Taken from: http://www.cs.ruu.nl/wais/html/na-di...troll-faq.html


"Then there are some who are accused of being trollers yet do not
agree. They argue that they are only having a discussion. They call
it "sarcasm" "irony" or witty banter. There are many versions of this
kind of person, they argue and cause an uproar and don't understand
the uproar they cause. Others may not have understood their intention
and both sides may have gotten a little too caught up in the
discussion. It is possible to try and help these people understand
the uproar they cause using e-mail. Sometimes the cause is hopeless.

Bottom line is that every news group at one time or another has a
"troll". Someone who everybody learns to love to hate. The Troll
changes from news group to news group, from e-mail address to e-mail
address. Ever changing and nearly impossible to keep up with. Below
you will find out how to deal with these trolls."


"A) Sit on your hands and bite your tongue. Reread the post. It may
be a new person to the Internet who has innocently hit your raw nerve.
B) Look at the [thread] line and see how many groups the poster has
posted to without replies.
C) Continue to sit on your hands.
D) Look at the top to make sure that someone hasn't forged the poster's name. [Look at the number of posts that say "stop picking on me" or "post the rules" or "enforce the rules evenly" or "here's what's being done to me" or "I've decided to quit" Or any other look at me / hear from me / stop doing this to me / me /me /me post]
E) Stop sitting on your hands, but *Don't* reply to the post.
F) Read the alt.bigfoot FAQ : http://www.faqs.org/faqs/bigfoot/
G) Sit and think.
H) Read about the Gullibility Virus. This is a very funny editorial
to be passed along to your friends who send you all those hoaxes : http://www.sccu.edu/faculty/R_Harris/warning.htm
And why Disney is *not* giving away 13,000 free trips, why Bill Gates
is not collecting e-mail addresses (and many other hoaxes): http://www.deja.com/article/406150013
And Hoaxes on the Internet: http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/CIACHoaxes.html
I) Whatever you do, don't reply to the post.
J) Sit and think. Go clean that green stuff off the sides of your
fish tank like you have been meaning to do. Try to remember that the
Internet is not real life. It is not worth getting upset over. The
news group you are so involved in would forget that you exist if you
stop posting for 6 months (most likely even quicker). Real life goes
on with or without the Internet.
K) "Arguing with anonymous strangers on the Internet is a sucker's
game because they almost always turn out to be -- or to be
indistinguishable from -- self-righteous sixteen-year-olds possessing
infinite amounts of free time." -Neal Stephenson, _Cryptonomicon_

Hopefully if you have done all these steps your blood pressure has
gone down a few points.

The above applies to *all* posts that are trolls. The post may only
be to one topic, but none the less it is a troll to try & cause
problems in the newsgroup. DO NOT POST! It will only get more people
upset at you than at the original flamer."


[This message has been edited by Dr. PfP (edited 03-07-2000).]