Trolls, and how NOT to keep them fat, happy and content

Some things to keep in mind about trolls:

1. If you see a posting from a Cycling '74 employee, but with a new
email address or alias that they've never posted under before, that
person is a troll.

2. Even if you find it amusing, even if you think the troll is an
asshole, you perpetuate the problem by replying to their post. Mailing
list users are especially bad about this, because we will delete the
thread in the forum, but as soon as a list reply comes in, voila! it
creates a new forum thread, which we then have to delete.

3. The troll continues to come back and cause trouble because every
person who has ever replied to a troll post, no matter how well-meaning
they were in replying to said troll post, FEEDS THE TROLL. If all of us
were to simply IGNORE the troll they would go away -- but see, by giving
the troll attention, they continue to come back, again and again and
again. Therefore,

4. Feeding the troll is -essentially- as bad as *being* a troll. As soon
as you feed the troll, knowing full well how bad that is, you become
part of the problem. Be a part of the solution and IGNORE TROLLS.

5. This should be obvious, but when somebody feeds a troll, and then you
jump in and reply to that feeding -- guess what -- you've now just fed
the troll *again*. Even if you don't quote the troll or reply to
anything they've said, you're still feeding them. Every reply to a
thread started by a troll is a feeding (unless it's a post by a C74
person asking you to stop feeding them).

6. Next time you see what is obviously a post by a troll, ESPECIALLY on
a weekend, don't assume that I or any other Cycling employee has seen
the post. Please send me an email immediately and let me know.

thanks for reading,

w