# Trolls, socks and familiarity with the Board. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 19, 2007, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052 "2007-11-19T17:18:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/61 "2007-11-20T02:20:05Z")
[QUOTE=Giraffe] But thanks for saying I’m classy. Maybe now I can claim all the pee and gravy stains are a daring fashion statement. 🙂 [/QUOTE] I sort of picture you as a cross between Thoreau and Twain. Your clothes may be rumpled, and your house may be a mess (I don’t know), but there would be a twinkle in your eye, and dinner with you would be a treat just for the conversation. As I’ve said before, you have a great command of the language. ---
**Author:** ![Rico](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rico/32/3582_2.png) [@Rico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rico)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/62 "2007-11-20T02:54:59Z")
**silenus** , you WILL remember my Beer-Of-The-Month subscription for Christmas, won’t you? One other thing - a sock yesterday not only pinged my radar, but crashed right through the hull. Idiot admitted that he was a returnee. That’s pretty good evidence right there. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/63 "2007-11-20T03:55:22Z")
Convince **Dmark** to host another VegasDopeFest and I’m sure I can scare up a bottle of nice single-malt. **Rick** got the bottle I brought to the last Fest. Blame him. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/64 "2007-11-20T04:14:08Z")
[QUOTE=Liberal(about Giraffe)] I sort of picture you as a cross between Thoreau and Twain. Your clothes may be rumpled, and your house may be a mess (I don’t know), but there would be a twinkle in your eye, and dinner with you would be a treat just for the conversation. As I’ve said before, you have a great command of the language. [/QUOTE] **Giraffe** You DO realize this counts as negative points in your standing in the PIT-Mod contest, don’t you? Bwahahaha!!! ---
**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/65 "2007-11-20T04:25:44Z")
[QUOTE=samclem] **Giraffe** You DO realize this counts as negative points in your standing in the PIT-Mod contest, don’t you? Bwahahaha!!! [/QUOTE] That’s OK. I’m the most hated person in pretty much every other venue I participate in. I can let you have this one. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/66 "2007-11-20T05:04:31Z")
I have a pretty extensive knowledge of past events that range wayyyy before I ever signed up. This is because once I did sign up, I set out to read all of the biggest topics (and this was a time when they were all here, from 1999, save for the Winter of the Missed Content) by sorting them in each forum by number of replies and starting at topics that had (about) 88 replies and moving steadily upwards. First forum I did this in was the Pit where all the old drama abided. I’d print out hundreds of pages of topics and read them all at home… **Melin** gate, **Phadrus** (sp?)/ **Mark Serlin** , **Wildest Bill** , **december** , **Collunsbury** , **Mike Masterson/Silo** , **Contestant Number 3** , **Aceospades** , **Jack Dean Tyler** , **Joe Cool** , **satan** …every little bit that had happened. I took it all in, and remembered it. I’ve made references many times since then to things I was never around for. Maybe more so than anyone else…yet I’m not banned. So methinks it might just be the attitude of certain posters rather than the knowledge, as others have said in this topic. When all it seems is that the said poster wants to link to other threads to remind people of more drama and they’re a guest at that, seems to me this person is just trying to troll for reactions or support against someone they don’t like. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/67 "2007-11-20T13:37:48Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Well, I may have been unclear. A better way of expressing my post #10 might be: “If confronted with an allegedly new poster who is acting like a jerk right from his earliest posts, he may be a sock (which by board rules means an instant ban) or he may just be a jerk (which generally involves several warnings before a ban). I’m prepared to tolerate the admins banning such people even if their sockdom is not proven beyond a reasonable doubt, even if this means kicking some genuine noobs, because noobs who don’t know how to make a good first impression are jerks, anyway.” [/quote] Well, that’s perfectly reasonable, and I agree. I was thinking more about stuff like this - > [@Giraffe](#): > > If we have strong evidence that someone is a sock, they’re likely to be banned, regardless of how nice and/or well-behaved they are. Like **xtisme** , ISTM that a well-behaved sock is not much worse than a bannee who has learned his/her lesson. I am guessing the policy of “ban the returning sock even if he is behaving nicely” is necessary so the Ban Stick[sup]TM[/sup] remains the ultimate weapon. If banning is not “that bourne from whence no traveler returns”, then the level of behavior is compromised to some extent because jerks think they can return under a new guise. [QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Wait, we’re getting civil in the Pit. Fuck you! [/QUOTE] You’re right, it was inappropriate of me. My apologies. 😃 Regards, Shodan PS - May you be drowned in a vat of pimple-squeezings from a zit on K-Fed’s back. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/68 "2007-11-20T13:50:21Z")
Plus, the fact is that banned people CAN return if they go through the proper channels and demonstrate a remorse and maturity that the admins find believable. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/69 "2007-11-20T14:10:08Z")
It also helps if you have compromising photographs. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/70 "2007-11-20T14:22:19Z")
I’m much more disturbed by the influx of obviously brand-new arrivals masquerading as long-timers with thousands of posts, or as I call them, “inside-out socks.” They’re wily, and skilled at eluding detection, but you can pick them out if you watch carefully. They’re the ones who say really dumb things that no _real_ veteran Doper would ever say. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/71 "2007-11-20T16:46:56Z")
[QUOTE=Shodan] Like **xtisme** , ISTM that a well-behaved sock is not much worse than a bannee who has learned his/her lesson. [/QUOTE] I made a similar point [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=9164798&postcount=26) in that if someone wants to return to this board, all it takes is a bit of civility because no-one is actually hunting for you or will notice you unless you make a point of being noticeable. But, of course, it’s not fun to fool someone who doesn’t know they’ve been fooled, blah blah blah… so they feel compelled to announce how clever they are, and out they go. Of course, there could be a few hundred sock accounts active right now, staying below the radar, but here’s a newsflash to our undercover brothers - _nobody cares!_ ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/72 "2007-11-20T16:55:46Z")
I care. I love our undercover brothers… (I really have a thing for those old 70’s style platform shoes) -XT ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/73 "2007-11-20T18:37:19Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Of course, there could be a few hundred sock accounts active right now, staying below the radar, but here’s a newsflash to our undercover brothers - _nobody cares!_ [/QUOTE] I gotta give it to you “nobody cares about socks” folks–you’re _really_ trying to convince yourselves. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/74 "2007-11-20T19:15:51Z")
As in elementary school, when the teacher would command us to ignore the class clown because “he’s only doing it to get attention.” So we’d gamely pretend not to be distracted by the kid who’d powdered his cheeks with orange chalk dust and stuck pencils up his nose, balancing his chair on its two back legs and humming a rousing fart-noise-punctuated rendition of “The Stars and Stripes Forever.” (Okay, okay. I meant _they’d_ pretend I wasn’t distracting _them_.) ---
**Author:** ![ChattyChattyBingBing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@ChattyChattyBingBing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ChattyChattyBingBing)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/75 "2007-11-20T19:40:02Z")
I would guess that a large percentage of daily visitors to the board are lurkers/readers. This board is entertainment, even to those with no desire to join in. Is there any mechanism for giving subscriptions as gifts? That would knock one or two people off my Christmas list. ---
**Author:** ![Omegaman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/e480ec/32.png) [@Omegaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omegaman)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/76 "2007-11-20T19:44:25Z")
[QUOTE=Vinyl Turnip] As in elementary school, when the teacher would command us to ignore the class clown because “he’s only doing it to get attention.” So we’d gamely pretend not to be distracted by the kid who’d powdered his cheeks with orange chalk dust and stuck pencils up his nose, balancing his chair on its two back legs and humming a rousing fart-noise-punctuated rendition of “The Stars and Stripes Forever.” (Okay, okay. I meant _they’d_ pretend I wasn’t distracting _them_.) [/QUOTE] I’m glad you edited it. It made more sense that way. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/77 "2007-11-20T19:55:00Z")
[QUOTE=fetus] I gotta give it to you “nobody cares about socks” folks–you’re really trying to convince yourselves. [/QUOTE] I would gotta give it to you ‘socks are the worst thing since Bush!’ guys, but aside from Giraffe’s ‘It’s basically in the rules’ comment the whole thing really makes no sense to me. I’m not trying to convince myself…I simply remain unconvinced. There is a difference there, ehe? -XT ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/78 "2007-11-20T19:59:16Z")
[QUOTE=ChattyChattyBingBing] I would guess that a large percentage of daily visitors to the board are lurkers/readers. This board is entertainment, even to those with no desire to join in. Is there any mechanism for giving subscriptions as gifts? That would knock one or two people off my Christmas list. [/QUOTE] Actually there is to some degree, but you have to arrange it for them to join as a guest and then you can just pay their subscription. [Here is the link to instructions for subscribing someone](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=8432983). Jim ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/79 "2007-11-20T20:37:14Z")
[QUOTE=Shodan] It also helps if you have compromising photographs. Regards, Shodan [/QUOTE] word to the wise - it won’t help if the comprimising photos are of yourself. Jus’ sayin’ ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2007, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052/80 "2007-11-20T20:50:43Z")
There are three thing to remember, if you don’t want to get booted out the door. The are not carved into stone, but they are pretty well known to everyone who posts here regularly. In descending order of importance, the three things are: 1: Don’t be a jerk. 2: “Getting around” the rules is being a jerk. 3: Hi Opal. ``` Tris ``` [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trolls-socks-and-familiarity-with-the-board/427052.md?page=5)