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Title: Internet Trolls Really Are Psychos
Source:
Forbes
URL Source: [None]
Published: Jul 15, 2018
Author: Roger Dooley
Post Date: 2018-07-15 14:02:55 by tpaine
Keywords: None
Views: 3437
Comments: 33
Internet Trolls Really Are Psychos Roger Dooley i Oct 6, 2014, 06:02am 30,020 views If you've ever managed an online community, a blog, or a brand's Facebook page, you have encountered the dreaded "troll." These community members can be provocative and rude, and are known for creating posts for the sole purpose of agitating their fellow members. Trolls add inflammatory comments not because they hope to inform or convince others, but because they know they'll spark an avalanche of negativity. Left unchecked, trolls can destroy communities. Helpful members tire of the conflict and eventually leave. Trolls present a challenge to community managers not just because of their toxic behavior, but because they don't always overtly break community rules. Many people make comments that prove to be inflammatory, often unintentionally. Trollish behavior is evident only after a pattern of such comments emerges. Conventional wisdom says that the anonymity of the Internet lets people behave in ways they never would in real life, or online if their identity was known. But, if you think that means that trolls are normally nice people who only act out in their online persona, think again. New research shows that internet trolls are, in real life, narcissists, psychopaths, and sadists. The paper's title, Trolls Just Want To Have Fun, is amusing, but the findings are anything but funny. Canadian researchers surveyed more than a thousand internet users about their commenting behavior. They then administered a personality test designed to measure, among other things, what's known as the Dark Tetrad. That's a measure of negative traits: sadism, psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism. The correlation between these negative traits and trollish behavior was striking. No other kind of community participation showed such a relationship. The research validates what most community managers have always believed: trolls are awful people in real life, too. These results may not be of much use in curbing trolls online, but it does suggest that trying to stop the behavior by gentle coaching is doomed to fail most of the time. That, too, won't surprise experienced community operators. In my years of community building, I've seen a few trolls that actually tried to mend their ways but inevitably reverted to their old ways. Since trolls actually derive pleasure from the suffering of others, engaging with them at all can be counter-productive. Instead, follow the simple maxim of experienced community leaders: "Don't feed the trolls." Roger Dooley is the author of Brainfluence: 100 Ways to Persuade and Convince Consumers with Neuromarketing (Wiley, 2011). Find Roger on Twitter as @rogerdooley and at his website, Neuromarketing.
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 13.
#3. To: tpaine (#0)
I'm not a psycho, just a geek of sorts, and I don't find much cause to do it here (blocking Jameson was a better solution than wasting time on that loser), but I absolutely *love* to poke hardcore leftists on their own-dominated forums - just to remind them of their massive failures and idiocies and that the normal-person opposition is legion, we don't forget, we don't give up and we're winning. It makes them crazy and thus makes me happy.
I'm surprised they allow that as intolerant as they are and also hate being reminded as to their silliness.
Depends on the site. I lasted about five minutes on Mother Jones, Huffington Post and DU before being consigned to the memory hole.
Yeah that doesn't surprise me, lol.
DU is the mirror image of FR.
Dividing the sheeple for dialectic class warfare. Got caricature?
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If that's psycho, well ok then. I call it schadenfreude.
#9. To: Hank Rearden (#3)
but I absolutely *love* to poke hardcore leftists on their own-dominated forums - just to remind them of their massive failures and idiocies and that the normal-person opposition is legion, we don't forget, we don't give up and we're winning.
#10. To: CZ82 (#9)
I'm surprised they allow that as intolerant as they are and also hate being reminded as to their silliness.
#11. To: Hank Rearden (#10)
I lasted about five minutes on Mother Jones, Huffington Post and DU before being consigned to the memory hole.
#12. To: CZ82, Hank Rearden (#11)
I lasted about five minutes on Mother Jones, Huffington Post and DU before being consigned to the memory hole.
#13. To: Deckard (#12)
DU is the mirror image of FR.
Replies to Comment # 13.
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