the grey zone where using them as grounds for banning opens the way to a hell of a lot of people getting banned (like "he never substantiates his arguments"). Apparently in the end he was banned because of incontrivertable proof that he was Rev Prez, but I suspect that poster was also banned on spurious justification.

[Goliath]

The title of this thread brought back memories of the ever mysterious Troll Hunter.

Ah, those were the days at the IIDB...

[livius drusus]

I avoid PD like a toxic waste dump, always have, and so only know of the person through hearsay. That being said, one of the more common complaints was that he was apparently rather insulting. Feeling insulted tends to lead to a more personal dislike, which no doubt spawned quite a bit of joy when the first ban was announced. However nothing spoils a victory celebration like finding your enemy still in your midst. That is likely to have created the flood of threads and all. It's the old lynch mob again, bound and determined not to let him 'get away' again.

That makes sense, Ymir. I suppose it just seems odd to me that a penchant for stupid, insulting generalizations would make this guy such a target for venom. IIDB is rife with idiotic generalizations; all forums are. Hell, I just made one right now!

Genghis posted pictures of a dead woman a few days after the death of the then-admin at JREF's wife and said he was going to fuck her corpse. That's trolling. Nobody needs to explain to me why people would howl for his head after such a display of viciousness. Some guy who calls liberals traitors, otoh, is just standard dumbassedness.

Maybe the mob tolerance bar lowers during election season?

That's the view from the back row, anyhow. :popcorn: <-I like this smiley!

And I'm glad you posted it. I love getting opinions from sideline observers even more than you like the popcorn smilie. :)

[livius drusus]

I sincerely tried to engage the guy on a couple of occasions with great care not to indulge in inflammatory rhetoric and was surprised to get polite responses. I'm left with the uncomfortable feeling that he was banned because of unpopularity.

Inspired by your post, I took a look through his recent efforts and at this point, I have to agree that he was far more sinned against than sinning. Maybe that's part of the frenzy in the way Ymir was suggesting: once people get into fuck you mode (whether they actually say "fuck you" or blanket it in rhetoric), they only need the most gossamer of reasons to leap into lynching mode.

Many of the accusations against him are true, but fall in the grey zone where using them as grounds for banning opens the way to a hell of a lot of people getting banned (like "he never substantiates his arguments"). Apparently in the end he was banned because of incontrivertable proof that he was Rev Prez, but I suspect that poster was also banned on spurious justification.

I think you may be right on that score too, which only adds more layers of weirdness to this particular tempest in the internet teapot. I suppose a hardcore liberal would be treated much the same one on Free Republic or some such board. :shrug2:

[dave_a]

I think you may be right on that score too, which only adds more layers of weirdness to this particular tempest in the internet teapot. I suppose a hardcore liberal would be treated much the same one on Free Republic or some such board. :shrug2:

Yup, except that IIDB plays happy host to political fuckwits like RedDave and Malachi who are so Marxist they can't resist going on the offense repeatedly against non marxist points of view. How their ultra leftist views are less offensive than ultra rightist views I personally don't see.

IIDB is not a conservative or liberal site, it is an atheist site that allows theists to dialogue. As such political conservatives should not be at an administrative disadvantage.

That is what I see, however. It's unfortunate. The conservatives often make assholes out of themselves, but it isn't necessarily because they are trolling, it's because they are unabashedly advocating radical conservatism to a group that leans left.

They may not do a good job of supporting their arguments, but neither do most of the more left leaning members. When one takes a minority viewpoint it can be very difficult to deal with the 10,000 dissenters who will attack both you and your views.

I don't post much on IIDB for this very reason. If I disagree with the mainstream thought I have have to be prepared to offer up chapter and verse to a bunch of people who really just want to be right and will ignore whatever I say anyway.

[LadyShea]

I put Rev Prez on ignore as soon as I realized he was never going to post anything of substance or answer a question on an abortion discussion. Really, the ignore feature is not that hard to work, I don't know why more people don't use it.

[Petra]

Uh-oh. I haven't been posting much. Have I been failing in my purpose?

Yes. And if you don't shape up, I'll have to smilie you to death.
:P

[Petra]

I agree.

I have never placed anyone on ignore, but I know I can if I want to.

Bumble Bee Tuna's thread in the CR at II was, I thought, in very bad form.

It amazes me how proponents of free speech like to silence those voices they disagree with. Personally, I couldn't stand GoUSA. But so what? There are many posters who are equally, or more, as insulting and aggressive as RevPrez/GoUSA was. Why are they not considered trolls?

[pzmyers]

Uh-oh. I haven't been posting much. Have I been failing in my purpose?

Yes. And if you don't shape up, I'll have to smilie you to death.
:P

Smilies...disabled. You're just going to have to use the English language, or whatever it is Kiwis write.

I suspect whole threads are about to turn into vacant swathes of white space.

[xorbie]

The thing with Rev Prez is, he did insult people. So its not like he was clean. HOWEVER. I would not have banned GoUSA or been in favor of it were he not RP (which I'm nearly 100% sure he is). The worst thing he really did was the 30 reported posts I got from him EVERY FUCKING DAY.

However, half of those were actual insults, so eh.

In summary, I don't understand the whole troll hunting thing either. Put them on ignore people, it will make all of our lives easier. It must stem from some masculinity, testorone thing or something.

[Petra]

Smilies...disabled. You're just going to have to use the English language, or whatever it is Kiwis write.

I suspect whole threads are about to turn into vacant swathes of white space.

Tch! Y'dunno what y'missin.

[viscousmemories]

From here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll):

Regarding troll-related conflicts, there are five groups into which users might be classified:

Trolls are users who actively provoke conflict.

Trollhunters (or Trollbaiters) behave according to a principle of "second strike". They do not initiate conflict, but escalate it once it begins. Often they use other trolls as an excuse for their own misbehavior, and in many cases, typecast a user as a "troll" regardless of his or her intent.

Ignorers seek to ignore the conflict, continuing with the topic at-hand. They usually express a nonchalant disdain for the troll, but do not seek actively to insult him or her. They behave like elders, issuing simple words of wisdom such as "do not feed the trolls," or other phrases that generally mean the same thing: "ignore the troublemaker and he will give up and go away."

Moderators (not in the same sense as a "system moderator") seek to resolve the conflict, making all parties happy, if possible.

Bystanders withdraw from the conflict. In particularly bad cases, they will leave the forum in disgust.

In the "attention-seeking" cases, trolls seek the conflict provided by trollhunters, whereas in the "cry for help" cases, they seek the consolance and compassion offered by moderators.
I think the above usually applies to trollhunters. But I don't know if it applies in the case of Rev Prez/GoUSA because I haven't followed that little drama. I did notice the frenzy to have GoUSA's head, though, and I can't say it surprises me to hear that the mob might've overreacted. Mobs usually do.

[livius drusus]

IIDB is not a conservative or liberal site, it is an atheist site that allows theists to dialogue. As such political conservatives should not be at an administrative disadvantage.

I've seen both of Malachi and RD get moderated - RedDave was even pested to much furor a little while ago - but I think there may be something else going on when it comes to RevPrez and GoUSA. Specifically, I think the constant battering of threads and reports created a disproportionate sense of insult, particularly after his pesting when everything he said was scrutinized for inflammatory rhetoric, and of course, most everything he said was peppered with it.

When one takes a minority viewpoint it can be very difficult to deal with the 10,000 dissenters who will attack both you and your views.

True, and this has to accentuate that disproportionate impression I mentioned above. Not only is the pressure of holding the minority viewpoint difficult to withstand, but for every 10 people you complain about, you've got 50 people complaining about you and only you. How's that going to look to the staff? Like you're a dick who dishes it out constantly but can't take it, is how, and the rest of the regulars agree. Vocally. Perhaps it's that kind of dynamic that lies dormant until the next alleged incarnation and then comes out again in tar and feather mode.

Is makes sense, I suppose, that this would be more prevalent in a time of high political dudgeon. I dunno...

One thing this makes me think about is how important it is to have a diverse membership lest we all take our opinions even more pathologically seriously than we do. Got any neo-con friends, dantonac? Even a libertarian would do. ;)

[livius drusus]

I put Rev Prez on ignore as soon as I realized he was never going to post anything of substance or answer a question on an abortion discussion. Really, the ignore feature is not that hard to work, I don't know why more people don't use it.

I agree, but when I really think about it, I agree with one major exception: myself. I don't use ignore lists and I can think of 2 recent cases when I on principle generated conflict and refused to ignore the object of my contempt.

I'm sure plenty of the individuals in the off with his head group felt they were justified by their principles as well. What principle it is is what I'd like to know.

[LadyShea]

I don't always ignore people I can't stand as anybody who has seen me talk with a certain boy with Mommy issues knows, but Rev Prez basically just answered with meaningless one liners and platitudes in my brief experience with him. I couldn't get a response worth fighting about even...I just threw my hands up and was like "Oh nevermind". Quite frustrating really.

I am sure he was similar in his political discussions...no back up for his assertions, no reasoned response to questions or points just "Blah blah blah and I am right and don't have to prove it or demonstrate it because you are stupid"

[LadyShea]

Here are some of his scintillating posts from the abortion debate. In this case he denied that the following were strawman arguments. I said that saying "I agree" to something your opponent did not say is a form of strawman. I might have been worng but it is some kind of fallacy! Basically he resorted to "Yes it is" or "No it isn't" type arguments.


Rev Prez
Agreed, so we're all up for scrapping abortion then?
(nobody said anything about scrapping abortion, this was in response to Loren saying "So teach them to fuck responsibly")

Rev Prez
In that case, why not legalize murder and teach people to kill responsibly?
(dunno what this means)


In response to my posting links to thousands of kids waiting to be adopted after his assertion that there are no "surplus" children waiting to be adopted he states "They are unprocessed children." ...I do not have the slightest idea what that means.

wack abortion discussion (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=93031&page=3&pp=25&highlight=rev+prez)

[Farren]

In response to my posting links to thousands of kids waiting to be adopted after his assertion that there are no "surplus" children waiting to be adopted he states "They are unprocessed children." ...I do not have the slightest idea what that means.

wack abortion discussion (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=93031&page=3&pp=25&highlight=rev+prez)

He probably only eats them processed :D

Seriously, though, I often find myself wondering why people even take the bait when someones just flamebaiting. I'm sometimes filled with the desire to PM every other person on the thread with DNFTT messages (because you can't post them in public) and the rationale that people who get ignored (not via the ignore feature, just not responded to) will either shape up or ship out.

After all, the main reason for making known their vicious little views is the pleasure of seeing other posters getting pissed about it.

[HelenM]

I don't post much on IIDB for this very reason. If I disagree with the mainstream thought I have have to be prepared to offer up chapter and verse to a bunch of people who really just want to be right and will ignore whatever I say anyway.

"chapter and verse" - lol. Yeah, they don't have much tolerance for chapter and verse at IIDB. :D

Helen

[livius drusus]

In response to my posting links to thousands of kids waiting to be adopted after his assertion that there are no "surplus" children waiting to be adopted he states "They are unprocessed children." ...I do not have the slightest idea what that means.

wack abortion discussion (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=93031&page=3&pp=25&highlight=rev+prez)

He probably only eats them processed :D

That was my first thought too! :giggle:

Seriously, though, I often find myself wondering why people even take the bait when someones just flamebaiting. I'm sometimes filled with the desire to PM every other person on the thread with DNFTT messages (because you can't post them in public) and the rationale that people who get ignored (not via the ignore feature, just not responded to) will either shape up or ship out.

Was he just flamebaiting though? How can we tell flamebait from passionately held unpopular opinions and/or shitty argumentation skills? I know well that impulse to holler at everyone to quite playing into a troll's hands, but I suspect that's the very same impulse that drives people to report everything, make complaint threads, PM the staff: To expose a scam.

After all, the main reason for making known their vicious little views is the pleasure of seeing other posters getting pissed about it.

Some people, sure, but it seems to me people leap very easily to a baiting conclusion. Sometimes people just believe fucked up shit and express it in a fucked up way. Unless it's personal and someone is out to get you where you live, why call for his head?

[Farren]

Seriously, though, I often find myself wondering why people even take the bait when someones just flamebaiting. I'm sometimes filled with the desire to PM every other person on the thread with DNFTT messages (because you can't post them in public) and the rationale that people who get ignored (not via the ignore feature, just not responded to) will either shape up or ship out.

Was he just flamebaiting though? How can we tell flamebait from passionately held unpopular opinions and/or shitty argumentation skills? I know well that impulse to holler at everyone to quite playing into a troll's hands, but I suspect that's the very same impulse that drives people to report everything, make complaint threads, PM the staff: To expose a scam.

After all, the main reason for making known their vicious little views is the pleasure of seeing other posters getting pissed about it.

Some people, sure, but it seems to me people leap very easily to a baiting conclusion. Sometimes people just believe fucked up shit and express it in a fucked up way. Unless it's personal and someone is out to get you where you live, why call for his head?

Yeah I agree. I suppose I didn't mean deliberately flamebaiting so much as being so unwilling to actually discuss things that all you do is tell other people how much you disagree with them and refuse to substantiate anything you say, which solicits a peculiar kind of outrage.

Take for example, the continual bickering between linox and Sauron. Despite the fact that they're diametrically opposed on Israel much of the resulting heat is contained within the confines of the discussion and doesn't end up spreading to the complaints forum. I submit that the main reason is that each of the protagonists at least attempt to defend their respective positions through logic and facts, however succesful or unsuccessful they are at it.

GoUSA, however, is perfectly happy to tell outright lies and refuse to substantiate them, like saying there is a "well documented strategic relationship" between Saddam's Iraq and Al Qaeda and "Saddam provided training to Al Qaeda members" when even the other more persistent Bush apologists on the same forum restrict themselves to more cautious obfuscations like "evidence of contact".

The naked ignorance and/or deception, refusal to back up claims, tortured logic, textbook talking-points and so on massively reduces the entire intellectual level of discussion and debate which is frustrating. As fierce as some discussions in PD are, I feel many of the regulars there are reasonably bright sparks and its horrible to watch things go down the toilet because of one ignoramus.

As I indicated earlier, I'm opposed to practicing vague and nebulous standards in order to maintain such a level. Its just stupid. That's why I said at times I'm tempted to just PM everyone and say don't play with the poison intellectual dwarf and it will go away. Not out of a dissatisfaction with moderation or the belief that someone is simply trolling.

There's little to be gained from discussing issues with someone like that in any event.

[xorbie]

Actually Farren, I think some people are starting to ignore pfcgreene. Or at least not taking him seriously enough to respond to his "NONONONONOONO. I am right you are wrong." posts that are just sooooo blatantly wrong.

[Petra]

I actually find that "NONONO" thing kinda cute.

Anyway, those like pfcgreene and whaddad, or whatever his name is, are not worth worrying about. Their postings do not even need vigorous refutation, as anyone reading them - no matter which side of the ideological fence they are sitting on - will see them as simplistic nonsense, anyway.


[off topic]has anyone else had trouble with IIDB not loading properly, etc, lately? [/off topic]

[JoeP]

[off topic]has anyone else had trouble with IIDB not loading properly, etc, lately? [/off topic]
Working fine here (when you allow for the piece of wet string across the Atlantic that connects SA to the rest of the world).

[seebs]

What offends me is that, as a long-time Kibologist, I feel that modern "trolls" are a degradation of, and an insult to, a real art form.

The work that goes into a long post arguing that a 15-digit number whose last digit is 6 "must be prime" is real work, and posts like that can contribute to and build up the community they're in.

[Clutch Munny]

While not disputing that GoUSA was good for laughs, helpfully illustrated the intellectual degeneracy of the views he espoused, and did not merit banning for anything written under that name, I also think y'all are missing some pretty important context.

The comparison merely to a radical liberal poster on a conservative site is not apt, nor is it very useful to characterize the problem simply as GoUSA's being a staunch conservative on a board with many non-staunch-conservatives. Bush and Cheney and the war in Iraq have been defended often at IIDB without (many) charges of troll-hood being levelled -- by lamma, by Aerion, by layman, and by Loren Pechtel. Each has come in for some hard words, but since each was prepared to give (silly and sophomoric, but still) arguments for their views, they were not given the GoUSA treatment.

What made him a troll was not the unpopularity of his crazy views -- and I'm not politically axe-grinding when I say "crazy views"; I mean things like his denial of the existence of Palestinians, and use of the term "Greater Syrians" for those displaced by the creation of the state of Israel. He was a troll because of his complete lack of interest in defending these crazy views, and his insistence on repeating them. This does not justify the frenzy, but it is also very different from just "He was a conservative on a non-conservative board".

The other bit of context to bear in mind is that some folks are well and truly on a hair-trigger -- this justifiably -- because they see their entire nation being destroyed before their very eyes by Bush-supporters whose actions seem unintelligible in light of observable facts. When a Bush-supporter shows up and is ostentatiously contemptuous of facts, arguments, evidence, and in general the basic units of intellectual exchange, I think you'll see that anger and fear and bewilderment come to the fore. Again, it's not just a locally unpopular view presented without argument; it's a locally unpopular view that is destroying America and plunging the world into chaos, presented without argument. Maybe we could find some motivation besides straight-up intolerance of dissent to explain what happened.

[Petra]

Damn, you're sensible.

[LadyShea]

pfcgreene says:

I am a proud republican and a bush supporter.

You all that have responded to any of my responses do not know what you are talking about.


I think Clutch is right, as usual, it's not that he's a Bush supporter necessarily, it's that he makes no argument...even a silly one

[Clutch Munny]

Damn, you're sensible.


Oh, yes. Did I forget to explain my plan to eradicate poverty and lovelessness all at once, by making hugs and kisses into a global currency?

[Petra]

Damn, you're sensible.


Oh, yes. Did I forget to explain my plan to eradicate poverty and lovelessness all at once, by making hugs and kisses into a global currency?

Clutch, please run for President in 2008.

Please.


:yup:

[Petra]

pfcgreene says:

I am a proud republican and a bush supporter.

You all that have responded to any of my responses do not know what you are talking about.


I think Clutch is right, as usual, it's not that he's a Bush supporter necessarily, it's that he makes no argument...even a silly one


I really think the guy, if he did serve in Nam, is brain damaged. Really, I'm not trying to be mean here, I'm serious - as having suffered a head injury. I kinda feel sorry for him.

Hell, I even feel sorry for him if he's a great-big-faking-it troll.

[Clutch Munny]

Alas, luna, as one born in Wetaskiwin, Alberta (http://city.wetaskiwin.ab.ca/), I am not eligible to be P of the USA.

Besides, I'm plenty happy here in Canada, shouting "Timber!" as the log cabins fall and so forth.

(A line stolen, by the way, from Donald Jack's screamingly funny Three Cheers for Me, the story of a hapless but lucky Canadian doofus who goes off to WWI and becomes a fighter ace.)

[livius drusus]

What offends me is that, as a long-time Kibologist, I feel that modern "trolls" are a degradation of, and an insult to, a real art form.

The work that goes into a long post arguing that a 15-digit number whose last digit is 6 "must be prime" is real work, and posts like that can contribute to and build up the community they're in.

I'm sorry seebs. I have no idea what you're talking about but I really think I'd like to. Could you perhaps expand on this post?

[livius drusus]

The comparison merely to a radical liberal poster on a conservative site is not apt, nor is it very useful to characterize the problem simply as GoUSA's being a staunch conservative on a board with many non-staunch-conservatives.

I don't characterize the problem so simply, but I think it is certainly a factor in the passion he engenders. The same goes for comparisons involving radical lefties on a righty board: it would only be mere if it were the sole explanation, and I don't think anyone here has suggested such an oversimplified equation.

What made him a troll was not the unpopularity of his crazy views -- and I'm not politically axe-grinding when I say "crazy views"; I mean things like his denial of the existence of Palestinians, and use of the term "Greater Syrians" for those displaced by the creation of the state of Israel. He was a troll because of his complete lack of interest in defending these crazy views, and his insistence on repeating them. This does not justify the frenzy, but it is also very different from just "He was a conservative on a non-conservative board".

Again, I'm not sure who was suggesting that his being a conservative on a non-conservative board was the sole cause of the frenzy. It has to be a factor, though, because I really don't think some fringe weirdo who repeated some communist propaganda crap without defending it would be driven out of PD and then IIDB on a rail, complete with celebratory yay he's banned threads.

Again, it's not just a locally unpopular view presented without argument; it's a locally unpopular view that is destroying America and plunging the world into chaos, presented without argument.

That makes sense. It certainly comes closer to explaining the intensity of the hatred, that personal vehemence which is so perplexing to me when there aren't any actual personal assaults to be found.

Maybe we could find some motivation besides straight-up intolerance of dissent to explain what happened.

This is what the arguments in this thread boil down to you for you? Because I've found them somewhat more nuanced and wider-ranging than that. Then again, I may be confusing what's in my head with what's on the screen.

[Clutch Munny]

Maybe we could find some motivation besides straight-up intolerance of dissent to explain what happened.

This is what the arguments in this thread boil down to you for you?


No ma'am. You yourself alluded to levels of weirdness, and mentioned the election season as a contributing factor. Farren anticipated some of my reasoning by giving a nice example of how Sauron and linox manage to hate each other without complaint threads and trollery charges. Lady Shea anticipated some, too. I was not disagreeing with the thread as a whole, though that too may have been clearer in my head than in what I wrote. The thread as a whole has plenty of subtlety, and I should have said that I realize as much.

But there were a good few reactions that struck me as over-simplified diagnoses, or analogies that missed the mark -- for reasons I've sketched -- or were straight-up questions. F'r instance:

I'm left with the uncomfortable feeling that he was banned because of unpopularity.
--
I suppose a hardcore liberal would be treated much the same one on Free Republic or some such board.
--
How their ultra leftist views are less offensive than ultra rightist views I personally don't see.
--
The conservatives often make assholes out of themselves, but it isn't necessarily because they are trolling, it's because they are unabashedly advocating radical conservatism to a group that leans left.

They may not do a good job of supporting their arguments, but neither do most of the more left leaning members. When one takes a minority viewpoint it can be very difficult to deal with the 10,000 dissenters who will attack both you and your views.
--
It amazes me how proponents of free speech like to silence those voices they disagree with. Personally, I couldn't stand GoUSA. But so what? There are many posters who are equally, or more, as insulting and aggressive as RevPrez/GoUSA was. Why are they not considered trolls?

I took myself to be addressing, by turns, these and similar remarks, broadly by arguing that we have to take more context into account if we're gonna compare like with like. There is, I think, a bit too much quick movement from "It's an over-reaction of some sort" to "It's intolerance of opposing viewpoint/free speech/unpopular ideas".

Now, can't we just swap $50 worth of my new currency?

[livius drusus]

Now, can't we just swap $50 worth of my new currency?

Oh well, I'd be up for that even if we disagreed most vehemently. Now that it's all agreement and understanding, I say we bump it up to a $100. Canadian, no less.

[Clutch Munny]

Now, can't we just swap $50 worth of my new currency?

Oh well, I'd be up for that even if we disagreed most vehemently. Now that it's all agreement and understanding, I say we bump it up to a $100. Canadian, no less.


Great. Into which pocket shall I put it?

[livius drusus]

Now, can't we just swap $50 worth of my new currency?

Oh well, I'd be up for that even if we disagreed most vehemently. Now that it's all agreement and understanding, I say we bump it up to a $100. Canadian, no less.


Great. Into which pocket shall I put it?

They're all open, so just pick your favorite. And put some body English into it, wouldya?

[seebs]

What offends me is that, as a long-time Kibologist, I feel that modern "trolls" are a degradation of, and an insult to, a real art form.

The work that goes into a long post arguing that a 15-digit number whose last digit is 6 "must be prime" is real work, and posts like that can contribute to and build up the community they're in.

I'm sorry seebs. I have no idea what you're talking about but I really think I'd like to. Could you perhaps expand on this post?

Okay. So... Not all trolls are looking for just any response. One of the great recreations of Usenet is a specific kind of troll, the goal of which is to get a very specific response.

That response is that at least one person thinks you're a total idiot, and everyone else thinks that person is a total idiot to think so.

The goal of these trolls is to make claims that are not just stupid, but carefully crafted so that, with a little thought, it's obvious that no one could actually be stupid in that particular way -- that, to make that mistake, it would be necessary that you know better.

There's also the more mundane attempts to simply convince people of false claims. But not plausible false claims. Hilarious ones.

Sample troll conversations:

"Of course ATMs print money. You think they're going to put $40,000 in cash in a machine, when it could just have some blank paper and a couple of metal plates?"

"That's ridiculous. The plates are worth too much for them to do that."

"No, it's true. I used to work in a bank, and one of my jobs was to change the rolls of paper in the ATM."

"Those are for the receipts, not the money, dipshit."

"Don't be stupid, the receipts are pre-printed."

Part of the fun of trolling is managing a series of responses, each more ludicrous than the last. For instance, having claimed that "a solar eclipse is when the sun passes between the earth and the moon, casting the moon into a deep shadow", one could go on to suggest that, if the earth weren't spinning, the moon would fall. When someone says "first he wants us burned to a crisp, now he wants the moon to fall", the correct response is "I don't *want* the moon to fall. I just hope everyone in the U. S. doesn't drive east at the same time."

One can have endless fun stacking ludicrous claims on top of each other, and the thing is, some people will keep correcting even if you offer lots of hints that you're doing it on purpose.

I should add my more recent April Fools' jokes to my web page. I do a lot of these things for April Fools' day. One of my more successful ones, I think, was a post to the Mac newsgroups in which I wrote a 2-page lament about how complicated and confusing OS X was. "I got an error saying my disk was full. I don't want to have to go to college to learn what a disk is, I just want to know whether my files copied!" Then, after about two pages of complaints about how these "error messages" are confusing and take away from the simplicity of the Mac experience, I continued... "And finally, it seems as though the shared library loading mechanism doesn't have a versioning system to protect against potential API creep; what do we do if we ever need two subtly different versions of a library, and older applications will have problems running with the newer version? I think they really ought to have done something more like the standard Linux and BSD ld.so structure." Only I added more technical details.

:)

[JoeP]

That kind of troll. Now I understand why ATMs actually print money.

Still having memories of hikes in the mountains (last week), I'm still in the frame of mind that your kind of troll is also modern. Real trolls hide under bridges ... rickety wooden ones, not that far from the Nature Conservancy Service hut ... and demand treasure before allowing you to cross.

The most regrettable difference between modern and real trolls is that they don't turn to stone when exposed to sunlight. They just become more trollish.

[livius drusus]

The breadth of troll history never ceases to amaze me. When I read something like this:

"Of course ATMs print money. You think they're going to put $40,000 in cash in a machine, when it could just have some blank paper and a couple of metal plates?"

"That's ridiculous. The plates are worth too much for them to do that."

"No, it's true. I used to work in a bank, and one of my jobs was to change the rolls of paper in the ATM."

"Those are for the receipts, not the money, dipshit."

"Don't be stupid, the receipts are pre-printed."

I understand why the ol' Usenet pros curl their lips at modern troll variants. It's brilliant, seebs, as are the falling moon scenario and your gleeful needling of the poor Mac types. What kinds of responses did you get on that, btw? Did people get mad or try to convince you of the error of your ways or just laugh and laugh?

Oh, and I looked up Kibologist. :bow:

[viscousmemories]

Oh, and I looked up Kibologist. :bow:
Hey, I just did too and lookie what I found:

In addition to "Leader Kibo", other Kibologists have developed cult followings of their own from their unusual and humorous writing, the most prominent of these include Stephen Pacheco[?], Lisa Pea[?] (Elizabeth Rea Higgins), Matt McIrvin[?], Stephen Will Tanner[?], Stefan Kapusniak[?], Joe Bay[?], and E. Teflon Piano[?].

Recognize anyone? :P

[livius drusus]

Oh. My. GOD! We're among web nerd royalty, it seems.

[Roland98]

No WAY! I want my own cult!

[seebs]

I understand why the ol' Usenet pros curl their lips at modern troll variants. It's brilliant, seebs, as are the falling moon scenario and your gleeful needling of the poor Mac types. What kinds of responses did you get on that, btw? Did people get mad or try to convince you of the error of your ways or just laugh and laugh?

Oh, and I looked up Kibologist. :bow:

I got a couple of funny responses on the Mac one.

http://www.seebs.net/humor/af/

The best responses may have been the ones to the "Superbowl is a hoax" thing.

I don't know if it's up, but I did one once asking how much water fish need. "Should it cover the gills entirely? They seem a lot more active when it doesn't." I got a charming letter that maybe my children and I weren't quite ready for the responsibilities of pet ownership.

[seebs]

And yes, IIDB's lisarea is a Kibologist. We're everywhere.

[Goliath]

The best responses may have been the ones to the "Superbowl is a hoax" thing.


Why of course it's not a hoax! I saw one once! It was beautiful and majestic....then a little gross when it swooped down to pick up a field mouse and later puke up its bones, but hey..nothing's perfect, right? :P

[lisarea]

What offends me is that, as a long-time Kibologist, I feel that modern "trolls" are a degradation of, and an insult to, a real art form.

Seebs, you adorable, wonderful man.

I stopped tilting at this windmill some time ago. Kids these days, they don't know from nothing. I give up. But now you done made me all nostalgic.

Real trolling was an art, in the grand tradition of Socrates, Richard III, Andy Kaufman, and Ted Frank.

Ted Frank. The master of the modern troll, Ted Frank, wrote up troll scoring guidelines once upon a time, allowing extra points for things like including the word 'troll' in troll posts, rebounding from being outed, making the biggest and diverse crossposts while still being on-topic for every newsgroup, and things like that. I think. Sometimes I forget stuff.

Trolling in the Mensa newsgroups barely counted at all. Like hunting deer with a salt lick and a floodlight. Mensans were the bunny slopes. The shallow end. Trolling wheels.

Someday, I want to tell the story about the witches and the werewolves and the wrestlers. But not today, cause I'm looking for a job.

PS: Kibo is a hack. Stop pretending he's anything but a scared-of-girls diaperbaby.

PPS: He's in love with me. Stupid Kibo.

[viscousmemories]

I got a couple of funny responses on the Mac one.

http://www.seebs.net/humor/af/
I loved the pet cloning and oil/water mix for the fish. :biglaugh:

I wish I could see some of the responses.

[seebs]

Go to Google Groups, they have the threads. The oil/water one got EXCELLENT responses.

[viscousmemories]

Go to Google Groups, they have the threads. The oil/water one got EXCELLENT responses.
You're right, seebs. Those responses were pretty funny.

I never got into Usenet for some reason. I've been on the Internet daily since 1994 (mostly playing a MUD and surfing the web), and have used Usenet for, um, well acquistion of binaries let's say, but have never had a discussion about anything there. I've just never really understood the way the threading works. Same problem I have with Slashdot, actually. I participated in a Yahoo! group called "agnostics corner" for a couple weeks once, but that was all until I found IIDB. I just find it infinitely easier to find and re-find topics in this format.

[JoeP]

have used Usenet for, um, well acquistion of binaries let's say,
:D So, you're into binography? :innocent:

[viscousmemories]

have used Usenet for, um, well acquistion of binaries let's say,
:D So, you're into binography? :innocent:
Yeah, yeah... that's the ticket! :stooges:

[beyelzu]

There are many posters who are equally, or more, as insulting and aggressive as RevPrez/GoUSA was. Why are they not considered trolls?
Cuz I have a winning disposition.





:D


actually, if being aggressive is all it takes to get banned at ii these days, my days are numbered.

[Corona688]

Go to Google Groups, they have the threads. The oil/water one got EXCELLENT responses.
You're right, seebs. Those responses were pretty funny.

I never got into Usenet for some reason. I've been on the Internet daily since 1994 (mostly playing a MUD and surfing the web), and have used Usenet for, um, well acquistion of binaries let's say, but have never had a discussion about anything there. I've just never really understood the way the threading works. Right on the money, usenet has always struck me as a pretty ugly system. The way it copies and forwards messages(or fails to) is about as close as you can get to sneakernet over a land-line. It's nearly as old as the internet itself, and far less elegant.

[lisarea]

Right on the money, usenet has always struck me as a pretty ugly system. The way it copies and forwards messages(or fails to) is about as close as you can get to sneakernet over a land-line. It's nearly as old as the internet itself, and far less elegant.

FWIW, your newsreader is largely responsible for the threading and the layout.

OTOH (I'm trying to start all of my new paragraphs with annoying initialisms), I know that part of the reason it doesn't bug me is that I'm used to it. Until the mid-90s or so, there weren't any web-based discussion forums to compare it to, so it seemed fine at the time.

YMMV, but in my experience, you just get used to it after a while.

[wei yau]

Why do some people get so het up about catching trolls? The recent GoUSA frenzy at IIDB has left me utterly perplexed. I mean, I've seen people rend a troll and eat his flesh before - compared to Genghis on JREF, for example, this latest GoUSA episode is high tea at the Ritz - but what is it that drives people to multiple complaint threads, an avalanche of post reports and countless numbers of PMs to staff over some lame right-wing rhetorical gasbag?

The definition of trolling seems to have shifted from someone posting one-liners to generate fury to anyone who posts in a manner I consider to be unproductive. It's a weird standard and I just don't get it. If I used that definition, a good three quarters of the posters I know on a good dozen boards I know would be screwed.

Besides, every board needs assholes to be interesting. It's a common enemy thing.

Well, it looks like some things just won't stay dead.

Meet Dirty Adan (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?p=1895325#post1895325)

I know what I think of the poster, but I keep it to myself. I have to admit, that most of the PD posters seem to be taking it better than they did with the GoUSA incident. However, it seems that now it's up to the moderators and admins.

I don't envy their job.

Posters like Dirty Adan are why I sought refuge here. I almost feel bad for soiling this place with that link, but I can't sleep...too worked up...and needed to vent somewhere.

Frankly, I think the best thing to do would be to simply ignore the poster. I understand that a lot of what he posts appear to be deliberately provocative, but how hard is it to simply step away from the keyboard and take a couple of deep breaths?

Still, some seem willing to tangle with him, that's their choice.

I just feel for the mods and admins, this poster is going to call their objectivity into question and make a big stink. Shame really, PD was getting better for a long while there.

[beyelzu]

Why do some people get so het up about catching trolls? The recent GoUSA frenzy at IIDB has left me utterly perplexed. I mean, I've seen people rend a troll and eat his flesh before - compared to Genghis on JREF, for example, this latest GoUSA episode is high tea at the Ritz - but what is it that drives people to multiple complaint threads, an avalanche of post reports and countless numbers of PMs to staff over some lame right-wing rhetorical gasbag?

The definition of trolling seems to have shifted from someone posting one-liners to generate fury to anyone who posts in a manner I consider to be unproductive. It's a weird standard and I just don't get it. If I used that definition, a good three quarters of the posters I know on a good dozen boards I know would be screwed.

Besides, every board needs assholes to be interesting. It's a common enemy thing.

Well, it looks like some things just won't stay dead.

Meet Dirty Adan (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?p=1895325#post1895325)

I know what I think of the poster, but I keep it to myself. I have to admit, that most of the PD posters seem to be taking it better than they did with the GoUSA incident. However, it seems that now it's up to the moderators and admins.

I don't envy their job.

Posters like Dirty Adan are why I sought refuge here. I almost feel bad for soiling this place with that link, but I can't sleep...too worked up...and needed to vent somewhere.

Frankly, I think the best thing to do would be to simply ignore the poster. I understand that a lot of what he posts appear to be deliberately provocative, but how hard is it to simply step away from the keyboard and take a couple of deep breaths?

Still, some seem willing to tangle with him, that's their choice.

I just feel for the mods and admins, this poster is going to call their objectivity into question and make a big stink. Shame really, PD was getting better for a long while there.


I dont know I have always found pd to be a snake pit and enjoyed it for that. hell, even the "respected veteran" posters trade jabs and attacks with fiery vengeance.

I am bothered by a recent trend, I have been edited twice there in the last couple of months and I dont make personal insults.

I called someone's statement fucking stupid and that got edited by loren and I cant recall the other one.