Trolling: What's it All About

As my regular readers may have noticed, this blog has been plagued by a troll (possibly two, if the latter person is a real person, but I have my doubts).

I wanted to tell you a bit about trolls  and how to recognise them.  For a really in-depth definition, the Wikipedia one on (Internet) Trolls is pretty good.  Click here to read it.

What I want to bring up is that as annoying and confrontational internet trolls are, letting them stop or disrupt a discussion is exactly what they want.  They crave attention, and are unable to get it in the regular healthy ways that you and I do, so they stir up trouble and are generally just irritating to all others involved.

I really believe that the best way to deal with trolls is a two part action.  Firstly, do not change your behaviour in your blog, or other forum that the troll has turned up.  Ignore them as best as possible, and keep to your normal activities on that site/application.  

But secondly, when you do spot a troll, it's a good idea to call them out if nobody has before.  Because once they realise that people can see through them, they tend to just go away.

I choose not to delete comments that trolls leave because it outs them to the internet community.  But if it is particularly offensive or upsetting, it is ok to delete it, that's up to you.  And don't worry if they crap on about how you're censoring them, it's your blog, if someone is behaving like a troll you have every right to delete that.

Unfortunately, as much as we pick up on trolls behaviour, they find new ways to be a pain in the arse.  For every new application there is out there, they find a new way to troll.  So it's something that genuine people do need to keep clear about, and share information when they do suffer troll behaviour.

If you are not sure if you are dealing with a troll, a few questions to ask are:

• Do the posts this person makes stir up the community un-necessarily?
  
• Does this person hold double standards? (ie, accusing others of name calling but being name callers themselves, spouting their opinion loudly but not liking it when they are challenged or debated with etc)
  
• Does this person try to get other people "on their side"?
  
• Have a look at their account profile and others connected to them.  Do they look fake, lack detail or depth, or seem to come from the same source?
  
• Take a look at spelling, punctuation and grammar.  Trolls are more likely to have bad writing skills.
  
• Trolls are rarely rational.  They contradict themselves, throw insults, swear, ridicule people, and generally create a bad atmosphere.  Someone who is sharing a valid point is rational and balanced about it.  Trolls are not.  Trolls often end their posts with things like "HA!  I told you so!" like small children would.
  
• And most of all, trolls disappear when the subject is positive, fun or happy.  They like creating anger and misery.

I just found this rather interesting article from the eCommerce Journal, which gives a  nice simple explanation of trolling behaviour and the type of trolls you will find.

Most of all, I guess the wisest advice is:

Black Sheep are Still Sheep

Most of you know that I am an avid Twitter user, or "tweeter" in the lingo of Twitter.  I've been on it for a year or something, I don't remember because I joined up and then kind of ignored it for a bit, then when a friend got into it, I started to use it more and was hooked.  I love how it opens up new worlds to me, brings me new and interesting things to explore and I meet lots of cool new people.  Both on Twitter and in real life, since I've been going along to the BTUB (Brisbane Twitter User Brigade) get togethers.

Even if you're not a Twitter user, you probably have heard about the whole business with Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk) setting a challenge to beat CNN to 1 million followers.  At first it started out as a fun thing he did, saying he was going to ding dong ditch Ted Turner if he got to a million followers before CNN, but it took off so huge (mostly because people love the idea of Ted Turner being ding dong ditched) Ashton realised the power of what he was doing, and decided to take it somewhere productive.  Not only did he put a philanthropic purpose behind it (offered to buy 10,000 mosquito nets for a charity) but also he realised the change in communication that the internet and sites like Twitter can have, because one person (ie Ashton himself) can have as much of a voice as a whole media network, CNN.

It went very huge very quickly, and then Oprah asked to interview Ashton, and she joined Twitter, and of course now it's just exploding all over the place.

This draws me to the purpose of this particular blog post.  With the whole Ashton/CNN/Oprah thing, there has been a lot of talk on Twitter over the past 48 hours about how Twitter now sucks and people are leaving because Oprah is on it, and some loser posted a blog about how yesterday was "the day that Twitter died" and so on.

I couldn't believe it, and to be honest, I still can't.  I can't get over how some people are so pretentious they would actually stop using a site/service because it has gone "mainstream".  I can't get over how people actually think that Twitter is going to hell in a handbasket just because the popular media is interested in it, and a lot more people are joining it.

Admittedly, because of the massive influx of new users, there have been some technical hitches with Twitter, mostly time lags in the posts or "tweets" showing up, and a few times it has been over capacity and stuff, but mostly it's holding up alright.

I do think that the extra activity on Twitter is only going to work in all users favour technologically speaking, because it gives the folks behind Twitter the clout (and finances) to upgrade their service.  The more that use it, the more successful the service is and the better they can offer.

It amazes me that there are people who leave a service claiming it has been "overrun with sheep", yet their behaviour is just as sheep like as anyone else's.  They're the ones who will only be involved if something isn't mainstream.  They're the ones making an exodus when something changes.

I guess these are the same people who announce that they only listen to "alternative" music.  Alternative to what?  Oh I get you, you only listen to music that isn't popular.  Music that is "cool".  Right.  And who decides that it meets the "alternative" criteria?

Look, there is no-one holding a gun to anyone's head forcing them to follow Oprah or Ashton or anyone else.  If you're not into the whole pop culture thing, if mainstream bothers you, then don't follow those people.  That's the beauty of Twitter and the internet in general.  You choose what interests you, and you spend your time using those things, reading those blogs, following those tweeters, etc.  If you want to be all edgy and alternative, then hang out with other people you consider edgy and alternative.

Don't hang shit on people who have different taste to you, because that's all it is, their taste.  Nobody should ever apologise for their taste in music, movies, television, books, internet stuff, whatever.  What you like, and what interests you is yours and nobody can tell you it's less worthy than anyone else's.  Besides, with the internet, you will ALWAYS find someone else who is interested in the same stuff as you, regardless of how obscure your taste is.

Follow me on Twitter.

I Don't Need Filtration Thank You!

So you know the Australian Government want to put a filter on the Australian internet right? Supposedly it's there to stop kiddie porn being available to the Australian public, but as there are all kinds of ways to circumvent filters (people in China do it all the time), it won't work because those people who want to partake in child pornography are crafty bastards right.

Instead, it will make YOUR internet painfully slow, block sites that are legitimate because they have one naughty word in them and besides, this ISN'T China anyway. This is Australia, a free country where the laws against kiddie porn need to be tougher and more comprehensive, not a filter put on the rest of us law abiding citizens accessing the internet that WE pay for with OUR money...

So here's something quick and easy you can do to help. Sign this e-petition. You don't even have to leave my blog to do it.



And if you blog, or Facebook, or anything else, spread the word. Cos trust me, your internet access will suck even worse than it does now if this goes ahead, and it won't even have solved the problem of child pornography.