The Trolls Among Us | Hacker News Reader

The Trolls Among Us

nytimes.com

83 pointsAlex391798 comments

The founder of 4Chan said:

"My personal private life is very separate from my Internet life ... There's a firewall in between." http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/jul/20/internet.go...

and here in this article Jason Fortuny calls himself "a normal person who does insane things on the Internet."

In both cases, they separate their screen lives with their non-screen lives. But, the mind is the same that moves between the two, except that there are two separate levels of morality that habituate according to the mind's sensory context.

So what lies in the mind at the border between the two moralities: shame, fear, hate and intolerance.

I find it clarifies things to filter statements like "My personal private life is very separate from my Internet life" and "a normal person who does insane things on the Internet" through the rule: "Judge talent at its best and character at its worst."

In that case would you say Weev has lots of talent and seriously bad character, in which case his "destroy others around him to build himself up" philosophy is the result?

Those people "with a firewall" hurt people in real life with their "virtual" selves, crossing the real-world/virtual border, but I have a feeling they'd be the first to whine if someone retaliated in real life (in a more or less civil way) for what their "virtual" selves did.

What hypocrisy.

Humans have a tendency to compartmentalize themselves. It's an inherent cognitive bias.

http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/01/outside_the_lab.html

I remember kids like that from junior high, they push the line until someone punches them in the face, then they have borders. The internet removes that whole punch in the face part, it's a shame.

The self-righteousness of trollers is every bit as intense as those of the so-called "blowhards" that they target. It's something that I recognize. It's just like the kids who used to haze me when I was a kid, solely because of my Asian ethnicity. There is the same insistence that it's some kind of joke. There is the same delight in cruelty. There is the same self-righteous self assurance that somehow they've struck a blow to make the world a better place.

It is also something that I recognize in myself. The superiority of the Tit-for-Two-Tats strategy seems to be on the level of mathematical truth.

What does 'haze' mean in this context?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazing

Agreed. I is funny that the majority of these 'trolls' would not dare provoke an individual in the real world as they will online. I knew a guy in high school who was extremely passive and timid in the real world, but got the biggest kick out of being an aggressive ass to strangers online - I never understood him, but feel that he knew in the real world, there were consequences for his actions, where online he could get away with it with no recourse. Really cowardice in my opinion.

agreed. Mankind has always had cowards, only difference is that today we would laugh at the people who try hard but fail and fawn over those who gained much without courage, risk or merit.

"They are not distinguished from other men by any unusual skill in finding truth nor any virginal ardour to pursue her. ... It is not excess of thought but defect of fertile and generous emotion that marks them out. Their heads are no bigger than the ordinary: it is the atrophy of the chest beneath that makes them seem so. "

from "Abolition of Man - or Reflections on education with special reference to the teaching of English in the upper forms of schools" http://www.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/arch/lewis/abolition1.h...

Do you not feel that the ability to do things online without fear of some of the recriminations you would receive in real life is also one of the great things about the internet?

If you mean blogging about political issues from within China, then yes.

If you mean forgoing any semblance of social decency for the sole purpose of antagonizing people and destroying positive discourse or social interaction, then no.

Exactly.

I guess it can be argued that you cannot partially support freedom, as it is only sold as the whole, but I also feel that there are laws that can mediate this middle ground.

Although I am not always the biggest fan of 'Johny Law', I do feel that at least the law can step in when harassment or threatening behavior is occurring to reduce its presence. Most of these participating in trolling behaviors would not continue their actions after a couple of rounds in the courts and after paying the associated fines...

And the troll communities are aware of this. The only problem is that, as the article points out, no objective standard of "cyberbullying" can be established. Most of it does not even fall into the ethically debatable category of hate speech, despite the meaningless spam of ethnic slurs these groups use.

The troll groups will push the law a lot more softly than they'll push private citizens -- they crack down on child pornography in their own ranks to avoid being "v&" ("vanned", or "sent for a ride in the party van" -- the FBI). So if we extend the van-hammer to mere insults, we might get them to back down... but do you want to live in a country where calling someone names on the internet, even horrible hateful names with full intent to hurt feelings and disrupt mental equanimity, gets you arrested?

While I do feel that the anonymity provided on the internet has great value, I also feel that positive things can be exploited in a negative and counter productive manner.

Just as trolls exploit this aspect of privacy to attack people that they likely would not have the courage to in the real world, so too do pedophiles exploit children that they otherwise would not in the real world. Using this same anonymity, con artists, thieves and all varieties of low lives are able to orchestrate their attacks and subvert the societal protections that would obstruct or prevent their attacks in the real world.

I guess it is all about the person and their moral compass, or in some case, the lack there of. I certainly do not believe that this privacy should be removed from the net - actually I strongly support its preservation. This said, I make a habit of only doing or saying things online that I would also do or say in the real world.

I do however feel that when these facets of anonymity are exploited to the degree that a criminal offense is occurring, the douche bags who are crossing the line should be tracked down and handled - i.e. the story in this article of the parents receiving multiple calls from little pricks after their son's suicide - I am pretty sure that can at the least be construed as harassment and should be criminally perused as such.

In this example, you have misguided youths tormenting individuals who are already suffering greatly - these same youths a) would not like this being done to them had their parents or siblings also died (golden rule) and b) likely would not do this without the separation of the web or the phone system our of fear of having their asses kicked, which is sad in itself...

Such articles prepare a ground for laws which will hurt everyone. Exaggerating trolls influence leads to a cure that is worse then the disease.

Sorry, I don't see anything exaggerated about intentionaly trying to hurt epileptics to "make them aware of the precautions they need to take."

He who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither </quote>

I don't want a political debate here. My e-mail is in the profile.

If you are going to use the quote, get it right:

"Those who would sacrifice essential liberty for temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety"

(note the words "essential" and "temporary" in there, the interesting discussion is about what qualifies as essential liberty in this debate and whether or not the safety provided would be temporary or have a more lasting effect.)

The really interesting discussion is how a quote became an axiom.

Don't your believe in authority arguments?

I kind of hope the father of an epileptic shoots one of these griefers with a deer rifle in order to "make them aware that they should be wearing ballistic vests".

I hope no one is shot.

Oh I'm sorry, it would seem you got confused on your way to YouTube and ended up here. For the record, the solution to every problem or disagreement isn't "shoot the offender."

It is a quality YouTube-style comment, however; you've even gotten specific as to the type of rifle, suggesting you've given more than a moment's thought to this punishment.

Needs more capital letters and cussing, though.

Actually, for me the comment is so sarcastic to the point of being funny (hunter: do you really think that that vigilante act would bring justice or would it be disproportionate?). But, these trollers are lying when they say "look, because we did this, it shows that you should be more alert to people who can also do it but actually intend harm." Or, "we've hurt your feelings, maybe you need to toughen up cupcakes, next time it could concern something that actually mattered." To me, the serious trollers do intend harm for the most part and they say it in this interview. Their excuses are a lie. They are the practical jokers that go overboard, placing white hats over their black hats when things go bad.

I saw a documentary once of a team of people boarding a plane during its refueling and restocking at an airport. They ran down the aisles jumping around. Their message of "look what we can do and no one can stop us" should be taken seriously, and they had then intent to help.

If someone wants to do some white-hat cracking for real benefit, why not announce it before the act has taken place and do it in a way where the recipient can at least first respond and say, "no, we'll do it ourselves" or thanks go ahead. If they ignore such a warning, the cracker can go ahead and at least have some form of recourse. I can't see many crackers doing that anyway, and the whole area's shady. White-hat crackers are usually treated like criminals.

The desire to shock or somehow get a rise out of somebody, supposedly in the interest of education, often reveals that the perpetrator really just wants to shock someone.

It was to illustrate the point that the argument is deeply flawed. Exploiting a weakness in a violent or destructive manner simply to draw attention to it is never acceptable.

If you did believe it to be so, then you would have to carry it out to its logical conclusion and walk around with body armor on.

Perhaps I should have chosen something besides firearms as an example, as they tend to cause a fairly visceral reaction. It wasn't meant to be a "First kill all of the lawyers" post, it was meant to be a "if you believe that nonsense, then you actually do believe in "kill all of the lawyers" justice" post.

No, in context it's clear that this post isn't a real death threat. It's a Guns-and-Ammo-flavored riff designed to subtly point out that attempting to cause seizures in epileptics is, in fact, reckless endangerment with a hint of manslaughter.

The fact that it takes careful literary judgement to tell the difference between this wry comment and a death threat illustrates the central fact of Internet life: software can't prevent trolls. Human beings - editors and mods - are needed to prevent trolls.

Well obviously it's not a real death threat; I've been using the Interwebs a long time and I've never seen a single legit threat of any sort.

Perhaps I misinterpreted the entire comment, but if so it's only because it seems to be common now to threaten or recommend death upon anyone who does anything one doesn't approve of. I've seen enough of that in the real world and I've grown tired of seeing it on the Internet, where most people have no understanding of what they're saying and nobody seems to get that killing the opposing viewpoint is not the solution since their viewpoint is what creates the contrast necessary for you to have one in the first place.

So, to conclude, I apologize to noonespecial for the flame; my patience with an increasingly intelligence-diluted Web wanes.

Thanks, dude. For my part, in the future, I will use "bonk them over the head with a large wooden mallet to make them aware that they should be wearing helmets."

This will both avoid the use of the firearm image (and its strong, overused, negative connotations), and more directly imply that its a humorous post.

Sorry to stir the pot folks, but I am a bit tired of the "I was trying to help them by showing them their weakness" line of BS use to justify violence, destruction, and other blatantly antisocial behavior. I feel quite strongly that they wouldn't be such good sports if someone else were to point out some of their weaknesses in like manner.

How is the article exaggerating? It's publicizing (and arguably somewhat glorifying), but I don't see where it's inaccurate.

I wonder...how many wall street journal and (now) new york times readers will, for the first time in their sheltered lives, head on over to the darkest [1] corner of the internet and see its inevitable bounty of child pron and mutilation pron and cartoonishly extreme racism?

[1] Maybe. There's probably worse... Keep your wsj subscription up, I guess.

All I can say is: A Clockwork Orange was prescient, it just didn't predict the roving bands of violent hooligans would be on the Internet.

> As we walked through Fullerton’s downtown, Weev told me about his day — he’d lost $10,000 on the commodities market, he claimed — and summarized his philosophy of “global ruin.” “We are headed for a Malthusian crisis,” he said, with professorial confidence. “Plankton levels are dropping. Bees are dying. There are tortilla riots in Mexico, the highest wheat prices in 30-odd years.” He paused. “The question we have to answer is: How do we kill four of the world’s six billion people in the most just way possible?” He seemed excited to have said this aloud.

Wait, is this article about reddit users?

Weev is mad that they didn't include his entire philosophy:

http://weev.livejournal.com/305600.html

Fortunately most of us have already seen The Matrix, so we didn't need the refresher.

I had no idea that The One referred to being number one in the MarHedge rankings.

A symptom of the web being the lawless frontier. Eventually, the law will begin to close in on this frontier as it has on every other.

Or customs, at least. The reason trolling doesn't work in the real world is that there are long evolved customs for neutralizing such people, like the idea of private buildings. The first generation of online communities had no protection against them. But these tend to evolve quickly in response to abuses.

But Internet escapism is in large part a rejection of these long-evolved customs. The people who flock to places like /b/ want a place where everything goes. Sure, there will be the equivalent of "private buildings" on the Internet, but there will always be free-for-all places, just as there are places in the real world where typical customs are more relaxed (e.g. Burning Man)

My guess is that as the web matures, there will be some places populated mainly by trolls, like /b/, and that everywhere else will evolve protections against them.

I haven't been to Burning Man, but it doesn't sound like it's a complete free for all. Doesn't it have customs banning certain types of asshole behavior?

I just came back from /b/ with a decapitated man's head laying alongside his genitally-dismembered body now seared into my mind. Sounds like a daily hangout for some.

I just posted this to my Friendfeed:

"A good idea is to have a cross-site commenting system such as Disqus that enables both identity-verified and anonymous commenting and comment viewing. This separates commenters into two groups, those who want to be anonymous and those that do not. The system would not be fault-free, but it would promote responsibilty, encourage better commenting and improve user experience without necessitating modding - one's named identity is the moderating factor. It may not be as fun, but would filter out spam, trolls and junk."

Plastic.com has the feature to post a comment as anonymous even whilst logged-in. Trolls would absolutely love this. Also, anonymous comments can be set to hidden.

Another reason we need to keep anonymity, is that it allows people to report sensitive information, they don't want their names attach to.

Funny anecdote (though I've never been to burning man): There is a very common practice of shirt-cocking, where men only where shirts and nothing on the bottom. A brigade of annoyed burners decided to solve this with a pants cannon. The range was good and the platform was mobile, and shirt-cockers would get bombed with pants and everyone would laugh at them.

So, yeah, there is _some_ policing.

So bsaically what we need is an internet pants-cannon?

That mass of laughing people pointing at the shirtcockers also helped. Community policing with editors that have big guns is already pretty common on the internet. Here we have flag options for the community, and a set of editors. To shoot pants at shirtcocking trolls.

I've been to Burning Man. Its history is such that in the first couple of years it had no customs banning anything. A common interpretation is that this was due to the type of personality of the average attendee (the "we are all in this together" type). An alternative interpretation is that it was less about the predominant personality type (assuming there even is such a thing, as opposed to just situational influence) and just about the relatively low number of attendees (hundreds or single thousands at the time). As it grew to its current size (over 50 thousand attendees last year) more and more rules had to be introduced, and they even have a 'conflict-resolution' group called the Black Rock Rangers.

My experience with Justin.tv has shown me there is a more dangerous kind of troll who will call the police on you, prank call at all hours of the night, make prank deliveries, etc. These more dangerous trolls are mostly enabled by the weak security in our phone system, rather than the internet.

Actually, as I write this, I realize that the solution will not be laws (although I would certainly derive pleasure from seeing these people jailed). The real solution will be VOIP; turning phones into the internet. When you can turn your phone into accept-whitelist-only with a click, mass prank calling will be stopped. When identity can be cryptographically determined, fake calls to pizza places or the police will be stopped.

So we don't actually need laws; we just need a secure phone system.

Wow, it would be fantastic to have your phone controlled by software. For one thing, you could apply the same kind of anti-spam techniques, and since there is a canonical phone number distributor, they would be even more effective.

After reading this article, I am concluding that there are small percentage of trolls who are literally terrorists - impacting other people's lives in a dangerous way. No remorse, too.

In the real world we call them "douche bags"...

I honestly don't understand why this is getting modded up as much as it is.

Because it seems too obvious, or because you disagree?

Because it's crass.

Disagree with it being modded up? Yes, this is more the type of comment I would expect to be modded up ono Reddit.

Disagree with calling "them" "douche bags"? I don't think I've ever called any one a "douche bag". A regional dialect thing, perhaps.

Well, one interesting thing about it is that it points out that such people have always been around, and in turn implies that we could learn how to deal with them online by using techniques we've developed for dealing with them offline.

To clarify, I was referring to the parent comment, not the article. I thought the article was pretty well done.

Unless you're also referring to the comment, in which case I'm baffled.

Well I apologize for my crassness and low brow jab - actually, no I don't. I guess I could have taken the time to articulate some well formed argument about the role of trolls and the underlining motivations for their actions on the net, but why waste the time?

These people are "douche bags" and I think my choice of terminology is concise and to the point. I am sorry if you have lost your sense of humor along the way and that you feel that there is no room for this language in the such a place as hacker news. Ultimately, I feel that the majority of the hacker world (not just on HN) finds a level of comfort and 'release' in the usage of such terminology - ex. Linus and his 'masturbating monkey' comment or the massive amounts of profanity widely known to be in source...

Not to attack you or your opinion, as we are all entitled, but just as you have (apparently) grown tired of low-brow language, I too have grown tired of the condescending tone of many people on here as well. Instead of taking the "holier than thou" route against my comment, how about taking your time to compose an original thought of your own in regards to THIS STORY - not my comment, an action I feel detracts from the value of HN far more than my selection of the descriptor "douche bags" to describe trolls.

I have absolutely no issue with your language. I have no issue with you commenting however you feel like commenting.

I do have an issue with that kind of comment being modded up as high it is, not because the comment has any value, but because it's crass and/or people want to say "me too".

As for me, I have posted several comments in regard to this story. If you can spend so much time composing a reply to perceived criticism, perhaps you could have spent that time composing a thoughtful comment on the story instead?

I think people tend to upmode comments which they agree with and/or short funny comments.

Perhaps - I wish I weren't out of hero cookies - I would give you one for sure. Perhaps even 2.

I didn't either, until after 5 visits I noticed it was still high, so I read the article. Actually kind of interesting.

In the overwhelming majority of cases, the troller thinks of his/her victims as the "douche bag." They think of their "joke" as some kind of blow for truth.

When I was in college eons ago I used an IRC channel that was taken over by trolls. Taken over might be an exaggeration... they showed up, took channel ops, and never left. The original regulars just kept chatting as usual.

Anyway, the thing I find most bizarre is that the trolls who took over my IRC channel only talked about weird anti-semitic conspiracy theories. The stuff they discussed was exactly the same as what the "Weev" character from this article talks about on his livejournal page. I also had never looked at encyclopedia dramatica before... i guess internet troll culture is heavily intertwined with the white supremacy movement? Or is all the jewish conspiracy stuff part of the joke?

It's part of the joke. Several friends of mine are active trolls, and in person they're pretty well-balanced. Their saying things like that is entirely because they know it'll offend people.

Wow - what a great article- I never thought characters like Weev actually existed. Definitely makes the sound of cars passing by more interesting.

I actually found moot's new robot9000 banning algorithm to be interesting. I'd like to hear more about it. Banning people for progressively larger periods of time seems to be a decent idea.

Actually, it's Randall Munroe's: http://blag.xkcd.com/2008/01/14/robot9000-and-xkcd-signal-at...

The leading photo is hilarious.

As I was reading this article, a song called "Most Terrible Archer" by Joy Electric came on. While it was probably not written about trolls, I couldn't help seeing the connections:

  Separate your chief anxieties
  Cut the cord, but you won't
  Excommunicate from our society
  Are you bold? You are not

  Oh no
  The most terrible, terrible
  Archer
  
  You among the league of militants
  How little you have learned
  Tried and failed to be one of the innocents
  Little left of yourself
  
  Little left of myself
  Little right of yourself

It's kind of funny how mean/trollish a lot of the comments to this article are here.

Actually, it makes perfect sense. Agression is the natural reaction to hurt.

Oh, it's certainly understandable. Showing hurt is how the trolls win, because that's what they feed off of. And especially responding with aggression, you're going down to the level of the troll.

ED was having serious bandwidth/funding issues already. Looks like it's down again now; getting this kind of publicity was probably the surest way to kill it dead.

Oh no! Where would people find documentation of underage girls and their webcam pics?!

jj.am.

What's with all the MSM coverage of 4chan lately? Why, of all Internet communities, does the New York Times write about its filthiest cesspool?

It makes for good TV and sells. That's why the press.

> said one ex-troll

Once a troll, always a troll.

There are many different kinds and levels of trolling. Most trolls are reasonable people who refuse to post racism or affect others IRL, but get a kick out of stimulating controversial discussion or "pwning" others (Rickroll, etc.) in harmless ways online. One of my best trolls, in 2000, was when I hit a Magic: the Gathering forum and started the rumor that the ink on old Magic cards has a 10-year lifespan and that valuable cards would soon become illegible. It's obnoxious and hilarious, but no one is harmed or harassed by this.

The fringe, though, is clearly getting out of hand. For 95% of trolls, it's an embarrassing hobby held by a small set of neurotic, but otherwise normal and upstanding, individuals. It's like a video game, in terms of its addictive nature, and also the ease with which the practice can absorb an unreasonable proportion of one's time. Unfortunately, the truly rotten 5% is giving the rest of the trolls a terrible name by doing things that are unacceptable by any standard, internet or "IRL".

There are really two types of trolls and they're completely different things. One type is the person who does rickrolls, feigns ignorance in technical forums, and generally is more of a prankster than anything else.

And then there are people who would be best described as terrorists. These are the people who drive teens to suicide. These are the people who send death threats to Kathy Sierra. These are the ones who need to be arrested for harassment.

I wonder how this story is doing on reddit...

There's a wide spectrum of behavior that is categorized as "trolling", from the obnoxious but harmless to the outright criminal. Rickrolling people on message boards and harassing people IRL don't deserve the same word.

Anyone who affects others' real lives has no right to use the "trolling" excuse. It's just unacceptable.

Also, the people claiming, in that article, to have made large sums of money from their trolling activities are lying. Trolls always exaggerate their "accomplishments" to absurd degrees, taking credit for others' "work" and blowing the external effects/importance of their trolling way out of proportion.

I just had an idea for how to turn the trolling phenomenon into potentially very lucrative profits for a startup. Anybody interested?

On the one hand, I don't want to give away my idea. On the other hand, implementing it might take several people working on it for a few months. What should I do?

Give away the idea to several people in the hopes that they hear the idea and want to work on it.

I think there is value in the idea itself. If I just give it away for free, whoever implements it has no incentive to share the profits with me.

If I share the idea, I make no money from it. If I don't share, I might one day have enough time to implement it myself, or run into people I can trust 100%. If these are the only options, I HAVE TO choose the latter, and not share it for now :-(

But you have to ask yourself, what are you doing currently that is more valuable than the idea, and if that is the case, then how valuable is the idea to you at all?

If what you are doing right now isn't as valuable as the idea, then why not work on it (right now, with someone you trust) instead?

Good point. I'll try to explore how trolling can be converted into cash flow more closely. Thanks.

Troll? At least I thought at first. But the last commment was too reasonable.

Sounds odd, but potentially interesting. Anti-troll software?

I know a few trolls, but mostly small potatoes; I wouldn't associate with the ones who affect people's lives. Anyway, feel free to contact me at magus.pwnsen at gmail dot com

It's not as so much anti-troll as it is pro-money :-)

In any case, I'm interested. Let me know what your idea is and I'll provide feedback on whether or not I think it can succeed.

Golf clap

Well its obvious what this article wants, for the government to step in and regulate people from hurting your feelings.

Seriously when have we become a country of pussies?

That's not the conclusion I got from the article.

Yes, the parents of Mitchell Henderson are indeed pussies. It's unbelievable that they could be so thin skinned about a few harmless prank calls... come on, it's only the suicide of their child we're talking about!

Being outraged by a problem is not synonymous with wanting the government to fix it. Bringing attention to a problem is not synonymous with begging for new laws.

I've been on the receiving end of prank calls. When I first reported it to the police, the officer assigned to my case seemed to have the attitude that I was just thin skinned. That changed the moment I played him a recording I made of the callers. After that, he was just as motivated to track them down as I was.

They turned out to be a bunch of teenage boys of low socioeconomic status. Their only reason for singling me out was my name which they had run across in the phone book. (The listing was in error -- it was supposed to be unlisted.) I suspect that their delight in the cruelty was enhanced by their conclusion that I was a poor immigrant who couldn't afford advanced features on his phone line. I suspect that they were happy to finally find someone "lower" than themselves to pick on.

If you've never been the subject of arbitrary cruelty by some kind of mob, then you don't really know what it's like. And if you don't know what it's like to grow up in a society that brands you as somehow inferior, such that cruelty to you constitutes some kind of "joke" then there's something else you don't really know.

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