Startling discovery about trolls

Joseph S Wisniewski · Nov 13, 2004

aar said:
Why do you waste your precious time

Not that much time. It's sort of relaxiing, like stamp collecting. See an interesting bit of troll behavior, add it to the database.

aar said:
on trolling here?
(aar)

This is just something I found interesting.

Just like you looked at my posting history, I looked at yours. You have absolutly no right to accuse anyone else of trolling.

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

Joseph S Wisniewski · Nov 13, 2004

Ordell said:
Some nice work, Joseph. How do you get hold of the information?

Well, for the major trolls, this information is wide spread. When Ger Bee was banned, for example, there were threads on 1/2 a dozen forums. Long ones. "Ger bee was banned", "why was he banned", "I got a letter from Ger".

The sammmysams thread stayed up for about 3 days and hit the 150 post limit, before it was deleted. With such constant posting, it stays up on the top of a forum page (well, except for a hyperactive forum page like a Nikon or Canon SLR forum) constantly, so it's always in your face.

And you can't have spent years on USENET without encountering Gene Windell.

Aside from that, I've mentioned "troll watching" and tracking trolls enough in the Open Talk forum that folks in forums that I don't visit, like the Canon, Sony, or KM forums, email me their troll sightings.

Ordell said:
And that happens outside dp, like the deceased person. Impressive.

Not that impressive. When jacques passed away, it was the number one conversation topic in the Fuji SLR forum for days. You couldn't miss it.

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

Joseph S Wisniewski · Nov 13, 2004

RJNedimyer said:
Joseph,

[NOTE: I spend little to no time on the Nikon and Canon forums so
this might be the reason].
While I probably would not consider Ger Bee a troll,

Ger Bee may fit the classic definition of a "net kook". Once he latched onto something he liked, he ascribed it almost spiritual or magical qualities. And later, when he moved on to something else, the old "magical" things suddenly became, for lack of a better term, evil.

I really haven't had the inclination to break the database down into classic categories, such a troll (in the true "hit and run" sense, flame baiter, net kook. It's really a very small database, almost too small to support such categories...

RJNedimyer said:
he was at
times way out of line . Interestingly, at other times he was calm,
and reasoned, and even kind;

That's a characteristic of most of the people I mentioned, except SG10.

RJNedimyer said:
perhaps he has a an itch that he is
unable to scratch on the anniversity of his joining.

I think the same yearly itch that put him up to joining, also put him up to the weird behavior on anniversary dates...

RJNedimyer said:
An interesting note I have noticed some people repeatedly become
ill within a week or so of their birth date. Others have noted this
but I have not been able to find enough data for a study as to
causes.

Now that would be interesting. And an easy project if one had access to a decent database, such as that of a large insurance company. I bet it wouldn't be too hard to get such an organization interested in the project. If you can predict a "scheduled" illness, you can take countermeasures, and that should save a fortune (literally) in claims.

RJNedimyer said:
Your comments might mean there are other factors than just time of
year factors.

I did look at time of year. On USENET, you used to see dramatic upturns in trolling at the beginning of the school year, when people suddenly had computer access. Now access is so ubiquitous that time of year doesn't seem to play that much part in it.

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

aruzinsky · Nov 13, 2004

The notion of trolling is based on intent. Accusing someone of being a troll requires that you believe that you know their intent and that intent is to cause bad verbal behaviour in others. Since you are not a mind reader, you have no proof that anyone is a troll. Pretending that you know intent and appointing yourself as mind police is much more harmful to society than any true trolling.

You probably fit the same psychological profile as the people who burned witches 300 years ago and convict innocent people of child molestation today. You remind me of the pod people in the second remake of the Invasion of the Bodysnatchers. Whenever you see someone not of your kind, you point your finger at them and let out a loud whine.

Joseph S. Wisniewski said:
It appears trolls have an annual cycle, like salmon swimming
upstream to spawn.

They frequently go on a rampage at yearly intervals, following
their joining of dpReview. These rampages are often severe enough
to result in banning. Cases in point:

Ger Bee - one of the sites most famous trolls. System switcher,
trolls about Nikon, Canon, Epson.
Joined October 25, 2000. Banned October 18, 2004, 7 days from his
"anniversary" date, after getting a bit too wild in one of his
Nikon D2H threads

Dan Frederiksen - with conspiracy theories involving aliens, the
government, the camera companies, and Phil
Joined August 20, 2003. Banned August 27, 2004, again 7 days from
his anniversary, for swearing repeatedly to Phil.

SG10 - famous anti-Foveon troll
Joined September 22, 2002. Banned September 23, 2003, one day from
his anniversary.

sammmysams - one of the four trolls known to have made a "master
troll" post, a single inflammatory post that gathers 149 responses
while the troll just sits back and watches, without the troll
having to "fan the flames" with additional posts
Joined May 18. 2002. Banned Mat 23, 2003, five days from his
anniversary.

Captain Obvious - a wanderer who would flame anyone in any forum.
Joined January 12, 2003. Banned January 10, 2004, 2 days fromhis
anniversary.

Here's the breakdown of the 32 trolls I'm currently tracking
17 - still with us
6 - banned within 3 weeks of their anniversary
3 - got tired and left
2 - banned within 2 months of joining
2 - banned more than 2 months before or after their anniversary date
1 - deceased

So, what is it with these poor wretches? What happened in Ger Bee's
life in late October, or Dan Frederiksen's in late August, that
cause them to act so strangely every year at a particular time? Why
do more than half the trolls who manage to get themselves banned,
get banned within 3 weeks of their anniversary date? That's a
pretty small window.

--
Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post
something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

--
Author of SAR Image Processor and anomic sociopath
http://www.general-cathexis.com

Joseph S Wisniewski · Nov 13, 2004

John Marsh said:
Joseph S. Wisniewski said:

--
Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post
something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Click to expand...

Good idea but I can't think of anything "useful" to add to your
thread.

If you believe my thread is trolling, but you can't think of anything useful to add, doesn't that make you guilty of trolling?

Personally, I'll put both my original post and your reply down as "fun".

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

Joseph S Wisniewski · Nov 13, 2004

hello goodbyte said:
Could be worse...

...like the porno troll who often used to invade rec.photo.digital,
no posts but just these extremely obscene headers. So you had to
fine tune your kill filter to be on the lookout.

It has been worse. I was witness to an amazing display last month by Bob Ranch. He took a dislike to on particular poster on the Olymous forum, and actually set up at least three different comcast.net accounts, created dpReview ID after ID, and posted the most horrible things, like how he hoped the guy's mother, wife, and children would be tortured and killed by a serial killer, or how he wished that the man would have to watch his family crushed by a collapsing roof in the Florida huricane. The graphic detail of the descriptions made me want to vomit.

This wasn't your typical trolling, it bordered on criminal, and dpReview deleted the accounts and all the associated posts within hours.

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

Joseph S Wisniewski · Nov 13, 2004

aruzinsky said:
The notion of trolling is based on intent. Accusing someone of
being a troll requires that you believe that you know their intent
and that intent is to cause bad verbal behaviour in others. Since
you are not a mind reader, you have no proof that anyone is a
troll. Pretending that you know intent and appointing yourself as
mind police is much more harmful to society than any true trolling.

You probably fit the same psychological profile as the people who
burned witches 300 years ago and convict innocent people of child
molestation today.

You should practice what you preach. "Since you are not a mind reader, you" do not "know" anyone else's "intent", especially mine.

By your criteria, no one could ever be convicted of any crime, because no legal system with which I am familar requires judge, tribunal, or jury to be capable of mind reading.

In the cases I have described, just as in general society, intent is infered by clear, repeated actions. Have you read any of the posts by these people. Go read some SG10 posts: one or two bloody noses is an accident, hundreds of them establish intent.

aruzinsky said:
You remind me of the pod people in the second
remake of the Invasion of the Bodysnatchers. Whenever you see
someone not of your kind, you point your finger at them and let out
a loud whine.

Your response is typical of someone who understands their own character flaws and feels a need to point those same flaws out in others, to make yourself feel better.

Sorry if that's not working out for you.

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

Joseph S Wisniewski · Nov 13, 2004

Severian said:
Joseph S. Wisniewski said:

I tested a few. My favorite was "Normally, a signature this small
can't open it's own jumpgate", but no one got the B5 reference.

Click to expand...

Well, no-one responded perhaps. But I appreciated it.

Thanks. Maybe I'll bring it back.

Severian said:
What is JMS working on these days, I wonder.

He took some time out to write a comic book called "Rising Stars". Had two new B5 spinoffs and a movie project cancled.

And is currently working on something known only as TMoS, which rumor has it is not B5 related.

Severian said:
Severian

"The avalanche has already begun. It is too late for the pebbles
to vote" -- Ambassador Kosh

I like that one. Even people who don't know B5 would appreciate how that quote ties into digital photography.

We can debate the direction this stuff will take (CMOS vs. CCD vs. Foveon, the future of film, 4/3 system vs. propriatary systems) but we are the pebbles, and the avalanche is in progress.

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

Joseph S Wisniewski · Nov 13, 2004

Severian said:
What is JMS working on these days, I wonder.

Post apocolyptic series called Jeremiah. Made for cable, aired on ShowTime.

http://www.sho.com/site/jeremiah/home.do

http://www.tvtome.com/Jeremiah/index.html

It starred Malcolm-Jamal Warner ('The Cosby Show' and 'Malcolm and Eddie') and Luke Perry (soap operas and B movies).

Unless a miracle happens, it's cancelled at the end of the current (second) season.

There's a write in campaign, if you want to help save a series that you've never even seen.

http://home.comcast.net/~westalliance/index.html

TMoS is a B5 movie "Babylon 5: The Memory of Shadows".

http://worldsofjms.com/projects.htm

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

tko · Nov 13, 2004

Maybe because you don't frequent the Panasonics Forum? Ove Sentlig aka Fredrik aka Microsaft has been a persistent thorn on this site for quite some time. He doesn't own a Panasonic of any type, yet posts unwanted and incorrect advice on the Panasonic board, with more posts than just about any other member. Despite his third ban, he keeps on coming back.

Yup, all three bannings occured in about one year. When they leave it's like the construction crew next door knocking off for the day.

Tom Rowland · Nov 13, 2004

BorisK1 said:
That's a pretty funny study!

Before you know it, somebody's virtual personality, posing as a
psychiatrist, will be treating online personas with virtual
problems, and a virtual statistician will find a very real trend in
diagnosis...

Another poorly documented case is the 1982–1983 saga of AlexAndJoan from the CompuServe forums. Van Gelder, a reporter for Ms. magazine, documented the incident in 1996 in an article for his publication. Alex (in real life a 50+ shy Jewish psychiatrist from New York) pretended to be a highly bombastic, anti-religious, post-car-accident, wheelchair-bound, mute woman named Joan "in order to better relate to his female patients". This went on for two years and "Joan" had become a hugely detailed character with an array of emotional relationships. These began to fall apart only after "Joan" coaxed an online friend of hers into an affair with Alex.

Here is the source url

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

charlesh · Nov 13, 2004

too, too much time on your hands. I can't believe someone would actually track things to the extent that you have. To each his own, I guess. Me, I like spending less time on the forums and more time outside actually using my cameras. Trolls, I could care less about them because in the grand scheme of things, they don't really matter.
Charles
http://www.pbase.com/charles_hess

Joseph S. Wisniewski said:
It appears trolls have an annual cycle, like salmon swimming
upstream to spawn.

They frequently go on a rampage at yearly intervals, following
their joining of dpReview. These rampages are often severe enough
to result in banning. Cases in point:

Ger Bee - one of the sites most famous trolls. System switcher,
trolls about Nikon, Canon, Epson.
Joined October 25, 2000. Banned October 18, 2004, 7 days from his
"anniversary" date, after getting a bit too wild in one of his
Nikon D2H threads

Dan Frederiksen - with conspiracy theories involving aliens, the
government, the camera companies, and Phil
Joined August 20, 2003. Banned August 27, 2004, again 7 days from
his anniversary, for swearing repeatedly to Phil.

SG10 - famous anti-Foveon troll
Joined September 22, 2002. Banned September 23, 2003, one day from
his anniversary.

sammmysams - one of the four trolls known to have made a "master
troll" post, a single inflammatory post that gathers 149 responses
while the troll just sits back and watches, without the troll
having to "fan the flames" with additional posts
Joined May 18. 2002. Banned Mat 23, 2003, five days from his
anniversary.

Captain Obvious - a wanderer who would flame anyone in any forum.
Joined January 12, 2003. Banned January 10, 2004, 2 days fromhis
anniversary.

Here's the breakdown of the 32 trolls I'm currently tracking
17 - still with us
6 - banned within 3 weeks of their anniversary
3 - got tired and left
2 - banned within 2 months of joining
2 - banned more than 2 months before or after their anniversary date
1 - deceased

So, what is it with these poor wretches? What happened in Ger Bee's
life in late October, or Dan Frederiksen's in late August, that
cause them to act so strangely every year at a particular time? Why
do more than half the trolls who manage to get themselves banned,
get banned within 3 weeks of their anniversary date? That's a
pretty small window.

--
Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post
something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

--
charlesh

aruzinsky · Nov 13, 2004

Joseph S. Wisniewski said:
aruzinsky said:

The notion of trolling is based on intent. Accusing someone of
being a troll requires that you believe that you know their intent
and that intent is to cause bad verbal behaviour in others. Since
you are not a mind reader, you have no proof that anyone is a
troll. Pretending that you know intent and appointing yourself as
mind police is much more harmful to society than any true trolling.

You probably fit the same psychological profile as the people who
burned witches 300 years ago and convict innocent people of child
molestation today.

Click to expand...

You should practice what you preach. "Since you are not a mind
reader, you" do not "know" anyone else's "intent", especially mine.

I don't have to read your mind because I addressed this to "troll stalkers," and you just confessed by answering.

Joseph S Wisniewski said:
By your criteria, no one could ever be convicted of any crime,
because no legal system with which I am familar requires judge,
tribunal, or jury to be capable of mind reading.

Wrong. Plenty of crimes are not intent based. For example, if you drive through a stop sign, you can be ticketed and convicted without proving intent. Your idea of trolling is more akin to a "hate crime" in that proving intent is crucial.

Joseph S Wisniewski said:
In the cases I have described, just as in general society, intent
is infered by clear, repeated actions.

The general populace has low epistemological standards. In Ilinois, USA, the death penalty was lifted because it was proved that an unacceptable percentage of people sentenced to the death penalty are innocent. Adding intent to the list of things to be proven is going to make the reliability of proper convictions a lot worse.

Maybe, Saddam Hussein INTENDED to have weapons of mass destruction. Let's get him for that. We don't need to prove any weapons of mass destruction.

Joseph S Wisniewski said:
Have you read any of the
posts by these people. Go read some SG10 posts: one or two bloody
noses is an accident, hundreds of them establish intent.

No, and these people don't bother me. Sticks and stone may break my bones, etc.

Joseph S Wisniewski said:
Joseph S Wisniewski said:

You remind me of the pod people in the second
remake of the Invasion of the Bodysnatchers. Whenever you see
someone not of your kind, you point your finger at them and let out
a loud whine.

Click to expand...

Your response is typical of someone who understands their own
character flaws and feels a need to point those same flaws out in
others, to make yourself feel better.

Sorry if that's not working out for you.

You are projecting and it IS working for me.

Joseph S Wisniewski said:
--
Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post
something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall.

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com

--
Author of SAR Image Processor and anomic sociopath
http://www.general-cathexis.com

hello goodbyte · Nov 13, 2004

Joseph S. Wisniewski said:
It has been worse. I was witness to an amazing display last month
by Bob Ranch. He took a dislike to on particular poster on the
Olymous forum, and actually set up at least three different
comcast.net accounts, created dpReview ID after ID, and posted the
most horrible things, like how he hoped the guy's mother, wife, and
children would be tortured and killed by a serial killer, or how he
wished that the man would have to watch his family crushed by a
collapsing roof in the Florida huricane. The graphic detail of the
descriptions made me want to vomit.

This wasn't your typical trolling, it bordered on criminal, and
dpReview deleted the accounts and all the associated posts within
hours.

I remember him, Icarius, or something like that, although I missed those particular posts as I was away for a few days.

What I meant was, because the dpreview forums are web based, there's no kill filter so you just have to take what comes. Whereas with the Usenet forums, while many of them are totally unmoderated, there is at least some end user control, unless of course you're looking at the archive and then it's back to the Wild West again.

But I see your point. Things can get pretty rough here. Some of those political threads we've seen over the past few weeks come to mind. But that's a different kind of trolling - you could say that the thread originator was trolling by posting off topic material.

And what's off topic can be quite debatable. Some are blatantly off topic, others are more subtle.

Last week there were two threads about that photographer arrested in Florida, one in News and the other in Open Talk. The former is still alive yet the latter quickly reached 150 and got deleted soon after, it just got too vitriolic, like many of them do.

--

brianj · Nov 13, 2004

I have coined a new term called a 'troll responder' to label such people who must keep on responding to a troll thread.

I have found that if no one responds the thread will very soon die a natural death, but this never occurs because of the troublesome troll responders.

In fact they appear to be more of a problem than trolls themselves and if they were banned we would have no trouble.

Brian

John Marsh · Nov 13, 2004

Joseph S. Wisniewski said:
Personally, I'll put both my original post and your reply down as
"fun".

That was the spirit of my reply.

John

tyoung · Nov 13, 2004

responders to responders that respond to responders of trolls.

Huge problem. Ban them ALL!!! Heck, ban everybody. It's the only way to be sure.

brianj said:
In fact they appear to be more of a problem than trolls themselves
and if they were banned we would have no trouble.

--
Tom Young
http://www.pbase.com/tyoung/

Frits Thomsen · Nov 13, 2004

Joseph S. Wisniewski said:
It appears trolls have an annual cycle, like salmon swimming
upstream to spawn.

They frequently go on a rampage at yearly intervals, following
their joining of dpReview. These rampages are often severe enough
to result in banning. Cases in point:

Ger Bee - one of the sites most famous trolls. System switcher,
trolls about Nikon, Canon, Epson.
Joined October 25, 2000. Banned October 18, 2004, 7 days from his
"anniversary" date, after getting a bit too wild in one of his
Nikon D2H threads

Dan Frederiksen - with conspiracy theories involving aliens, the
government, the camera companies, and Phil
Joined August 20, 2003. Banned August 27, 2004, again 7 days from
his anniversary, for swearing repeatedly to Phil.

SG10 - famous anti-Foveon troll
Joined September 22, 2002. Banned September 23, 2003, one day from
his anniversary.

Hmmm.. I believe SG10 was actually a pro- foveon troll, and I am quite certain that he/she is still posting in the Sigma forum, under another name of course, and much more quiet now....
--
Frits Thomsen
http://www.pbase.com/yoicz

Dimitrios · Nov 13, 2004

But he will likely return with another nick, as any genuine troll will do!
--
Dimitrios

Mareda · Nov 13, 2004

tko said:
Maybe because you don't frequent the Panasonics Forum? Ove Sentlig
aka Fredrik aka Microsaft has been a persistent thorn on this site
for quite some time. He doesn't own a Panasonic of any type, yet
posts unwanted and incorrect advice on the Panasonic board, with
more posts than just about any other member. Despite his third ban,
he keeps on coming back.

Yup, all three bannings occured in about one year. When they leave
it's like the construction crew next door knocking off for the day.

One year? TKO, he's only been at this since September of this year. It only seems like a year because the Panatroll has been unrelenting in hijacking nearly every thread that gets started and has chased away many of the regulars. He keeps shoving this Z3 down everyone's throats like a madman with little lens syndrome. Thank goodness he told everyone he was going away for the weekend. We need a rest.

Maureen

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