Has there ever been a study done of the motivations or personalities of hackers, trolls, vandals, and the like? I’m curious to know what the appeal is of annoying people. I suppose immaturity plays a part, but that doesn’t really tell me what makes it enjoyable for them.
As much as I value the opinions of the SDMB community, I’m not interested in your hypotheses or speculations, only scientific studies, if any exist. Thanks.
I think there was a study some years ago, with reference to hackers rather than Internet trolls, that indicated that one common constituent was a feeling of his (or her, I suppose) existence not being meaningful to others – that the attention he got from the incident in some way validated his or her importance.
I have no idea where I read this (it would have been ca. 1996) or to what extent you can place any trust in the results, but it’s one (tiny) step above IMHO.
Lets remember that hackers have built the entire IT industry,without them you wouldn’t be posting on this board.
Trolls on the other hand…
I was going to say “What’s wrong with hackers?” but was beaten to the punch.
Don’t confuse ankle-biters with hackers.
I don’t know what makes trolls tick but they really make me tick - I find them so funny! Maybe I’m the only person in the world who adores trolls for the sheer amusement value, but their antics make me laugh and laugh out loud in the office.
Someone linked to an ancient troll called bronzelion in a thread a few days ago, it was so hilarious I emailed it round the office. The internet needs more talent like that, IMO.
Ugh. Crackers! I meant crackers! Sorry. I’m always the guy who jumps on people when they say hackers are bad, and then I go do it myself. Next I’ll be switching “you’re” and “your” indiscriminately.
Well, you could cut one open and see what’s inside, but they regenerate three hit points per round, and you’d want to use fire or acid…
ow! stop hitting!
Ino: I have some trollish coworkers that you’d be welcome to try that technique out on. I especially like the part about using fire or acid 
What is an “ankle-biter” and why is it called that?
You called him Ino. Your days are numbered, Diceman.
‘sbeen a pleasure knowin’ ya.
(Okay, so I’m way too easily amused. Sue me. You’ll be fine, Diceman. Doctors can really work miracles nowadays…)
Besides a few sticks of dynamite and a loud alarm clock?
For crackers/hackers it may have something to do with the challenge set by the industry. ‘We have the most secure system of the millenium… yada yada yada’ Well guess what folks… you’re giving people a challenge to test that security.
At university, a mate accidentally accessed a site’s secured area (sorry not a techno-geek so am not familiar with all the jargon). He was so thrilled he tried accessing other sites with his mistake and succeeded quite a few times. No, he never damaged the sites he accessed.
Trolls, on the other hand, enjoy getting people to react in a way they want. A powertrip of the annoying kind. And until well into the trap do many realise just what is happening. By then though, the troll has gotten just what they wanted.
I managed to find a paper called *Simple Vandals or a Unique Social Movement? A Psycho-Sociological Discourse on Internet Trolls * that, though long, was rather interesting - if you like this sort of thing.
wipes off some blood
Well, it not a brain… I’ll keep looking… Hey! Get back here I’m not done dissecting you yet!
Yeah, I was aware of the “crackers” vs. “hackers” thing too, and used the wrong word.
Well, hackers are mainly motivated by a love of learning and the desire to make complex machines do really, really neat things.
Well, that and the caffeine.
Hackers tend towards wanting to be in complete control over their machines, but even that out with a generally laid-back view of controlling humans. Political libertarianism is common, as is a total lack of religious zealotry. On that note, hackers aren’t tolerant of bigotry at all.
(Seriously, thanks, guys. This is like a good dream. :))
ESR’s ‘Profile of J. Random Hacker’ – Appendix B of the Jargon File.
Vandals in general (crackers, trolls, and other lusers) are motivated by a more sinister form of control: Control through coercion. Lusers want to make you do what they want by harming your property if you don’t. It’s highly immature, but there it is.
I’m not sure if this paper is legitimate - it may be an elaborate practical joke. While the first half of the paper uses a fair amount of convincing-sounding technical jargon (whether it actually is convincing is something I’m not qualified to judge), it goes off an a bizarre tangent in section 6, e.g.
In the above, the word “growing” is a link to http://www.mediametrics.com/, while “gun collections” is a link to http://www.nra.org/. Reference 18 is legitimate: http://www.nd.edu/~dmyers/cbsm/vol2/bgham99.pdf, which I will admit I merely skimmed, but appears to conclude that the Internet will make it easier for protest groups to organize.
Later on, the paper degenerates, dropping any pretense of a scholarly tone:
And, for what it’s worth, I can’t find any other internet reference to “Amy Dhala”.
It’s too bad: I was hoping to find some credible information on the topic - and was considering posting a reference to this paper on a message board I administer (which has some trolls!). I may well be wrong, but my hypothesis at this point is that the paper is an elaborate practical joke … a troll, if you will.
I don’t know that you will count [url=http://www.teamtechnology.co.uk/troll.htm]this as scientific but it is an interesting discussion of the different forms of trolling nonetheless.
http://home.ica.net/~leifb/aic/story/aic-history.htm
Not really a study, but interesting nonetheless.
dwarven one: 404 errors certainly aren’t funny, but how interesting are they?
Aren’t studies. Damn. I’ve been up too long.
And the siren-song of assembly language still calls…
int 80h