DIG's SIG

[The Sleeper]

a little too usual

[Goatweed]

I thought those pics were for the mod forum only?

[Luna]

Oh. my. god.

I don't know if I believe that is actually Alkey, but...... YOWZERS! My virgin eyes!

I have not laughed this hard in a damn long time, either. :lol:

[2 tired 2 give N F]

The image of Alkey's penis is burned into my brain like the sight of the A-bomb going off on Hiroshima...



*Turns off lights*

I CAN STILL SEE IT!!!!

[Luna]

The image of Alkey's penis is burned into my brain like the sight of the A-bomb going off on Hiroshima...



*Turns off lights*

I CAN STILL SEE IT!!!!

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

[Galt]

If I continue to read this board, I will get fired.

[Kid Afrika]

At least you're not black.

[Galt]

How about everyone on the Internet just stops posting naked pictures of themselves.

You are in are ugly, in horrible shape and no one wants to look at your naked body. Deal with it

[Luna]

hidden post

COOL! When did you guys put in the Ikonboard ignore poster hack on this board?

This rocks. Thank you.

[diceisgod]

You need to be taught some respect. Perhaps a scourging at Alkey's pillar will do the job.

[Galt]

hidden post

COOL! When did you guys put in the Ikonboard ignore poster hack on this board?

This rocks. Thank you.

aside calling you an idiot that time, when have I ever been mean to you? I didn't even call you ugly.

[diceisgod]

Call her Toronto Lunakaru

[Luna]

Call her Toronto Lunakaru

Cool. Can the powers that be put that in my status please? :thumbs-up:

[Luna]

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Trolling and Harassment
What is a troll?


The traditional definition of a troll refers to a member of a community or usenet group who makes posts deliberately designed to attract responses of outrage or indignation. It is the troll's intent to "hook" unsuspecting members into responding, (hence the term "trolling"), thus providing him/her self with the attention they crave.


A distinction must be made between true trolls, newcomers who are merely experiencing growing pains as they attempt to adjust to community standards, and community members who simply have strong but otherwise harmless, dissenting opinions. Trolls should be removed, newcomers assisted, and contributing community members given at least a modicum of respectful distance.


In our experience with online communities, there are four types of trolls...
Types of Trolls:


1) Mischievous: Such trolls have a humorous intent. Often, they are a "regular" who has temporarily adopted a new identity in order to play a good-natured prank. They are not abusive to members and rarely create trouble within a community. Generally there is no harm in responding to them. Some members may find mischievous trolls to be annoying, particularly if their presence leads to lengthy threads that distract the community from its true intent.. Other members inevitably find that the troll's humor and light-hearted antics provide the community with an opportunity to laugh together, thus enhancing and strengthening community bonds.


2) Mindless: Mindless trolls have a tendency to post lengthy stories of questionable belief thus promoting good facial tone in members due to excessive eye-rolling. They are generally harmless. On rare occasion, the ficticious posts of a mindless troll may lead to insightful debate and discussion. Aside from encouraging them, there is generally no harm in responding.


3) Malicious: A malicious troll arrives with the intent of being blatantly abusive to the group and/or specific individuals within the group. One of their characteristics is that within a very short time of gaining access they begin targeting and harassing members using both low-end and high-end tactics. In some cases, the troll has a prior history with the group or someone within the group [Ref: Personality Clashes and Conflicts]. In other scenarios, the troll is simply looking for fresh meat.


4.) Destructive: Around 1999 a new form of troll began to appear on the net in mail groups and online communities. The primary purpose of this type of troll is to completely destroy the group it has infiltrated. Destructive trolls may work on their own, or possibly in teams or gangs.








Personality Clashes and Conflicts:


Personality clashes tend to be one-time events between community members that often result in building familiarity. They are more common among members who have no history of one another such as two newbies, or a newbie and a long-term community resident. Following the incident, the two members may feel they know and understand the other far better than they did before - the disagreement may even pave the way to a friendship forming. In other instances, hard feelings may develop. These can fuel later misunderstandings and conflicts between members.


Personality conflicts involve a period of sustained animosity between two members who have a history of interaction between them. Although each member may be well-known and admired by others they do not get along with one another. There is a strong component of dislike, disrespect or disapproval. Low-end harassment is often exhibited to various degrees by both parties. The conflict may simmer privately for weeks or months and then explode publicly on the boards.


Personality conflicts have the potential to divide the community as friends and admirers line up behind their favored member (or favored ideology), glare offensively at those on the 'other' side, and trade verbal barbs or other forms of mudslinging.


Personality clashes and conflicts may lead to one or more members adopting troll identities in order to flame or harass others without having to be accountable for their actions in their known (possibly respected) identity. This may be especially true in instances where conflict resolution standards are not explicitly understood.








Online Harrassment:


Harassment is not an isolated event, it is not a solitary outburst. Harassment is a pattern of ongoing behavior directed at a specific target. The legal definition of harassment, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is:


"A course of conduct directed at a specific person that causes substantial emotional
distress in such person and serves no legitimate purpose" or "Words, gestures, and
actions which tend to annoy, alarm and abuse (verbally) another person."


We recognize two levels of harassment: low-end and high-end.


Low-End Harassment is comprised of posturing, implication, insults, taunting and forms of baiting. Projection and transference may be involved. The harassment may take place on the boards, in chatrooms, or in private mail. It is a frequent component of unresolved or unacknowledged personality conflicts, or volatile discussion. It may include following a member from post to post, thread to thread, or board to board, and responding to them with a rapid-fire of low-level tactics; this approach in particular can be so aggressive it may well become a form of high-end harassment.


In some cases, low-end harassment is unintentional. It may be teasing gone too far, or a misunderstanding in regard to personal boundaries. Taunting, on the other hand, is a form of low-end harassment. Consider the differences...


Teasing:
Allows the teaser and the person teased to swap roles
Isn't intended to hurt the other person
Maintains the basic dignity of everyone involved.
Pokes fun in a lighthearted, clever and benign way.
Is meant to get both parties to laugh.
Is only a small part of the activities shared by those who have something in common.
Is innocent in motive.
Is discontinued when the person teased becomes upset or objects to the teasing.


Taunting:
Is one-sided and based on an imbalance of power
Is intended to harm.
Involves humiliating, cruel, demeaning or bigoted comments thinly disguised as jokes.
Includes laughter directed at the target, not with the target.
Is meant to diminish the self-worth of the target.
Induces fear of further taunting.
Is sinister in motive.
Continues especially when the target becomes distressed or objects to the taunt.


While precise definitions of low-end harassment can be subjective according to a member's personal boundaries, high-end harassment tends to be widely recognized as a clear crossing of boundaries and an invasion of privacy. It is common in troll attacks, volatile personality conflicts, and may be a component of online stalking. High-end harassment may include:


Publicly posting private and personal information about a user (pictures, address, phone number, name)
Impersonating (or attempting to impersonate) a member.
Spreading false rumors about another community member
Publicly revealing a sexual liason with a member without their consent.
Publishing private correspondence
Spamming a member's private mailbox.
Sending viruses or trojan horses to a member's private mailbox.
Signing the targeted member up for subscription or free services.
Unprovoked personal attack or sexual overture.
Public or private disclosures of affection that are innappropriate to the circumstance
Attempting to solicit information about a target from other members.
Repeated interactions with a member after they have firmly requested that you stop.
Public attempts to turn other members against the target.
Explicit or implied threats of harm to the target or their loved ones.

[Luna]

The Psychology of Trolls

Once upon a time, there existed creatures called Trolls, or so the legends and folktales say. According to my reference works on these subjects, Trolls of Scandinavian folklore are usually huge ogres with great strength and little wit. The most famous tales of them have them lurking under bridges to demand payment of those who would cross, killing those who would make the attempt without paying the toll. Later, so the texts say, the stories told that they shrank to a smaller, dwarfish folk who inhabited caves. Eventually, they apparently left our world altogether, and were never seen or heard from again.

But those reports are wrong, for Trolls do indeed exist, even today. They are alive and well and wreaking new havoc on the Internet.

Do you wish to enter a chatroom or participate on a message board? Beware the Trolls! They will appear when you least expect it, and demand a different kind of payment from you. They will assail you with insults, obscenities, and anything offensive they can think of to get you give them what they really want: attention. They will keep up these attacks to watch you cry out in protest and pain, and the more you do so, the more they will keep it up. That's what they really want, after all: a reaction, any reaction, for that is the coin by which they measure their success. The more they receive, the more they will continue the behavior that is giving them what they want. That it upsets others is of no concern to them -- or, rather, it is of primary concern for them, for upsetting people is their business.

Like the Trolls of old, they seem to have great strength, given the kinds of trouble they can cause; but ultimately, also like the Trolls of old, they have little wit. They all use the same tactics, and they all resort to the same ways of provoking people. First insult members of the chatroom or board by calling them names, ridiculing their comments and questioning their intelligence. Then start insulting the subject for which the board or chatroom was created. If that doesn't get enough reaction, start upping the ante by bringing in completely unrelated subjects. Tell the other participants that they (or the subject under discussion) are prejudiced racially, sexually, ethnically, religiously -- take your pick, they'll eventually hit 'em all, and then go for the jugular: doing all this while throwing in obscene language and casting other foul aspersions on anyone who happens to be within range. This is, of course, incredibly inflammatory behavior to any marginally civilized person, and a normal sense of justice and fair play naturally demands defense and protest.

Which is exactly what the Troll is hoping for, because they don't play fair. They don't care about the same things that brought the other participants to the site; they only want to get people riled up and see the trouble they created so they can feel big and strong and powerful because they created such a fuss. And while they're watching the outrage and anger fly, they're sitting under the bridge, laughing while they chew on the bones of their victims. All that public indignation has served only one purpose: it fed the Troll's hunger for power and made him happy. It certainly did nothing for the people who got upset.

Tales tell us that warning signs were put up near bridges where Trolls were believed to be living, to keep unsuspecting folk away so that they would not be robbed or killed. You could not cross that bridge without losing either your money or your life, so it was better to turn around and ignore that bridge. Not especially convenient if that was one of few bridges around and you needed to get to the other side, but eventually, the Troll would either starve to death or leave, and the bridge would be safe again. Until the next Troll moved in, and then the same warnings and behavior would apply.

Simply put, Trolls are bullies. They are at heart small and mean people who have a need to make themselves feel big and strong, and the easiest way they can find to do that is by mistreating other people and taking pleasure in their pain. It's not healthy, but it's also not something that will be made better by giving in to the bully. It is far better to walk away from him, to ignore him, and even suffer a few punches rather than give him what he wants by crying and begging for mercy or even fighting with him. If you are not a "good victim," he will look elsewhere to get what he wants. And ultimately, if direct action needs to be taken against any bully, it has to come from the proper authorities: in the case of school bullies, the administration and faculty, or even the police, in the case of Internet bullies, the persons on the site who have the power to block or remove their inflammatory and offensive remarks.

Because if you look closely at what these Internet Trolls say, you will eventually see the truth: They may look like big nasty ogres, but theyre really just sorry little people hiding in their dark caves, coming out to make mischief before running back into hiding where they can watch the trouble they made and laugh all alone in the dark. They're emotional terrorists. Ignoring them isn't easy because it hurts to see them say and do things designed to make people feel upset and angry, but it's the only thing that will make them go away. Ignoring them completely creates an environment that simply does not give them what they're looking for. It's like soaking the woodpile with water: when the match comes along looking for something to burn, it wont catch, so it must go elsewhere to have its fun. But everyone must turn their backs and not respond, or the Troll will have the hope that if he keeps at it and tries hard enough, he'll get a big enough reaction to start a real fire.

Be it a Troll under a bridge or a Troll on the Internet, the warning sign is the same:

DO NOT FEED THE TROLL.

[diceisgod]

So what are you trying to say?

[GonzoStyle]

I think she meant to say:

:bouncer:

[diceisgod]

I ran her off once before and I can do it again. Oh yes, make no mistake about it, I ran her off. Her and the other outflux of posters, all of whom had built a deep unspoken bond and comradery. It pained them to see their friends get verbally raped by a superior so they just disappeared. They'll say they "lost interest", "lost touch", but no, they just lost...to me. What? You read a book about trolls and you think you can match wits with me?! I'll send you packin, bitch, with my aura alone.

[Black Lazerus]

I wonder which billy goat she is.

[Keyser Soze]

what she doesnt realize is, she is the troll.