Obviously not on the Straight Dope, of course, but have you ever gone a’ trolling elsewhere on the internet? Is there anyone here who regularly participates in trolling for fun and leisure? What’s the furthest you’ve gone?
I’m not, and never have been, a troll. I don’t understand the appeal. I was hoping someone might fight my ignorance on this matter.
Thanks,
Christy
p.s. Mods, I’m guessing this is allowed because it discusses trolling on other boards, but if not, I apologize.
Yes.
When I was in university, some friends and I watched a certain soap opera that shall remain nameless. We regarded it as a comedy but were nevertheless enthralled by the plot twists. Well…along comes exam time and we miss a pivotal twist. I hopped on the 'net to find out what exactly happened and discovered a huge message board devoted to this show. I popped in, got the info and left. Kept coming back out of morbid curiousity…I couldn’t believe how passionately the show was discussed. I signed up and voiced an opinion here and there for kicks. One day, someone shat upon my little post. They missed the point entirely, used gargage arguments and I didn’t care for it. So, egged on by my friends I went into threads and bashed fan favourite characters, looked up spoilers and posted them in non spoiler threads, generaly assholery. I used a lot of crap arguments and changed sides in the fights and watched it spin.
It was really funny at first. It got old real fast. I think it went on for less than a week. Haven’t done it since. I am much older and wiser now. With much less time to spend so frivolously.
Hmm…deliberately? No.
Back on my days on alt.atheism, though, I was known not to trim cross posts unless it suited me. Some dork form alt.religion.whatever wants to crosspost into the atheist group and be a dickhead? Gonna get smacked down in front of his peer group, I’m afraid.
I might be able to answer this question if I thought that the word “trolling” actually had a definition that touched on specific behavior and related it to principles of internet ethics and etiquette. Regrettably, the very common word has no such definition; rather it is a performative utterance, on par with saying some is “being an asshole.” Like “trolling” this latter phrase doesn’t mean anything in particular (try to define, completely and non-circularly, what is it to “be an asshole” – you cannot), rather it is used to do something, namely dismiss arguments that one is not capable of meeting with reason and evidence.
It’s rare, but there are times here when I’ve tried to be a dick.
But…the other poster started it!
Nope. The dope is pretty much the only place I really post.
Once. On some fish board. Jester had this gigantic toy fish and we both posted about it and got summarily banned. I wonder if he remembers.
Dope (and Giraffe/Domebo) is the only place I really post, but I have been accused of trolling here. I can’t say that I deny it, because I was actually having so much fun in the thread that I was accused of trolling in. And I do like all of the posters that people accuse of trollery, I hate to see interesting posters banned for ‘trolling’, I love the ‘trainwreck’ and drama threads, and like Kimmy, I would like to see trollery defined, officially; because the time that I was accused of trolling, I was posting only things that I actually believed.
Back in the stone ages when Yahoo chat was cool. Some people I regularly chatted with would travel from room to room, typing quack! quack! so much that no one else could follow a conversation.
Before the interweb, my brother used troll the Open Line on the local newspaper. The deal was any dumbass could call into the newspaper and anonymously leave comments that would then get printed. No self-respecting newspaper would do this, but our paper did.
It became so outrageous that they canceled the open line not long after.
He also wrote fake obits and false news items to see if he could get published. And he usually did.
Omegle.com. Not really trolling in the sense of pissing people off and being a jerk so much as in the sense of making increasingly outrageous claims to wind people up. I love doing this but usually don’t get good results, except the one evening when I went off on an inspired ramble about my deep-seated love for electronic/disco producer Giorgio Moroder and how I desired to knit him socks. Whoever I was talking to was completely strung along, believing I was some sort of disturbed naive individual with a serious foot fetish, for quite some time before spotting me as a troll.
Only once… a long time ago on a different message board. It was on snopes and they had just changed formats and there was a “secret” message board for regulars. I don’t even remember the details, but I thought I was being so obvious about how I posted my dad’s credit card number somewhere etc. that I thought it would be obvious I was joking, but lots of people responded… even some regulars who obviously weren’t paying attention to the other board. It really didn’t have a point other than people responding to a really dumb “kid” who didn’t get the whole internet deal. I believe there are even a couple of posters here that may have been involved at the time, and I think they were even calling me out as a troll at the time (TDN, Tengu… I’m looking at you). I intended no harm, and I doubt it was even memorable to others other than it was fun for me to see how far I could exagerate things and still get people to respond with “I think you’re kidding… but…”
there was a snopes secret board?! Why did I not know about this?
I’m a disabilty rights activist and have been banned (numerous times) from a Forum I Shall Not Name for “trolling” The adminstrator was a NAZI! Her site was almost like an advertisment for CIs and oral only education. She would attack ANYONE who suggested that maybe it might be a good idea to pursue a “full toolbox” approach (ASL AND speech) But when a parent of a newly dx kid would post she’d be ALL OVER them for chosing oral only and oral schools. Hell…I wasn’t the only one…a lot of other people thought that she was a Nazi too.
The good news is that that site is DEAD. I still lurk there, just in case a new parent signs on so I can direct them to unbiased support info.
Actually, I remember a friend and I used to crash a CI chat hosted by this particualr site. Again…this chat was basicly run by people who could ONLY talk about CIs 24/7…again almost an ad for them. Haven’t signed into that chat for a while.
I generally define it to be posting stuff you know will piss people off simply for the joy of pissing them off. I would imagine really hardcore trolls would join message boards for the sole purpose of getting a rise out of people, and make up outrageous stories just to see how others will respond.
This definition is highly subjective from a 3rd person point of view, but I’m asking people to report first person experiences of participating in message board activity with the sole purpose of raising hell. If you perceive yourself as having posted things for the sole purpose of causing a ruckus, simply to amuse yourself, then you have trolled.
Sorry for my ignorance, but what is CI?
This might sort of count.
I frequent an erotic story site and have even contributed a few stories. My first story dealt with a cheating wife and was put into the category that those stories are generally put into.
It riled up quite a few who would provide very negative feedback including threats against the character and against the “author”. It amused me so much that all the stories I have contributed have been changed to add the adultery element. I have also made the stories more outlandish and the anonymous trolls still treat it as a true account and take it personally.
No matter how many disclaimers I put at the beginning and mark it with the appropriate tags, people who claim to hate that type of story still will read it in then attack. I get more enjoyment from reading their responses than I do from people who actually like the stories.
Cumberdale, I’d say that counts. So why do you find this enjoyable? Because you like to feel superior to those who are overreacting? (Serious question. I don’t troll, but I admit I find a certain kind of person who gets offended easily or irrationally to be kind of amusing.)
Correct me if I’m wrong, AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet, but given the context, I’d guess it means cochlear implants. There is a great deal of debate over what’s the best way to raise and educate deaf kids. It centers largely on two issues: cochlear implant or not, and oral communication vs. ASL (American Sign Language) vs. some combination of the two.
So, if I understand correctly, the site admin **AAWAYCG **was referring to apparently switched sides: she and her site strongly advocated implants and oral education only, but she would then castigate new members for choosing that route. That would make the admin the troll, IMO.
No, I don’t feel superior. I just find it amusing that though I try to be upfront and label the story as what it is, people who hate that type of story still read it and post very nasty replies regarding it as if it was a surprise. That site has a few categories that I personally don’t like and if I find myself reading a story that has elements that I don’t care for, I just stop reading and move on.
If I do submit feedback, I try to let the author know what I liked and what I didn’'t and ways I think the story might have been improved. What I don’t do is call names, rant and threaten.
It probably helps that I really don’t consider myself a “writer”. The reason I started was to see if I could tell a good story, hopefully improve and possibly some day write the great American novel. I also take the overreactions as a bit of a compliment. As the old roadshow travellers would say, "you can leave the audience satisfied, you can leave them angry, just don’t ever bore them.
Think about it. 