Commenting on this particular troll is probably beneath the majority of us.<p>However, on a general note, I think it is important to realize that every text message you send, every cell phone conversation you have, every post to the CNN forum you make, every tweet you send ... is directly attributable to your IP whether you use your own name or not. With Facebook and Google tracking everything you do, whether you are logged in or not, I would go one step further, and say all of these things are directly attributable to you personally.<p>I would strongly urge young people to really think about what they are putting out there. Consider this, the military was doing the equivalent of credit checks for sensitive positions during the 60s. Now you need a credit check to do ANYTHING, even things that don't require credit. How long before an internet and phone background check is standard in the background checks organizations do before offering jobs?<p>I can tell you the military is doing this sort of screening right now for sensitive positions, but at least you are confronted about it. It still basically ends your career, but they will give you a chance to explain your posts. In the private sector in the future, they will just deep six your application and you won't know what happened. Or they'll let you in at entry level, maybe, and subsequently you'll start running up against an invisible barrier as you try to advance beyond the first or second layer of management. Or you will find resistance to you advancing into management at all.<p>Also be mindful, it can affect more than your professional life. Think about what the background checks for apartments will look like in the 2020s. Or what 'dating sites' will be like in the 2020s.<p>Please consider your future before you make comments on ... say ... Hurricane Katrina ... that might be misconstrued. Or post an opinion on ... say ... American soldiers in Afghanistan ... that could be taken out of context and viewed in a negative light.<p>All that said, the absolute best defense against these sorts of situations is just not to be a douche, which isn't very hard. If a guy or girl is dead...leave them in peace. If you can't say something nice...just don't comment.
Trivia:<p>Nimrod 7 is an asshole cyborg character from a Cyberpunk game Bloodnet (Microprose 1993).<p>Basically Nimrod is an excellent cyborg warrior. But if you have him on team you will face A LOT of unprovoked attacks.<p><a href="http://www.sysabend.org/champions/characters/mweisler@rz.uni-osnabrueck.de/Nimrod.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.sysabend.org/champions/characters/mweisler@rz.uni...</a><p>This guy seems to have his character covered pretty well.
I saw the whole episode this snippet came from, and I feel it should be mentioned that the whole thing was very much an assault on online anonymity.<p>The angle was that people can be very immature and very nasty via the Web when their identity is obscured, which is hardly something to dispute. However, the programme seemed to be hinting that public forums should be more regulated to prevent this being possible, which seems to be a poor alternative.<p>One of the more memorable snippets involved them contentiously asking a Facebook representative why Facebook can't run phonelines to manage abuse complaints from users.
It's good to see Facebook has it's moderating priorities straight. Just for the record its:<p>Holocost Deniers: Tolerated<p>Breastfeeding Mothers: Not OK
I have the feeling that this is the ultimate 'feed the troll' reaction. Actually caring enough to track them down, talk to them and reason with them about obviously attention-seeking and ill-meant content? Why?
I watched this last night. On the whole it was a pretty stupid programme with equally stupid people not knowing how to report and block people. Why not just ignore sites like littlegossip, and why have a formspring account.<p><i>"I love that the whole thing is narrated like they're tracking down an animal in nature. I loved the end "So, there you go, an internet troll. That's what they look like." Yep, that's what they look like."</i> - this did make me giggle though.
Difference between US and rest of world.<p>US has free speech.<p>Rest of world doesn't. (yeah yeah .. "we have free speech except for obectional material" ... right.<p>American develop an "idiot filter" and get good at using it: "dude's an idiot. whatever. move on".<p>Europeans don't and find the need for authorities "e.g. The BBC" to police their brains.<p>Big deal So what? Some clown is an offensive troll. I'd rather deal with that with big brother smashing anonymous complaints, no matter how off base.
Hmm, this is actually an entertaining idea.<p>I'd like to see a Chris Hansen style confrontation, where they track down trolls, confront them with what they've written, and then see how they justify or apologize their way out of the situation.
Maybe it's my American 1st amendment ideals but I'm almost more disturbed by the tone of the report than the troll (who is obviously a huge douchecanoe).<p>First of all, how did they track this guy down? Sure, there are legal ways of doing it if the guy is sloppy. But how does a report on the ethics of the Internet perpetrate a huge invasion of privacy without so much as passing comment on it? Disturbing implications for what actions are justified when directed at people with the "wrong" ideas.<p>Second, notice the reporter's repeated emphasis on the <i>illegality</i> of racist speech. He's not just shaming this guy. He's beating the drum of state censorship. Again maybe it's just my ideals but this is just obviously disturbing, maybe even moreso than trolls themselves.<p>I am not able to watch the whole program but judging from the synopsis it doesn't sound like it entails any substantive discussion of the ethics of privacy and censorship on the Internet, e.g. interviews with civil libertarians, which is what any serious report on trolling should include. As it stands it reeks of sensationalism.
I fail to see the relevance of this.<p>In addition it somewhat upsets me that someone could get jail time for making an offensive comment. Depending on the jurisdiction or culture, I know I have said things that would be offensive to someone (specifically regarding religion.) To be faced with jail time over something like that does not sound like something I would expect from a western country.
What are we to gather from this? That assholes on the Internet are also assholes in real life?<p>"Confronting" people like this does little to change their behavior. At best, it publicizes their identities, and causes some minor level of disgrace, but why would that matter to them?
It's ironic on a site called 'hacker news' where everyone knows what the older 'proper' definition of hacker people don't seem to care or even to point out what the older, 'proper' definition of troll is.<p>Fortunately wikipedia still has in their definition:<p>In Internet slang, a troll is someone who posts inflammatory,[2] extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum, chat room, or blog, with the primary intent of provoking readers into an emotional response[3] or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion.[4] The noun troll may refer to the provocative message itself, as in: "That was an excellent troll you posted".<p>So, a proper troll on HN might pop and point out that functional languages, while pretty and amusing, are largely unused because their performance is insufficient and make a comparison about, say, perl, provoking people to correct them and argue the point.<p>Look up adequacy.org to learn about proper trolling.<p>This guy is just a jerk.
Ah, good times when BBC Documentaries had actually high quality documentaries. Fascinating how their investigative journalism got all the way down to hunting people who talk trash on Facebook and exposing them. Are these really the most substantial social conflicts Britain has to worry about?
Not being familiar with privacy laws in the UK, did he have to sign a release to have his face shown on that program? If so I fail to see how its effectively shaming someone if they willingly submit to be filmed.
I have no experience in this area, other than having seen trolling on mailing lists, but my guess would be that a face-to-face confrontation with the troll would only give them further ammunition for subsequent enraged outbursts, or serve to make the situation even more dangerous/volatile.<p>Probably the solution is not to react to the troll, and for their outbursts to be met with silence. Don't read their content, and avoid forums or lists where trolling regularly occurs. When that's not possible report them to the list/forum admin, without engaging with the troll directly.
It's mental illness folks.<p>We don't accept it because it's abhorrent behavior but these people need mental health help. Getting them to seek help is a nearly impossible task though.
The tone of this article is downright chilling. Sure, this guy is a complete nuisance but he should have every right to spread his hate speech wherever property owners condone. The current anti-bullying meme that is being propagated by mass-media and politicians is just another in a long line of ruses designed to limit the human rights of the electorate.
While it would be lovely if we could find a way to get rid of harassing trolls on the internet, suppose someone on Facebook posts a comment disparaging [the founder of a certain faith known to try to assassinate people for disparaging said founder], then members of that faith might make formal complaints to the service demanding his account be deleted. So yeah, probably best to just try to make options to permanently block specific users/ip addresses from EVER posting to your feed.
I do not agree with the statements of the troll but will defend his right to say it. The internet is making the world like a small town. Piss on people on the internet will be like pissing on people in line at Walmart. You can, but people are going to hate you, and you will never be forgiven by anyone for anything bad you do unless you hire a professional to erase your histories.