Deck The Trolls: Winter Trolling Kicks Off
November 23rd, 2007 2 Comments
At first glance I thought Mashable’s troll contest Deck The Trolls: Winter Trolling Kicks Off was a great example of playing with the genre of online discussion albeit the icky side, but then on the same page at Mashable they report Megan Meier’s suicide in response to someone being abusive, sarcastic, etc (the very terms of the Mashable contest) on MySpace.
Now of course, the two stories aren’t really related in any way. One is organised fun, the other is bizarrely malicious (which is which I’ll leave to you). But in the way that the Sun used to put rape stories on page 3, it’s just not right… on so many levels.
Now, go and have fun being abusive you twat, you many win a competition… sigh…
November 23rd, 2007 at 6:20 pm (#)
Thanks for the feedback.
I think they’re very different things - the trolling contest is a bit of organized fun that doesn’t encourage sustained attacks against individuals.
Also note that the Meier’s post is not part of the contest, since that would be inappropriate.
November 23rd, 2007 at 6:51 pm (#)
Good troll!
I said they were different things… And maybe I’m gulity of a whole heap of old-fartism, but this internets thing encourages gittish, nasty and cowardly behaviour, and makes possible bulling from behind the firewall. And you at mashable are kind of celebrating that fact (as I said, on the same page).
Now I like being a snide, abusive low life as much as the next shit, but I can handle it… I’m down to 8 vicious put-downs a day (well below the national average for this time of year you know)… but in general I think as organ such as yours should be promoting the beneficial aspects of of the internets, not rolling in the muck and grime whilst laughing.
I look forward to your “Let’s be kind and polite to each other campaign for the sake of the very soul of Web2.0″ with baited breath.