Troll Handling

[rbb36]

Any public forum eventually has to learn to deal with trolls. This forum may run into the problem sooner than is common. Trolls can be successfully mitigated, particularly if the community as a whole knows how to handle them.

There is a nice article on handling trolls here:

http://blog.blogtalkradio.com/blogtalkradio/5-tips-for-handling-haters-trolls-and-negativity/

Main points:

1. Do not engage with trolls in the public forum space. Public arguments are their primary form of entertainment. The whole community should be encouraged to not give these parasites what they want -- attention.

2. Notify an admin or moderator. At the bottom of each post is a link titled, "Report to moderator." That is a quick and easy way to notify a moderator that you suspect the post is trollish. A moderator can then take a closer look at the post and the user who posted to see if it is actually a problem or just someone having a grumpy day.

3. Have a policy. I talked to Pierre on the phone briefly about this. Here is a simple example, excerpted from a link in the above article:

"Personal attacks, rudeness, vulgarity, profanity and spam won't be tolerated. All posts/threads crossing the line will be unceremoniously removed. Posts and threads that do nothing but bash BlogTalkRadio or are in general a negative experience will also be removed. Folks who wish to turn the BlogTalkRadio forum experience into a negative one for this community will be banned from participation."

4. Ban the offender. Admins / moderators should use appropriate discretion in this practice, but letting a troll poison the community is a greater offense to the good folks who come here than is banning the troll.

5. Moderation of a forum like this is not censorship. Again, appropriate discretion is important, but removing a counterproductive post rather than letting it damage the community is entirely valid. This is not the public square, it is a meeting place for sociable discussion of the screen printing business. Posts which run counter to that objective are not appropriate.

The most important bit is number 1. Don't feed the trolls. If they never get what they're looking for, they will quickly grow bored and go away even if administration and moderation are not perfectly effective or immediate.

Hope this helps!

Bob

[blue moon]

as mentioned in another post, I like the idea of being suspended when a certain level of negative karma is reached and banned if it gets any lower.

This way it is community enforced.

any thoughts?

[Frog]

We can play it by ear.
Some folks will rate each post, others only the outstanding, or especially helpful or hurtful.

One needs ten posts to even activate the options right?

[blue moon]

We can play it by ear.
Some folks will rate each post, others only the outstanding, or especially helpful or hurtful.

One needs ten posts to even activate the options right?

Yes, 10 posts for karma to kick in. We can raise that if deemed necessary.
Pricing board is hidden until 50 posts (regular member status is achieved).

As far as karma, it will all level out in the end. Ppl that are most helpful will have the highest numbers. Anybody causing problems will be in the negative. There is a limitation on how many karma points can be awarded per hour (1/hour), so we should not have a case of somebody clicking the negative 20 times in the row and getting another person suspended. I don't know if there is a way to find out where the karma points came from. We might want to verify that they are not all from one person before booting somebody off.

[Frog]

I think that though, a little less than totally democratic, a little discussion among administration and moderators may also be in order when and if an example of that situation arises.

The flip side is there as well. The nature of this board has already been established as less than "all posters are created equal", and with that in mind, executive decisions may need to be made in a more timely fashion.

Let's hope not.

Play nice, and be careful out there. 

[blue moon]

Luckily, we have Frog to protect us from the spiders!