When trolls attack.

DarthDimi

Recent events have demonstrated once more that trolls show up when they do, unexpectedly and, as it would seem, inevitably. We must accept a certain level of trolling every now and then; it's the nature of the medium. These trolls, unfortunately, often cause more trouble than they themselves seem to intend. Hopefully the following can explain what I mean by that.

1) Causality: argue and be argued with

Though many of our members have by now understood what the proper conduct is in an event of a troll invasion, some persist on making things worse, though unwillingly I'm sure. By replying to a troll's provocations, you see, doors are swung open for direct bickering and verbal fighting, more trolling and more derailing of threads. This in itself leads to more discontent among other members, and so on. No matter how tempting, trolls cannot be reasoned with, ergo every attempt made in that direction is futile and worsens things even more.

2) Why we have the flag option

When we ask our members not to interact with a troll, we do not ask for immobility or indifference. The flag button helps to bring offensive, spammy and other unwanted posts to our attention, which is really all we ask for. The mod team can then effectively remove inappropriate language, close certain threads or build a case against an unpleasant member. Rest assured that our flagged content is looked into on a daily basis. Also, it helps in pinpointing unwanted content and having said content deleted without a trace. Quoted posts and multi-page arguments are much more difficult to backtrack and delete without leaving unfavourable content behind.

3) What about the mod team?

Again we have read open statements about the mod team not doing its job as it should be done because it took a few days rather than a mere few minutes to ban a troll. Please remember that we respect all our members and allow any one of them more than one chance to prove their worth. Thus, we never make decisions on a whim. Instead we allow ourselves sufficient time to properly investigate matters. Even if we quickly recognise a formerly banned troll in a new disguise and swift action is agreed upon, then, still, technical procedures need to follow and as we all operate from various places on the globe, living in different time zones and with different schedules in our private and professional lives, one must understand that they too require a certain amount of patience.
But does that matter in the end? No, it does not. For trolls get banned eventually and provided everyone's been good enough to ignore them, it'll be easy for us to remove their filth. If, however, pointless quarrels are kept alive via unavailing attempts to talk some sense into the trolls, a time span of a few days does indeed allow for much damage and the clean-up duty afterwards becomes a dreadful burden.
We are happy to conclude, however, that many of our members have followed the correct procedure of 'IFM':
1) ignoring
2) flagging
3) moving on.
Many of them have received a token of our appreciation overn the past few days and righteously so. The mod team prides itself on the wonderful group of members it has the honour to serve. Thanks, folks, you make our job a pleasant one!

4) And from here on?

To accuse our forum admins of inertia would be utterly wrong. Our hosts aren't apathetic to suggestions for improvement. They hope we can all find the patience to wait for updates because, when they come, these updates must function properly right away. Rather carefully planned and effective than rash and weak!

So just sit back, enjoy the ride and have some fun on the boards. Ignore party crashers and flag anything that meets your disapproval. But above all, be a good Bond fan, for in that we are bonded together. Thank you.