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[Jackrabbit]

I prefer Toady coming in and explaining, personally.

[Sevrun]

Back to what the OP was referring to, I honestly think he's wrong.  If someone you've never met (and honestly aren't likely to) can get under your skin on some forum full of other people you'll probably never meet, then I think you're _more_ likely lose it on someone who annoys/embarrasses you in front of people you do know.  I'd go on to explain further, but it'd just lead to people misconstruing my words/// which I daresay some do intentionally. 

[Muz]

(USER WAS BANNED FOR THIS POST)

The good old days.

Heh, I actually liked the old tight laws system, where anyone was warned, muted, and banned for slight trolling. I did enjoy their company at times, guys like Yanlin and IndonesiaWarMinister, but it'd be more chaos here if they were still around. The longer you let a troll live on a forum, the more likely he forms friendship with people and the harder it is to get rid of them. If you let trolls hang around too long, they scare off the perfectly nice people and the only ones who stay are the ones with hard constitutions and the friends of the trolls.

Internet rules have to be strictly enforced and even sometimes re-interpreted by some administrators. Trolls just love to bend the rules, a good admin has to see when they're being malicious despite sticking to the rules.

[Grakelin]

Muz: I would disagree, on the grounds that an admin focused on banning miscreants at the first sign of trouble is going to go powermad and lay down a level of fear that will kill the forum all on its own. Also, we'll get self-moderators ALL OVER THE PLACE.

Back to what the OP was referring to, I honestly think he's wrong.  If someone you've never met (and honestly aren't likely to) can get under your skin on some forum full of other people you'll probably never meet, then I think you're _more_ likely lose it on someone who annoys/embarrasses you in front of people you do know.  I'd go on to explain further, but it'd just lead to people misconstruing my words/// which I daresay some do intentionally. 

If you're the kind of person who flies off the handle because of internet trolls, you need to talk to more internet trolls to learn how to deal with them, before you go out and deal with adversity in the real world.

[Deathworks]

Hi!

Grakelin: I have to disagree with you on that. First of all, defending the site rules without regard to personal feelings is a complete must for invoking trust. Is not having favorites who can do anything while others get punished for disagreeing with those favorites a typical symptom of maddened admins? At least that is what I would expect of such admins, given that I never really encountered any admin who was a problem. Besides, if you always stick by the rules as an admin, your decisions are always justifiable and you can expect people to respect your integrity.

However, Muz is also correct that people may try to violate the spirit of the rules while staying formally within their boundary. Fortunately, most terms of service agreements include clauses that can actually handle even somewhat murkier cases (which of course does pose a special challenge for admins).

As for the benefits of internet trolls, I highly doubt that. If it is really a troll, then he acts to anger/infuriate people. And this runs contrary to the interest many people have to relax and chill online after a hard day's work. We already have a lot of strive and idiocy in real life, so it is not unreasonable to expect that people look for some relaxation on the internet - and not everyone considers getting insulted or confronted with inappropriate conduct a relaxing experience.

Deathworks

[Grakelin]

It doesn't work that way when people are accusing others of being rulebreakers whenever they disagree with their political opinion. Forum rules (even the ones here) are usually pretty vague and open to admin interpretation, as well.

It's not like our admins participate in the discussions or have failed to ban people who make the atmosphere uncomfortable. They don't actually form any e-relationships with people here, and they aren't going to stop themselves from banning Neruz just because we all like him. I'm glad that this is the way it is, because a bunch of mods running about would only serve to ruin our egalitarian hierarchy and feeling of almost complete free speech.

[Deathworks]

Hi!

Grakelin: Somehow, I don't see how your latest post disagrees with what I am saying, except for seemingly the beginning. You too speak in favor of admins bringing the hammer down when necessary.

And your initial statement is not really valid as well in my eyes. First, if the accusations were made in a post, that already violates most standard rules, including those of Bay12 forums, which do not allow false claims to be made in posts. Thus, the party making the false accusations is likely to be the one meeting with punishment. Also remember that admins are not the blind slaves of the members of the community: When someone informs them about trouble brewing, they check out for themselves and see whether that is really the case. And if you harass the admins with constant false reports because of a vendetta, that is likely to also warrant retribution.

Deathworks

[smigenboger]

So who are these 'new people' we are always scaring off?

[ChairmanPoo]

Actually, it's any kind of booze, given that the ethanol itself is responsible. And if I'm remembering correctly, it's not that it reduces your cholesterol, it's that it reduces the harmful effects of it by acting as a blood thinner. Of course, more than one or two drinks a day and the ethanol starts damaging your system, but the point stands.

Has only been "proven" for wine, AFAIK, not for distillated drinks. And I'm not sure the mechanism is clear, either, although there's much speculation about possible ways it might work, as often happens in these things, with varying merit.

[Sir Pseudonymous]

Last I read on it, it was, specifically, ethanol consumption, regardless of whether it was wine, beer, or hard liquor. Of course, now the wikipedia page on it is basically "well they say that BUT THEY CAN'T PROVE ANYTHING BECAUSE THE W.H.O. DOESN'T LIKE ALCOHOL YOU GUYS COME ON DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT ALCOHOL YOU GUYS!" repeated over and over.

[Enzo]

I though it was polyphenols in the skin of the grapes extracted by the fermentation (or something) that make red wine especially healthy, not anything to do with the alcohol itself. I don't know. I heard it on CBC.

[Jackrabbit]

So who are these 'new people' we are always scaring off?

That's the best part! You can never know. If we scared them off, then they didn't even register. If they didn't even register, how can we know we scared them off?

I find it pretty funny, actually. But I try and maintain my decorum because I really don't want to scare people from Bay12, if that is indeed happening, because it eats into Toady's livelihood.

[nenjin]

Having just recently come in from the actual DF forums, and having haunted another board's OT for about 10 years....Most of the crazy stays here. And tbh, you have to have a certain appetite for crazy to find DF anyways. By the time people have gorged themselves on DF and go looking for entertainment elsewhere on the forum....I think they're well prepared for what Finally... has to offer.

[Jackrabbit]

Political discussions, heartfelt emotional issues and people throwing the word troll around like it's going out of style?

[nenjin]

More or less. You guys do it with more style than your average game forum though.