Much ado about nothing

ralph.ronnquist · 2018-06-11 13:44:35

Several years ago a new "feature" was implemented on this forum. It sparked a barrage of sometimes charged comments but not one of them predicted the future of this experiment correctly. It was only used a few times, quickly became a non-issue and then was forgotten in time! All that remains is an ignore function which some might find useful.

This forum has now gained a Troll Deterrent Extension, which involves the following:

The Display tab of the Profile page now includes an entry field where you can nominate usernames that you figure are trolls.
Any post by a troll of yours is replaced, for you, by a blanket notice instead of actual content. You can only see their posts if you withdraw the nomination.
In addition, there is a Troll Count in the user information area of all posts. This shows how many members consider the poster to be a troll. This however is only shown when the count exceeds a threshold.The current threshold is 2, i.e., if 2 or more members figure a poster being a troll, then the poster's Troll Count is shown to everyone, including guests, for all of that member's posts. The Troll Count Display Threshold is an administration option.

At the moment, the Troll Deterrent Extension is in English only.

yeti · 2018-06-11 13:56:41

This feature almost certainly will be abused.

cynwulf · 2018-06-16 20:11:14

yeti wrote:

This feature almost certainly will be abused.

+1

I'm sure this has been implemented with the very best of intentions.....

ralph.ronnquist · 2018-06-16 21:09:56

Perhaps one of you could spell out a way in which this might be abused, or rather I assume, a way in which this function can be used to abuse someone?

Is it that you think, that by X seeing an elevated troll count for Y, they (X) would be more inclined than otherwise to also nominate Y as troll? Or that Y would be unhappy seeing that so many members see them as a troll?

If Y is trolling in the eyes of some/many, then Y is trolling in the eyes of some/many, whether Y thinks so or not.
Without feedback, Y won't learn or change.

devuser · 2018-06-16 21:14:31

The only abuse potential i could come up from the top of my head is registering lots of sock puppets and having each mark user X as a troll thereby making X look like, well, a troll.

Anyways, are there even trolls here yet? No, don't look at me... I am just confused sometimes

golinux · 2018-06-16 21:19:00

Thankfully, for the moment this is a troll-free zone.

(Make a sacrifice to your favorite idol to ensure that it stays that way . . . LOL!!!)

Dutch_Master · 2018-06-16 21:55:50

I'd raise the threshold for defining a troll a little to, say, 5. A true troll will annoy enough members to meet this figure, but it will not falsely accuse a member who has a disagreement with one or more others about trivial, or controversial, matters. Like, which DE or text editor is the best, whether Devuan should do a full implementation of systemd (please don't! ) or even which music player to designate as standard for a minimal install. And members should be able to revoke their vote if/when they find it was wrongly applied.

Just me tuppence lads!

MiyoLinux · 2018-06-16 22:01:40

cynwulf wrote:

+1
I'm sure this has been implemented with the very best of intentions.....

WOW! It's good to "see" you cynwulf!

As to the troll possibilities...

All of this X and Y stuff has given me a nervous jerkdown in remembrance of high school algebra; whereas, it has conjured up memories of mathematical formulas that I use in my work today; therefore (and as a byproduct), I am reminded of basic sentence structure; as such, I am reminded of basic English punctuation and must reprimand myself for using run-on sentences; however, I like using lots of punctuation n'stuff...whether it's called for or not ('cause that's the way I roll); as such, I trust that most here are level headed enough to recognize trollism and will mark said trolls appropriately...n'stuff...n'other stuff n'such...n'stuff.

fsmithred · 2018-06-17 00:06:42

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is just an ignore filter with a public record of who is being ignored (but not a public record of who is doing the ignoring.)

Did I get it right? Or does the ignored get to find out who is doing the ignoring? I know if I got ignored, I'd like to know who is ignoring me, so that I could decide whether I care or not.

ralph.ronnquist · 2018-06-17 00:18:45

You got it right. There is no way you can find out who are ignoring you (short of bribing me to tell you, of course).

ralph.ronnquist · 2018-06-17 01:24:03

Just to add some motivation:

My assertion is that when you are trolling, you are trolling whether you think so or not; it's not up to you, as a troll, to judge it right or wrong. Further, I believe some people would be too polite to nominate a troll if they thought the troll would see them doing it. They would rather suffer the trolling, and that would dull any edge of this extension.

The troll list is that little bit different from an ignore list in publishing the count, in the hope that it both stimulates people to evaluate the (perhaps) trolling posts more thoughtfully, and triggers self-criticism for the (somewhat) trolling poster.

fungus · 2018-06-17 11:02:29

Dutch_Master wrote:

I'd raise the threshold for defining a troll a little to, say, 5. A true troll will annoy enough members to meet this figure, but it will not falsely accuse a member who has a disagreement with one or more others about trivial, or controversial, matters.

In 15th century Spain someone who would publicly advocate that the earth is a sphere, if he could escape the inquisition, they would match this definition of a troll. But there are countless other examples where this definition would fail miserably.

The real issue is whether this communication mode that is implemented can be applied in true physical relations and communication. Can you shut someone up in a group and stay within a group? If you start slipping more and more to where your digital communication deviates more and more to the mode of physical communication then this mode will affect the social relations you and everyone has outside wires and radiowaves. Sociologically this has a tremendous significance, and maybe I should be speaking in past tense already.. Is it my perception or do we know people who are very polite and popular in social media but in real life they are monsters that nobody cares to talk to, and vise versa. The importance here is not on one to one communication, but communication within a group, family, work, school, neighborhood, etc.

I am not implying there is a fault at this specific policy or there is a better one, but how we tend to deviate from being social beings to being social media beings, isolated in tiny little cults made of electrons. Emphasis on the freedom of isolation, therefore the freedom to depart from humanity.

It is a sad state of affairs anyway you want to look at it. The internet has given the ability to everyone to become a little dictator and shut anyone off. At some point we have to make the distinction on whether we are part of the engineers or part of what is being engineered. We are legitimizing any oppressive regime in doing exactly what we individually do. And that is OK?

Panopticon · 2018-06-17 11:45:44

Are you saying this forum is akin to an oppressive regime and legitimizing it by such an advisory stated in the OP fungus?

Me thinks you are reading into this too much. The internet is a tool, not a social experiment in my opinion and those that want to use it for social purposes will reap the rewards good and bad. Im still analog when it comes to being social.

Analog and digital signals are used to transmit information, usually through electric signals. In both these technologies, the information, such as any audio or video, is transformed into electric signals. The difference between analog and digital technologies is that in analog technology, information is translated into electric pulses of varying amplitude. In digital technology, translation of information is into binary format (zero or one) where each bit is representative of two distinct amplitudes.

Last edited by Panopticon (2018-06-17 11:50:38)

devuser · 2018-06-17 13:56:18

While i agree this might be a bit of an overreaction i can see very well where he is coming from. Modern communication is horribly broken. I am on the edge of the age group that grew up with social media and i am seeing the effects quite often. People sitting on the same table not talking to each other but nervously checking their phones in fear they might miss something. Outside who even notices their surroundings anymore? Most of everyone is staring at some little screen and this is just one aspect of it. Not even getting into the whole made up persona thing which is playing a huge part in the success of social media. You are ugly? No problem, just shoot at a different angle. People think you are boring? No problem, just copy some witty picture. Something bothers you? Just block it. Zero effort needed and very very fake. If this trend continues we are looking at a very bleak and cold future.

Last edited by devuser (2018-06-17 14:02:47)

cynwulf · 2018-06-17 16:06:52

ralph.ronnquist wrote:

Is it that you think, that by X seeing an elevated troll count for Y, they (X) would be more inclined than otherwise to also nominate Y as troll? Or that Y would be unhappy seeing that so many members see them as a troll?

Well since you asked, I honestly think it's an appalling idea, which should have no place on any forum, let alone this one.

Cliques often form on messageboards, so it doesn't take much for a clique - in this case only two users - to decide that someone with an opposing viewpoint is a "troll". You will also get more shill accounts registering as a result. In short the troll countermeasures is very likely to attract trolls, people jumping the gun and labeling others and getting others to club together and join in a witch hunt. In effect this would be a "brand" which will cause many users to prejudge that individual rather than adopting a more "speak as you find approach". I'm averse to labels as it is and it seems to me that we're living in a time when they're being used more than ever to neatly "classify" a certain type of person.

I'd also like to see the precedent for this - i.e. troll activity?

ralph.ronnquist wrote:

If Y is trolling in the eyes of some/many, then Y is trolling in the eyes of some/many, whether Y thinks so or not.
Without feedback, Y won't learn or change.

I don't think sites like this one should set out to educate / reform. If someone is being a dickhead, then just deal with that in the traditional manner. Trolling should be something members deal with through dialogue or staff deal with via whatever action is decided on - case by case - not a users' vote up/down or nomination system.

Last edited by cynwulf (2018-06-17 16:22:00)

ChuangTzu · 2018-06-17 16:21:01

vote up/down could turn the forum into a type of reddit....gasp.

yeti · 2018-06-17 16:24:18

cynwulf wrote:

Trolling should be something members deal with through dialogue or staff deal with via whatever action is decided on - case by case - not a users' vote up/down or nomination system.

+1

golinux · 2018-06-17 16:34:35

cynwulf wrote:

If someone is being a dickhead, then just deal with that in the traditional manner.

That would depend on your definition of 'traditional manner'. A troll's knee-jerk defense to any moderation or reason is to play the victim and it's a downward spiral of venom after that.

Disclaimer to those who may point a finger in my direction . . . this mod was not my idea but I'm not opposed to giving it a try. I would however prefer that there be no public "shaming" involved that could incite undesirable results. I do think that stats on users that are having a negative effect on this board are a useful metric for deciding what action if any should be taken.

yeti · 2018-06-17 16:44:19

This troll brand mark count does not need to be public to be useful for the moderators.
And this troll brand mark count should not be public because it biases the reader.

golinux · 2018-06-17 16:45:26

yeti wrote:

This troll brand mark count does not need to be public to be useful for the moderators.
And this troll brand mark count should not be public because it biases the reader.

Didn't I just say that? I totally agree.

cynwulf · 2018-06-17 16:47:52

golinux wrote:

That would depend on your definition of 'traditional manner'. A troll's knee-jerk defense to any moderation or reason is to play the victim and it's a downward spiral of venom after that.

My point is that this seems like adopting a very defensive stance and that in itself attracts trouble. Do you have more than one example of this?

You're saying to "trolls": "you're such a problem we're having to install sorts of shit..."

Which is precisely what drives trolls.

golinux wrote:

Disclaimer to those who may point a finger in my direction . . . this mod was not my idea but I'm not opposed to giving it a try. I would however prefer that there be no public "shaming" involved that could incite undesirable results. I do think that stats on users that are having a negative effect on this board are a useful metric for possible action..

I fail to see the value in the stats.

So if cliques "nominate" trolls what then? As you're very active here, you must know what goes on anyway. Leaving it to certain members to flag someone up, just seems like an open invitation for abuse. You would surely be able to sniff out potential trouble by now.

Sadly there is no "firewall" solution for this and many of these solutions only serve to alienate decent members.

As I said, I'm against this kind of thing, against surveillance, hypocritical "tagging" or treating everyone like a potential problem, just because of the actions of a few. There will always be personalities and those will clash and the tagging will go berserk in such cases. For me it simply has no value.

Last edited by cynwulf (2018-06-17 16:51:31)

Dutch_Master · 2018-06-17 17:34:20

Om further reflection I'm with cynwulf in this case. I run my own forum (nothing to do with OSS) and am a member of another, very large forum (100,000+ members, 1M+ messages, also nothing to do with OSS) which actually removed the 'negative' ratings people could give to posts for precisely the reason stated above: abuse by certain cliques. My own forum runs on phpBB (which doesn't have the ability to rate posts) and I've resisted the urge to upgrade it to a forum engine that does, even though I can see the merits of that, but I'm not willing to spend (much/any) time dealing with those abusing the ratings system.

golinux · 2018-06-17 18:48:27

cynwulf wrote:

I fail to see the value in the stats.

It would give the admins a sense of how users are reacting to questionable posts though as has been mentioned the numbers can be manipulated. In the past, users have on occasion emailed me when they feel someone else on the board has crossed a line. Perhaps public requests in Forum Feedback would be a better option to suggest a need for administrative action. All I know is that there are times when action might be necessary. We just need to figure out the best way to gauge when and what is appropriate.

Thankfully, this board has fewer issues than most because of the maturity of its members.

An another point . . . post ratings are not on our radar so rest easy on that.

And finally . . . the only cliques I have seen here are trolls banding together.

yeti · 2018-06-17 18:54:43

golinux wrote:

yeti wrote:
This troll brand mark count does not need to be public to be useful for the moderators.
And this troll brand mark count should not be public because it biases the reader.
Didn't I just say that?

I started typing before your message was there, wrote half an essay threw it away and boiled it down to the short 2 sentences. That took more then 10 minutes...

golinux wrote:

I totally agree.

;-)

golinux · 2018-06-17 19:32:23

yeti wrote:

I started typing before your message was there, wrote half an essay threw it away and boiled it down to the short 2 sentences.

Yeah, I've done that more than a few times.

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#1 2018-06-11 13:44:35

Much ado about nothing

#2 2018-06-11 13:56:41

Re: Much ado about nothing

#3 2018-06-16 20:11:14

Re: Much ado about nothing

#4 2018-06-16 21:09:56

Re: Much ado about nothing

#5 2018-06-16 21:14:31

Re: Much ado about nothing

#6 2018-06-16 21:19:00

Re: Much ado about nothing

#7 2018-06-16 21:55:50

Re: Much ado about nothing

#8 2018-06-16 22:01:40

Re: Much ado about nothing

#9 2018-06-17 00:06:42

Re: Much ado about nothing

#10 2018-06-17 00:18:45

Re: Much ado about nothing

#11 2018-06-17 01:24:03

Re: Much ado about nothing

#12 2018-06-17 11:02:29

Re: Much ado about nothing

#13 2018-06-17 11:45:44

Re: Much ado about nothing

#14 2018-06-17 13:56:18

Re: Much ado about nothing

#15 2018-06-17 16:06:52

Re: Much ado about nothing

#16 2018-06-17 16:21:01

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#17 2018-06-17 16:24:18

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#18 2018-06-17 16:34:35

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#19 2018-06-17 16:44:19

Re: Much ado about nothing

#20 2018-06-17 16:45:26

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#21 2018-06-17 16:47:52

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#22 2018-06-17 17:34:20

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#23 2018-06-17 18:48:27

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#24 2018-06-17 18:54:43

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#25 2018-06-17 19:32:23

Re: Much ado about nothing

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