User:Timwi/Slashdot trolling phenomena
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This article was not deleted for copyright violation or anything that I believe does not allow me to post this here.
Slashdot trolling phenomena make up a large subset of the bizarre and complex subculture found on the popular technology website Slashdot. They are a mixture of juvenilia, sarcasm, deliberately bad jokes, tasteless nonsense and attempts to provoke outraged responses from other forum users, or amuse them. Slashdot trolling is a subset and a microcosm of Internet trolling in general. Some of these behaviours are usually considered to be more offensive or insightful than others. On Slashdot, many of these phenomena have become the object of parody.
Slashdot trolls can generally be divided into four categories: disruptive, offensive, deceptive, and idiosyncratic. Disruptive trolls are those which intend to disrupt the normal flow of things on Slashdot, either by decreasing the signal-to-noise ratio or by causing the pages to render incorrectly. Offensive trolls exist for the sole purpose of offending as many people as possible. The purpose of deceptive trolls is to trick people into either following a link or reading a comment which seems legitimate but is actually a troll. Idiosyncratic trolls are those which are specific to Slashdot and have elements of Slashdot culture and history in them creating, in effect, an inside joke.
Some of the Slashdot trolling phenomena originated on Segfault, whose shutdown of commenting forced trolls to a new host.
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[edit] Disruptive trolls
The purpose of disruptive trolls is to cause the pages of Slashdot to display in an undesirable way or to otherwise bring attention to themselves. The two major categories of disruptive trolls are crapflooding and page-widening.
[edit] Crapflooding
Crapflooding is the posting of many nonsensical or gratuitously offensive messages in order to disrupt the normal functioning of Slashdot and annoy its users and editors.
Later versions of Slash, the software behind the Slashdot website, had an updated lameness filter to prevent posting of the same message more than once. However, crapflooders began avoiding this restriction by varying the content of the message after each post. Crapfloods can be performed manually with a dedicated user repeatedly clicking through the posting options each time, or automated by a piece of software. Automated crapfloods are — not surprisingly — larger, more effective and more frequent. The subject of crapflooded messages varies. Some examples include:
- Offtopic Messages
- Pornographic/Homoerotic sex scenes with the names replaced with those of the slashdot editors or open source celebrities.
- Incoherent nonsense that contains the correct letter frequencies so the lameness filter recognises it as vaguely English.
- Offensive Base64 encoded images or text.
Warning, potentially offensive external links:
[edit] Page widening/lengthening
The original page widening posts were simple messages consisting of one long stream of characters with no spaces. This caused browsers to render a very wide page with horizontal scroll bars, making it nearly impossible to read the comments page. Slashdot began inserting spaces into any long run of characters to prevent this and so began the evolutionary battle between Slashcode and the page widening trolls. Newer and more inventive ways of causing page widening were discovered, with the use of blockquote tags and the "." character to cause extreme widening on Internet Explorer. These methods were also eventually closed off by the Slashdot editors. Improvements in browser software have also closed many of the loopholes used to widen pages.
Examples of pagewidening include:
- a slashdot page widened ("fixed" by the Lameness filter)
- a pagewidening post using blockquote tags (also "fixed" by the Lameness filter)
[edit] Offensive trolls
Trolls in this category are those intended to be offensive, or those which take the reader to potentially offensive sites. A popular technique amongst Slashdot trolls is to post links to "shock sites" in order to annoy and offend other readers by tricking them into following the links. This is often accomplished by posting the link under the guise of being another link to the article or a rebuttal to the article.
A variation on this theme is for a troll to accuse a legitimate link or comment as being a link or reference to a shock site. In some cases this can have the desired effect of a genuinely insightful comment being moderated downward. Another technique is to embed a shock site link in a comment that otherwise appears relevant to the discussion, in the hope that unwitting moderators will mod up the post. The Holy Grail of any link troll is to slip a story submission containing a "shock site" link past the Slashdot editors. This situation occurred in July 2003 and June 2004 when disgruntled webmasters configured their servers to redirect to a shock site when the HTTP referrer was Slashdot.
One particular "shock site" which is overwhelmingly preferred to others is Goatse.cx. This has spawned a large number of other references such as ASCII art of its signature image (hello.jpg) within a square border, and with a derogatory word written inside the anus of the man in the picture. Troll postings often contain an ASCII art representation of some offensive image, often related to shock sites, with a nonsensical or provocative subject line. The 'Penis bird' troll, a crude ASCII representation of a bird perched on an erect penis, is a common variant, derived from the Penisbird image.
As a result of these trolling techniques, the Slashdot team introduced a feature which appends the domain name a link points to immediately behind that link in every comment to make disguising links more difficult. (for example, "See Wikipedia article [wikipedia.org]") When this was implemented, people used mirrors and CGI redirection scripts run by Yahoo!, Slashdot itself or other servers to circumvent this measure.
Examples of shock sites include (more can be found at List of shock sites):
-
- Goat.cx - http://goat.cx ('Goatse.cx')
- Penis bird - http://smoke.rotten.com/bird/ - Original image from Rotten.com
- Tubgirl - http://www.redcoat.net/pics/tubgirl.jpg or http://www.tubgirl.com
- Obscene ASCII image of Linux Penguin
[edit] Homosexuality and racism
Homosexuality is one of the most versatile and popular trolling devices used. In its simplest form it may be used on its own in the form of a homophobic insult or as a feature of a pornographic troll featuring common Slashdot topics and celebrities. Goatse.cx (see above "shock site" section) also takes advantage of homophobia.
Racism is another ploy, sometimes used for effect in conjunction with homosexuality which usually causes offense to individuals unfamiliar with it. At its crudest it simply takes the form of repeated racial insults. The Gay Nigger Association of America (GNAA) is an internet trolling organization commonly seen in Slashdot threads that uses this type of trolling device.
[edit] Anti-semitism
The most basic anti-semitic trolls usually involve posting pro-Nazi statements such as "Heil Hitler", sometimes accompanied by a crude ASCII-art swastika, and are usually very promptly moderated down as flamebait.
Less blatant trolls might involve anti-Jewish conspiracy theories or conspiracies, such as "Jews did 9/11".
In a somewhat related vein, trolls often inhabit science or technology stories concerning Israel, dropping into the discussion otherwise completely unrelated posts on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The editorial nature of Slashdot has been frequently critised for allowing such stories given the nature and sensitivity of this subject. It is believed by some that the editors deliberately include these stories so as to start a flame war, as this is believed to help "spice up" the website and keep people entertained and engaged in the site.
Some trolls have abused Slashdot's friends and foes feature to place a crude ASCII-art swastika at or near the top of other users' list of "fans." This is done by registering several accounts with names designed to form a swastika when they appear together in the list. [1] [2]
[edit] Nationalistic insults
One recurrent topic of discussion on Slashdot is the cultural quarrel between the United States and Europe. As an example, someone portraying themself as an American may run a joke on France, or may accuse Europeans of being "weenies". Someone portraying themself as a European may accuse Americans of lacking culture, not supporting democracy and civil rights or of being warmongers or "cowboys".
A similar subtopic includes banter about the differences between the United States and Canada. Usually an article about some perceived problem in the U.S. will elicit a claim of superiority from someone portraying themselves as Canadian. Often, to fan the flames, the American rebuttal will degenerate into Blame Canada.
The effect of such trolls is compounded by the immaturity and lack of political culture of many participants on both sides, who comment on foreign events they scarcely know about according to clichés seen in the mass media.
[edit] Deceptive trolls
Often, trolls are created with the purpose of tricking the reader into viewing offensive or misleading information, or to deceive them in some way.
[edit] Karma whores
Karma is a scoring system on Slashdot meant to reward "good" posting and punish "bad" posting. The goal is that people who repeatedly post offensive, offtopic, or otherwise unwanted messages will be punished with a lower visibility of their messages, and those who post informative, insightful, or otherwise desirable messages are rewarded with a higher visibility. Karma whores are individuals, or messages themselves, that attempt to receive feedback in the form of karma points. Often these will be needless information (such as a link to a Wikipedia article relevant to the subject being discussed), or a message of a political nature that is in alignment with the groupthink so that it will be moderated upwards by people who agree with the stance expressed in the message.
[edit] Comment plagiarism
Posters practicing this trolling technique will search for a highly moderated post a few pages down from the beginning of the discussion, reword it slightly, and re-post it as a reply to an earlier comment. This troll relies on the readers' ignorance to game the moderation system. These posts usually receive a lot of positive feedback in the beginning and draw negative attention once the added visibility exposes the plagiarism. Normal discussions can also crop up, from benign responses to the ripped-off comments. These replies create a multiplier to the overall karma waste, as moderators compete to raise and lower the visibility of the comments (insightful replies receive positive feedback, though responses to trolls are typically moderated downward, to sink an entire tainted thread below the normal visible threshold).
[edit] Article text alteration trolls
Considered by many to be an effective satire of those who post comments consisting of a linked article's text (most often in case of the Slashdot effect) for positive moderation (see Karma whores). These trolls consist of the linked article's text, copied into a comment, usually accompanied by a subject line indicating that the site has been slashdotted. One or more words, phrases, or paragraphs are covertly inserted or modified to form a subversive or offensive message not present in the original article. These can be in the form of film or book spoilers, or words changed to produce sexual innuendoes, amongst other things. Often moderators will 'mod-up' the comment based solely on its title and the overall appearance of the text, assuming that the comment is helpfully providing the verbatim text of the unavailable site. Comments that have been repeatedly modded-up become more visible and carry an air of validity. Troll comments that fool more moderators therefore trick more readers.
When other users spot the troll, many of them respond with comments warning other users of the deception and asking moderators to decrease the troll's visibility. The most concise posts are empty with the emphatic subject line: "TROLL - MOD PARENT DOWN". Other users go further by pointing out each instance where the troll post differs from the original article. This phenomenon has trolls of its own, wherein a response will describe extra changes that are not present in the original troll post. This "troll-on-troll" phenomenon further increases confusion. Still more confusion is introduced when trolls respond to "Mod Parent Down" comments with rebuttals claiming that the original troll was a legitimate copy of the article, and that it is instead the accusers who are the trolls. Depending on the subtlety and believability of the changes, readers may remain confused until the site with the original article becomes available again. Unfortunately, because of the nature of the Slashdot effect, the original article may not become available again until most readers have lost interest and moved on.
"Mod Parent Down" posts are also sometimes seen as comments on legitimate posts, presumably as an attempt to disrupt the thread.
Examples of text alteration trolls are here. These are external links, and some of the pages contain offensive language:
[edit] Web vendor referral trolls
Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and some other WWW vendors have a system whereby a user can post links on their (or others) websites, and gain a small commission per person following the link. These trolls post what appear to be discussion, with links to source material, but are really elaborate advertisements. For example: this post.
[edit] Signature trolls
Signature trolls are an advanced and effective method of trolling, commonly used in reviews of software. The trolls post an insightful comment, which is moderated up based on its merit. The trolls then change their post signature to include an extra link, usually to a shock site. Comments on Slashdot cannot be edited after posting, but the user's signature text is updated within the comment whenever the user changes it. When the troll changes his signature, the malicious link becomes part of the highly-moderated comment. With careful wording, the signature can seamlessly blend in with the post and trick many readers. Slashdot has an option to put a signature separator consisting of --, but this was not the default until late 2004. Slashdot also has the option to disable the showing of signatures altogether.
The dynamic signature can cause even more confusion, when the troll changes his signature back to make his accusers appear false. As the accusatory comments receive negative moderation for appearing false, the accusers lose points from their karma score, resulting in another victory for the troll. An example of a signature troll is: this.
[edit] Movie spoiler
This is a more subtle troll than most. It consists, for the most part, of a genuinely insightful comment split into several paragraphs, with the middle or penultimate paragraph containing one or more movie spoilers.
[edit] 300 Dead in Sri Lanka Tsunami
Another red herring similar to the Stephen King is dead troll, this often consists of an announcement that a tsunami has killed over 300 people in Sri Lanka, with a link to an old or unrelated news item. In some cases, the troll chides the community for caring about trivial tech issues over the welfare of tsunami victims in other parts of the world. A successful Sri Lanka tsunami troll will either drive participants to news sites searching for more information, or attract responses from members eager to show witty nonchalance, usually via nationalistic insults. Example troll on Slashdot.
[edit] Idiosyncratic trolls
Trolls that do not fall into the other three categories are idiosyncratic, and their existence is a result of an inside joke related to the workings of Slashdot culture or history or of geek culture itself.
[edit] First post
Whenever a new story is posted on Slashdot, comments may be added discussing it and there is often competition between Slashdotters to be the first to post such a comment. Some first posters try to make a short insightful comment to avoid being moderated down. The more immature first posts often consist of a subject and body saying "first post!" or merely "FP". Trolls may also post "first post" messages a ridiculously long time after the original story has been submitted as a parody of the first post. There are many other variants of the first post, usually misspellings to avoid the lameness filter: "Frist psot!". Some troll organizations require prospective members to post a 'First Post' on Slashdot using some pre-specified text, which may explain the persistence of the 'First Post' troll.
Due to the many typos and misspellings made by those attempting to gain such a 'first post', the language has been somewhat transformed. Many 'first post' attempts now say such things as "Frosty Piss", coming from the phrase "frist pist", a common typo when trying to spell out "First Post" in time to actually get one, or in attempt to avoid the lameness filter.
More subtle is the 'last post', which attempts to be the final posting on a topic before Slashdot turns the page static. These are rarely seen because of the large amount of attention needed to be paid.
[edit] Netcraft confirms it
Quite frequently (especially for BSD-related stories) a comment will be posted providing dubious statistics from Netcraft (a network services vendor and Internet research firm) and many links detailing the forthcoming death of the BSD operating systems. With its bogus statistics and inflammatory language the original "*BSD is dying" troll was enormously successful, and was still guaranteed to generate responses years after it first appeared. The troll typically starts with the phrase, "Netcraft confirms <victim> is dying", modelled after similar but authentic confirmations revealed by Netcraft in their research. Not surprisingly, many variants of this troll were created: Slashdot/VA Linux/Linux/BeOS/Apple (see examples below) is dying, variants on the original link-laden *BSD troll, and even elaborate poetry and song. None were as successful as the original.
[edit] HELLO WORLD
A recent troll first appearing on Slashdot in April of 2005. The "HELLO WORLD" troll posts what appears to be one-time pad encrypted messages in the style of a numbers station. Originally posted under the username "TheLoneCoder", they now are posted anonymously. It is unknown whether or not it is the same person posting all the messages or copy-cats. The troll also appeared on UserFriendly under the username "OUTGOING" but was immediately banned and the posts removed.
[edit] Stephen King is dead
Used simply as an off-topic troll or even a red herring, the American writer, Stephen King, has his very own subculture repeating the myth of his death:
The canonical text of the troll is as follows:
- I just heard some sad news on talk radio - Horror/Sci Fi writer Stephen King was found dead in his Maine home this morning. There were not any more details. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss him - even if you did not enjoy his work, there is no denying his contributions to popular culture. Truly an American icon.
The idea of this joke is that some readers will believe it to be true, and post in panic "is this true?" when they are unable to find any more information about the death -- thus making them look stupid, as the fake announcement has been repeated so often.
This joke has also been used to recognize actual celebrity deaths. The format has also been used outside of Slashdot, usually on other message boards, to announce or memorialize actual deaths.
[edit] First Obituary
A variation of the “First Post” and “Stephen King” troll. When a famous celebrity or politician’s death reaches the headlines there is often an attempt to make that headline part of the first post.
[edit] Hot grits
Early in Slashdot's history, an anonymous troll (also known as the "hot grits guy") would post a reply to every story with a simple "I have poured hot grits down my pants. Thank you." He mostly got modded down as a troll. The hot grits guy is considered the first recurring troll on Slashdot.
[edit] Reigniting flamewars
Popular on software and development articles, this troll tries to explain why a particular operating system, programming language or other concept is inferior to others, in a way intended to annoy and/or start a flamewar. This type of troll will either make an outlandish and obvious claim or subtly use a valid criticism of something in an irritating fashion.
For example:
- "DRM is the future"
- "The K in KDE stands for Krap."
- "Why would I want a desktop with a smelly foot on it?"
- "Linux has below average SMP support."
- "My BSD machines have much better uptimes and stability than my Linux machines."
- "Apple Computer will never sell a computer that uses multi-button mice"
- "Object-oriented programming is difficult to use and does not increase productivity."
- "Open source software has poorer levels of QA than proprietary solutions."
- "Python scales up for large projects better than Perl."
- "IPv6 adds too much new overhead to be viable."
- "Emacs users press less [sic] keys than Vim users." Example: [7]
- "Perl 6 is a mistake." Example threads: [8] [9]
- "Don't forget to pay your $699 licensing fee you cock-smoking teabaggers." [sic] [10]
- "TripMaster Monkey should be an editor." [11]
These types of posts, usually moderated down as flamebait (but often moderated up as Insightful), sometimes cause a flamewar to begin amongst those who reply and thus the troll gets his 'bite' (See You Have Been Trolled et al.).
[edit] Other trolls
The following are either set phrases or formulae for the construction of semicliché phrases posted with the intent of either annoying or amusing other readers. More and more commonly, it is a combination of the two.
- Perhaps the most famous one-shot troll was The first Slashdot troll post investigation. This post generated nearly a thousand replies, and anyone who moderated the comment up was permanantly banned from moderating Slashdot comments. The post can be viewed here.
- The Get Some PRIORITIES! troll began to appear after the September 11, 2001 attacks. A classic offtopic troll, it employs highly hyperbolic language to criticize the other posters and Slashdot in general for discussing trivialities like new gadgets or changes in U.S. copyright law in the wake of such a horrific event. (See this post for an example). It briefly resurfaced in September 2005 in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
- The Think about your breathing troll causes the user to think about their breathing, and it claims to be the most effective troll ever.
- The Think about your parents having hot sweaty sex next time you masturbate troll intends to implant offensive images in the mind of the reader the next time he or she masturbates.
- The Is it good or is it whack? troll: This troll responds to a comment by asking of the comment's subject, "What's [subject] all about? Is it good or is it whack?". In general, this troll aims to suggest wide-eyed naïveté about a well-understood subject. (See this post for an example). This phrase comes from the popular comic character in the UK and the US, Ali G.
- The I Fail It! / I succeed it! trolls originally came from the computer game Blazing Star in which the game over message read: "You fail it! Your skill is not enough, see you next time, bye-bye".
- The My freelance gig in front of a Mac trolls appear in virtually every discussion about Apple Computer. The troll claims to have witnessed <the latest Apple hardware> taking 20 minutes to copy a 17 MB file from one folder to another and proceeds to question all Apple users as to their platform choice. It is a straight forward copy-and-paste from a weblog entry by Jason Kottke. It has also led to some very inspired and amusing parodies.
- The I find your ideas intriguing / interesting and wish to subscribe to your newsletter / journal troll is a common sycophantic reply to a post that may or may not have merit. (See this post for an example.) (This is a quote from episode 4F10, Mountain of Madness of The Simpsons.)
- The Stalkers are trolls who fixate on a user and reply to all their posts anonymously usually repeating some sort of an insult.
- Subject line trolls primarily consist of an inflammatory subject line and nothing else, but some have been seen where the comment is valid, but the subject consists simply of GOATSE repeated to the maximum length.
- Chinese Torture of Tibetan Nuns appears occasionally as a reply to a topic with a fairly inane segue to wrench the topic over to the torture of Tibetan nuns by Chinese soldiers. The posting always includes a link to Physicians for Human Rights and their papers on torture of the Tibetan people. The lurid image of a Tibetan nun being raped with a cattle prod is sometimes invoked.
- We Tried Working With... is a cut and paste troll made infamous by anti-slash.org. The troll starts out by telling a story of an employer who evaluates <insert new item here> based on an employee recommendation. The troll then goes into how great <insert new item here> is, but then goes into how the new thing destroyed their company project - which leads to the dismissal of the employee who suggested the evaluation. (Here is an example: it is typical for this troll to be modded up until someone catches on)
- How do I get Quake 3 to run in Linux? is a recent cut and paste troll. It appears to be a genuine and current, if anonymous, comment about how difficult it is to install software on a Linux system but actually describes the difficulty users experienced circa 1999. It appears to be an attempt to slander Linux and thus usually gets a knee-jerk, if accurate, response from other users about how things are better now. It is likely also a sly dig at the lack of computer games on the Linux platform, as said poster is actively concerned with installing a game so old. It is now being spotted and commented upon as a troll.
- Bookmark trolls use Slashdot's bookmark feature to create bookmarks pointing to such things as shock sites, pornography, and trolling organizations. Slashdot maintains a list of "popular links" based on users' bookmarks, and it only takes a few people linking to a troll site for it to rise to near the top of the list.
- FTW Trolls write simple one-line statements regarding the main topic. For example, if the topic is Windows Vista, a For-the-Win Troll will type as an example: "VMWare FTW!". FTW is an internet acronym for "For The Win".
- 'Family Suicide Troll' - Usually used when someone whines, appears 'stupid', or asks slashdot a question. The context is usually 'Go find a cliff or a bridge somewhere, then take your entire fucktarded family. Have all of them jump off to their death, and after that, jump to yours' (here is an example).
[edit] Trolltalk
Trolltalk (also known as 20721, sid 20721 or sid=20721) is a hidden story ID on the Slashdot, where trolls formerly conversed amongst themselves, sometimes demonstrating new trolling techniques, bragging about successful trolling, and insulting each other. Trolltalk is the oldest active SID on Slashdot, and has received more posts over its lifetime than any other SID, but due to Slashcode's purge feature, only the most recent two weeks of posts remain at any given time. Although the two-week post count is usually in the thousands, at least 98% of the posts are intentionally content-free "crapfloods" generated by automated posting scripts, with the remaining handful being written by the various people who visit the forum.
The current trolltalk was predated by an earlier thread with the textual SID "trolltalk". It was created in 2000, when, due to a bug, Slashcode allowed arbitrary alphanumeric SIDs. There were several other custom SIDs created during this time as well, such as "sid=2dollarcrackho", "sid=k223320inchfan" and "sid=10gramspoppylatex". When Slashdot was upgraded to Slashcode 2.0 the bug was fixed but there was a short-lived new feature called "user-created discussions" which featured numeric SIDs. Soon thereafter new trolltalks were created such as 20721, 31337 and 20384. With the exception of 20721, they have all been deleted or disabled over the years. 31337 was closed due to abuse, and the others were automatically deleted by Slashcode's purge feature after not receiving any posts for two weeks.
Slashdot's moderation system is little used on trolltalk, since the community is relatively small and obscure, and its users rarely receive mod points. Due to this and the fact that few "normal" Slashdot users visit the SID it is essentially a zone without rules. In the past, the anonymous nature of trolltalk has led users to post nude photographs of themselves or to admit personal details about themselves that they would not otherwise admit, such as homosexuality, "cutting", or Ephebophilia. In the past, members of the community who are angry at having been insulted or losing an argument (or were simply bored) have used automated scripts to flood trolltalk with random messages for days or weeks, making any discussion nearly impossible. Crapfloods are a regular occurrence and are considered a part of trolltalk culture, although they frequently annoy users who wish to chat. During crapfloods, normal posting to trolltalk is typically reduced or eliminated until the crapflood ends, as has been the case during the current extended crapflooding of trolltalk that began around May 2005.
Before discussion on trolltalk was mostly halted by the start of the current ongoing crapfloods, most of the discussion over the past year had been about two women, Cracky-chan and Mercatur. Although neither woman was a user of trolltalk, both had a number of fans there, and a bitter rivalry developed with fans of each waging violent flame-wars against fans of the other.
[edit] Crapflood
As mentioned earlier, the current trolltalk is now under attack from a sophisticated crapflood, rendering trolltalk all but unusable except for the most avid readers. This was believed to have started to punish other trolltalkers who insulted the crapflooder.
During the first weeks of the deluge, attempts were made to establish "crapflood bunkers"; because the crapflood was confined to the top level of the discussion, discussion was able to continue as normal in the replies to "bunker" comments. This effort failed when the crapflooder modified his or her script to counteract this.
In December 2005 and January 2006, as an attempted anti-crapflood measure, a trolltalk user created and used software whose goal was to generate and publish a web page containing links to non-crapflood posts on trolltalk. The project was briefly successful at filtering out crapfloods until the crapflooder modified the crapflooding script. After a period of downtime, the digest has resumed but fails to filter out much of the crapflood.
[edit] Defunct trolltalk spinoffs
Trolltalk Archive - Since Slashdot removes the oldest comments from user-created SIDs, a now-defunct Trolltalk Archive was created. Originally posts were manually imported from saved trolltalk pages sent by an anonymous contributor and subsequently by writing an automated script to extract the contents of trolltalk. The archive was database-driven and had advanced search capabilities. The archive ceased operation in mid-2005.
Trollback Journal - The Slashdot user "TrollBack" (the name is an allusion to "Slashback") once compiled and published in his journal a list and of featured trolls over the past time period (usually a calendar month)with reviews and commentary. TrollBack has been defunct since October 2004.
7r0117a1K - This was an alternate trolltalk, sid 31337, that rivaled sid 20721 in popularity for a time. Some users participated in both sids, while some were loyal to only one and engaged in wars against the "enemy" sid, often "moving" undesirable messages from one's own sid to the other sid. The closure of 31337 occurred on September 15, 2004 as a result of an automated trojan horse that was advertising compromised IP addresses via the SID. The name "7r0117a1K" and its sid "31337" are references to Leet speak.
Trolltalks on other sites - At various times, trolltalk sids were created on other web forums. Although they are no longer actively used, some may still be viewed. The best-known of these is Kuro5hin's version of trolltalk.
Adequacy.org - This website was started by a number of trolltalk users attempting to reach a wider audience with their trolling. It ceased operation in September 2002 but its archives may still be viewed.
Trolltalk.net - A user of trolltalk set up a spinoff website using Scoop software at this address. It did not become popular and died a year later. The site no longer exists.
Geekizoid.com - Another user of trolltalk set up a spinoff website using Slash software at this address. Despite its creator being disliked by most of trolltalk and considered an enemy, the site lasted several years. The site no longer exists, although its founder runs an alternate site, Sporks-R-Us, which was once considered a trolltalk spinoff but is now only tangentially so.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Trolltalk
- Trolltalk
- Trolltalk Digest
- 7r0117a1K, now disabled
- Adequacy, a trolltalk spinoff
- Sporks-R-Us, a trolltalk spinoff

