Hcom3 [2003693] —
Original article
In the early hours of Tuesday 20th February, the face of Torn may have changed forever, thanks to a simple script posted by Alexstrasza which allows players to hide the posts of people they do not like. Within the space of a few days, Alexstrasza's post attracted over 200 upvotes, a total which demonstrates the strength of feeling towards those who would do our forums harm.
The response from the troll community was immediate. Evil-Duck complained just two minutes after the post was made. Several hours later, HH_Dude announced he was quitting the forums, in an apparent attempt to jump before he was pushed into oblivion. The trolls are panicking. The bridge under which they live has been sealed up on both sides. Soon, having been starved the oxygen of publicity, this group will suffocate on the noxious fumes of their own foul-smelling effluence.
Torn may breathe again once more.
However, not everyone believes this move represents a positive step in the right direction. Some have even criticised Alexstrasza's script as a hindrance to free speech. And others, such as _ Abaddon_ are concerned that the dedicated supporters of forum trolls will simply circle jerk each other off in the background, making their threads seem high quality to those who are new to the forums.
"How can I downvote those dimwits if I can't see their posts :P"
This is a good point. Let's take Evil-Duck for example. If everyone who dislikes his offerings installs this new script and never sees another of his posts again, Evil-Duck's popularity may take a hit, but his karma will rise and ensure his content stands out among those who use Torn script-free. Those who cannot see his posts may not care, but everyone else will surely wonder if the world has gone mad when people prolific simpletons are rarely downvoted.
Clearly, the plague of the s**tposter will not be cured by a simple script. To understand these forum-fillers better I interviewed some notable players who have spent their Torn lives combating s**tposts. To begin with, I asked Badzena the question we all want to know the answer to.
Why do s**tposters, s**tpost?
"Attention. I don't think it can be for anything else, it serves no purpose. It makes them feel very important, even though the negative attention is bad. Kinda like a child, any attention is better than no attention."
I personally agree with this opinion. The s**tposters want the attention, and people are giving it to them. So long as this continues, the posts will keep on coming. But dunmugmeh believes that boredom may also be a factor.
"Because they are so weak at game playing they have 'nothing' to do. They don't even try to strengthen themselves by working at earning more play money. Once their energy and nerve is used they just spam the place up."
This also seems to be a correct assessment, since most s**tposters have stats as s***ty as their posts. But how do we stop them? Organise some kind of community scheme? Find their homes and slaughter their pets? Implement a forum banning order?
Badzena: "Now there's a question!"
"Half of me says 'Ban Them!', but then if we all stopped replying to them, giving them attention, negative or otherwise, then surely they'd go away (you'd hope). But I know I reply, so I'm feeding the trolls, but sometimes it is good to just wind them up and see their greater attempt at s***e posting!"
Trader is another player whose opinion I sought, as she has been a vocal opponent of the forum trolls over recent weeks. Trader's opinion is that while ignoring s**tposters is usually for the best, it only works up to a certain point.
"They'll just escalate until they finally get a reaction. Picture a kid throwing a temper-tantrum. They just get louder until their parents give in. My approach is to remind them how irrelevant they actually are. That my world is unaffected by them, and that the best they'll get from me is to become a punchline."
Pictured: Evil-Duck
The solution, therefore, seems to be to puncture the troll's ego using jokes or harsh truths. But while this may work on idiots who are unaware they are s**tposters, the professionals may be a completely different story. My pal Sugarvalves interviewed Evil-Duck shortly after the release of Alexstrasza's script. Below you'll find one of the few responses we were able to print without confusing and annoying our readers.
SugarValves: "What is it about your posts that people don't like?"
Evil-Duck: "PEOPLE DON'T LIKE MY POSTS BECAUSE THEY DONT LIKE SEEING SOMEONE BE MORE SUCCESSFUL THAN THEM. THEY'RE A BUNCH OF SHEEP WHO SEE ONE PERSON HATE SO THEY THINK IT'S COOL TO JUMP ONBOARD, WELL GUESS WHAT, THIS SHIP IS GOING DOWN AND IM TAKING EVERYONE WITH ME."
Judging by the tone of his response, Evil-Duck doesn't like to be called out. Does this mean that when people insult him he doesn't enjoy the attention? Evil-Duck looks like he is trying to create a good brand for himself. And it doesn't seem to be working. Later in the same interview, ED also commented that the script created by Alexstrasza was discriminative and that this was not the first time he had been subjected to such treatment.
"BACK IN 2012 AT THE HEIGHT OF MY FORUM CAREER I HAD MOBS BEGGING OT BAN ME, BEGGING FOR THE RULES TO BE CHANGED AND GUESS WHAT, THE STAFF ABIDED AND CHANGED THE RULES TO ESSENTIALLY SHUT ME DOWN. NOT EVEN A YEAR LATER THE COMMUNITY WAS BEGGING FOR IT TO BE CHANGED BACK. WHY? BECAUSE THEY MISSED WHAT I BROUGHT TO THE FORUMS."
Will those who block Evil-Duck, HH_Dude and Sharpmid miss them? It seems unlikely. Although if truth be told, even stopped clocks are right twice a day, and even the most irritating s**tposter can occasionally provide a moment of amusement or insight, as Trader and Badzena intimate in the following comments:
HCOM3: "Do you think that sometimes s**tposters can bring good points to be discussed?"
Trader: "Sure they can...I call it the shotgun approach. Post enough, and sooner or later something will find its mark, just as pellets from a shotgun. But that doesn't require talent, so why pat them on the back for 1 relevant post out of 1000?"
Badzena: "I've not seen a 'good point'. But sometimes things to get thrashed out in the comments/posts that follow. But still way off the track of the OP."
Dunmugmeh disagrees entirely, claiming much of the forums are filled with mindless spam. Either way, it seems they are all in agreement that s**tposters do not provide enough good content to justify their existence. The last time I saw dude trying to make a point was when he claimed there was karma abuse. And that didn't go too well for him.
Still, their exploits are occasionally good for the odd giggle at their expense. We all need someone to look down on, otherwise, if we're at the bottom, we are the pile of s**t soiling people's shoes. So perhaps a small part of us will miss these odd little creatures. And so, with the spirit of positivity in mind, I asked Trader who her favorite and least favorite s**tposters were.
"That's like asking if I'd rather eat mouse turds or elephant dung. Some are less offensive than others, but the world would be a better place if s**t didn't exist. That said, ED is the least obnoxious, while DUDE is just toxic. Tadd is the kind you can sweep into a pile and ignore for a while."
Badzena was a little more generous, admitting that she cannot help but pay attention to the posts made by a certain Z_Junior loving, Gold AK wielding forum dweller.
"Fav...oh god...not sure I have a favorite one, but I suppose I always look at Champion's threads. Worst, well has to be a tie between Dud and Notsosharpmidkid. They are just poison, they spread rubbish and lies about people, which then has a knock on effect."
Dunmugmeh picked out Evil-Duck as his worst, while also identifying Champion as his personal favorite, describing the rest as mindless spammers. I don't know if this should be taken as a compliment by either party, but it's certainly better to be remembered than forgotten.
So there seems to be some agreement. The order of preference goes HH_Dude SharpMid Tadd Evil-Duck Champion
Still, based on the quotes we've heard so far, there's hardly much love for any of these people. If the script fails and the trolls remain, further solutions must be considered. With that in mind, I asked the players if they would permanently ban the s**tposters if they were Chedburn.
Badzena: "I would love the chance to wave a wand and make a few of them lose ability to type for a while, but I think they do encourage activity, but boy it's all pure crap. Maybe the best way would be to limit posts/threads made over a week or a month. Oooh, a 3 month on and 3 month off ban."
Trader: "All that would really do is spawn a whole new generation of s**t posters, all taking up the cause of staff being unfair and abusing powers. But I do believe that he should modify the game to allow people to silence certain forum posters. Mobile users can't use scripts, so a built-in feature would be great. It'd also have the added bonus of letting potential posters know they'll be banished from sight if they annoy the general public."
dunmugmeh: "Yes, but only after they had been warned and told plain and simple that they have to stop or they can't use the forums anymore."
Perhaps the solution lies in a combination of the solutions posed by dunmugmeh, Trader and Badzena. What if players who frequently spam and troll were warned, and if they still persist then all players are given the ability to block them out. This block could be permanent and at the discretion of individual players, or the staff could be allowed to turn it off once a s**tposter has been rehabilitated.
Is this a solution? Who knows. Changes aren't always for the better. When I asked for a final comment, Badzena said she has noticed a huge increase in people getting attacked and exposed within the forums since the rules were relaxed. This impacted her personally too, although she feels being targeted wasn't actually that much of a big deal.
"Yeah, it's happened to me a couple of times, but my mistake was to actually listen to someone who I thought spoke a lot of sense to trust a certain person to do business with. I'm sure for some it's a horrid experience to go through, but personally, it's been a blast!"
Trader's final words were less positive, but the image she conjured up was one of pure beauty.
"If someone dropped a turd in the middle of your living room floor, would you not still notice it? Yes, it has the right to exist. It even serves a purpose, as fertilizer, but wishing it weren't there doesn't stop us from noticing it. Even bitching about it. But what we really want is for someone else to just clean up the mess."
Dunmugmeh's parting comment was even less enthusiastic.
"Spamming is so pointless there is little point in even discussing the people who do it."
Well said you three, well said. So based on dunmugmeh's quote I suppose we should wrap this up. There are many questions left unanswered, but to even try would be to give the s**tposters more column inches than they deserve. Still, it is hard not to wonder whether s**tposting will end with Alexstrasza's script. If it does, where will the trolls migrate to? And if not, how do we rid our city of the perennial scourge of the s**tposter?
All these questions, but no-one to answer them. Except one man: Chedburn. How does he feel about Alexstrasza's script?
"I see no problem with it, users can do what they like assuming the scripts fit within our rules."
For even more hot troll action, don't forget to check out Krullebolle's article "Why do we feed trolls?" which is out next week.
The response from the troll community was immediate. Evil-Duck complained just two minutes after the post was made. Several hours later, HH_Dude announced he was quitting the forums, in an apparent attempt to jump before he was pushed into oblivion. The trolls are panicking. The bridge under which they live has been sealed up on both sides. Soon, having been starved the oxygen of publicity, this group will suffocate on the noxious fumes of their own foul-smelling effluence.
Torn may breathe again once more.
However, not everyone believes this move represents a positive step in the right direction. Some have even criticised Alexstrasza's script as a hindrance to free speech. And others, such as _ Abaddon_ are concerned that the dedicated supporters of forum trolls will simply circle jerk each other off in the background, making their threads seem high quality to those who are new to the forums.
"How can I downvote those dimwits if I can't see their posts :P"
This is a good point. Let's take Evil-Duck for example. If everyone who dislikes his offerings installs this new script and never sees another of his posts again, Evil-Duck's popularity may take a hit, but his karma will rise and ensure his content stands out among those who use Torn script-free. Those who cannot see his posts may not care, but everyone else will surely wonder if the world has gone mad when people prolific simpletons are rarely downvoted.
Clearly, the plague of the s**tposter will not be cured by a simple script. To understand these forum-fillers better I interviewed some notable players who have spent their Torn lives combating s**tposts. To begin with, I asked Badzena the question we all want to know the answer to.
Why do s**tposters, s**tpost?
"Attention. I don't think it can be for anything else, it serves no purpose. It makes them feel very important, even though the negative attention is bad. Kinda like a child, any attention is better than no attention."
I personally agree with this opinion. The s**tposters want the attention, and people are giving it to them. So long as this continues, the posts will keep on coming. But dunmugmeh believes that boredom may also be a factor.
"Because they are so weak at game playing they have 'nothing' to do. They don't even try to strengthen themselves by working at earning more play money. Once their energy and nerve is used they just spam the place up."
This also seems to be a correct assessment, since most s**tposters have stats as s***ty as their posts. But how do we stop them? Organise some kind of community scheme? Find their homes and slaughter their pets? Implement a forum banning order?
Badzena: "Now there's a question!"
"Half of me says 'Ban Them!', but then if we all stopped replying to them, giving them attention, negative or otherwise, then surely they'd go away (you'd hope). But I know I reply, so I'm feeding the trolls, but sometimes it is good to just wind them up and see their greater attempt at s***e posting!"
Trader is another player whose opinion I sought, as she has been a vocal opponent of the forum trolls over recent weeks. Trader's opinion is that while ignoring s**tposters is usually for the best, it only works up to a certain point.
"They'll just escalate until they finally get a reaction. Picture a kid throwing a temper-tantrum. They just get louder until their parents give in. My approach is to remind them how irrelevant they actually are. That my world is unaffected by them, and that the best they'll get from me is to become a punchline."
Pictured: Evil-Duck
The solution, therefore, seems to be to puncture the troll's ego using jokes or harsh truths. But while this may work on idiots who are unaware they are s**tposters, the professionals may be a completely different story. My pal Sugarvalves interviewed Evil-Duck shortly after the release of Alexstrasza's script. Below you'll find one of the few responses we were able to print without confusing and annoying our readers.
SugarValves: "What is it about your posts that people don't like?"
Evil-Duck: "PEOPLE DON'T LIKE MY POSTS BECAUSE THEY DONT LIKE SEEING SOMEONE BE MORE SUCCESSFUL THAN THEM. THEY'RE A BUNCH OF SHEEP WHO SEE ONE PERSON HATE SO THEY THINK IT'S COOL TO JUMP ONBOARD, WELL GUESS WHAT, THIS SHIP IS GOING DOWN AND IM TAKING EVERYONE WITH ME."
Judging by the tone of his response, Evil-Duck doesn't like to be called out. Does this mean that when people insult him he doesn't enjoy the attention? Evil-Duck looks like he is trying to create a good brand for himself. And it doesn't seem to be working. Later in the same interview, ED also commented that the script created by Alexstrasza was discriminative and that this was not the first time he had been subjected to such treatment.
"BACK IN 2012 AT THE HEIGHT OF MY FORUM CAREER I HAD MOBS BEGGING OT BAN ME, BEGGING FOR THE RULES TO BE CHANGED AND GUESS WHAT, THE STAFF ABIDED AND CHANGED THE RULES TO ESSENTIALLY SHUT ME DOWN. NOT EVEN A YEAR LATER THE COMMUNITY WAS BEGGING FOR IT TO BE CHANGED BACK. WHY? BECAUSE THEY MISSED WHAT I BROUGHT TO THE FORUMS."
Will those who block Evil-Duck, HH_Dude and Sharpmid miss them? It seems unlikely. Although if truth be told, even stopped clocks are right twice a day, and even the most irritating s**tposter can occasionally provide a moment of amusement or insight, as Trader and Badzena intimate in the following comments:
HCOM3: "Do you think that sometimes s**tposters can bring good points to be discussed?"
Trader: "Sure they can...I call it the shotgun approach. Post enough, and sooner or later something will find its mark, just as pellets from a shotgun. But that doesn't require talent, so why pat them on the back for 1 relevant post out of 1000?"
Badzena: "I've not seen a 'good point'. But sometimes things to get thrashed out in the comments/posts that follow. But still way off the track of the OP."
Dunmugmeh disagrees entirely, claiming much of the forums are filled with mindless spam. Either way, it seems they are all in agreement that s**tposters do not provide enough good content to justify their existence. The last time I saw dude trying to make a point was when he claimed there was karma abuse. And that didn't go too well for him.
Still, their exploits are occasionally good for the odd giggle at their expense. We all need someone to look down on, otherwise, if we're at the bottom, we are the pile of s**t soiling people's shoes. So perhaps a small part of us will miss these odd little creatures. And so, with the spirit of positivity in mind, I asked Trader who her favorite and least favorite s**tposters were.
"That's like asking if I'd rather eat mouse turds or elephant dung. Some are less offensive than others, but the world would be a better place if s**t didn't exist. That said, ED is the least obnoxious, while DUDE is just toxic. Tadd is the kind you can sweep into a pile and ignore for a while."
Badzena was a little more generous, admitting that she cannot help but pay attention to the posts made by a certain Z_Junior loving, Gold AK wielding forum dweller.
"Fav...oh god...not sure I have a favorite one, but I suppose I always look at Champion's threads. Worst, well has to be a tie between Dud and Notsosharpmidkid. They are just poison, they spread rubbish and lies about people, which then has a knock on effect."
Dunmugmeh picked out Evil-Duck as his worst, while also identifying Champion as his personal favorite, describing the rest as mindless spammers. I don't know if this should be taken as a compliment by either party, but it's certainly better to be remembered than forgotten.
So there seems to be some agreement. The order of preference goes HH_Dude SharpMid Tadd Evil-Duck Champion
Still, based on the quotes we've heard so far, there's hardly much love for any of these people. If the script fails and the trolls remain, further solutions must be considered. With that in mind, I asked the players if they would permanently ban the s**tposters if they were Chedburn.
Badzena: "I would love the chance to wave a wand and make a few of them lose ability to type for a while, but I think they do encourage activity, but boy it's all pure crap. Maybe the best way would be to limit posts/threads made over a week or a month. Oooh, a 3 month on and 3 month off ban."
Trader: "All that would really do is spawn a whole new generation of s**t posters, all taking up the cause of staff being unfair and abusing powers. But I do believe that he should modify the game to allow people to silence certain forum posters. Mobile users can't use scripts, so a built-in feature would be great. It'd also have the added bonus of letting potential posters know they'll be banished from sight if they annoy the general public."
dunmugmeh: "Yes, but only after they had been warned and told plain and simple that they have to stop or they can't use the forums anymore."
Perhaps the solution lies in a combination of the solutions posed by dunmugmeh, Trader and Badzena. What if players who frequently spam and troll were warned, and if they still persist then all players are given the ability to block them out. This block could be permanent and at the discretion of individual players, or the staff could be allowed to turn it off once a s**tposter has been rehabilitated.
Is this a solution? Who knows. Changes aren't always for the better. When I asked for a final comment, Badzena said she has noticed a huge increase in people getting attacked and exposed within the forums since the rules were relaxed. This impacted her personally too, although she feels being targeted wasn't actually that much of a big deal.
"Yeah, it's happened to me a couple of times, but my mistake was to actually listen to someone who I thought spoke a lot of sense to trust a certain person to do business with. I'm sure for some it's a horrid experience to go through, but personally, it's been a blast!"
Trader's final words were less positive, but the image she conjured up was one of pure beauty.
"If someone dropped a turd in the middle of your living room floor, would you not still notice it? Yes, it has the right to exist. It even serves a purpose, as fertilizer, but wishing it weren't there doesn't stop us from noticing it. Even bitching about it. But what we really want is for someone else to just clean up the mess."
Dunmugmeh's parting comment was even less enthusiastic.
"Spamming is so pointless there is little point in even discussing the people who do it."
Well said you three, well said. So based on dunmugmeh's quote I suppose we should wrap this up. There are many questions left unanswered, but to even try would be to give the s**tposters more column inches than they deserve. Still, it is hard not to wonder whether s**tposting will end with Alexstrasza's script. If it does, where will the trolls migrate to? And if not, how do we rid our city of the perennial scourge of the s**tposter?
All these questions, but no-one to answer them. Except one man: Chedburn. How does he feel about Alexstrasza's script?
"I see no problem with it, users can do what they like assuming the scripts fit within our rules."
For even more hot troll action, don't forget to check out Krullebolle's article "Why do we feed trolls?" which is out next week.
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