Sports Journalist Gets Trolled On Twitter, Tattles To Troll's Parents

from the this-won't-end-well dept

There's a spectrum of responses in how to deal with internet trolls. On one end, you can give them a nice little golf-clap while mostly ignoring their often-hilarious antics. Somewhere in the middle is when a news organization decides to track the troll down and harrass them in real life in one of those ironic little moments that makes life worth living. Finally, I think we can call sending a SWAT team to respond to an internet troll on the other far end of the spectrum.

So, with that established, I wonder where we'll put Al Trautwig, a sports analyst in New York for the MSG Network, who found himself the target of a troll after he Twitter-typo'd his new co-worker Marty Biron as "Boron."

@AlTrautwig Thought it was an autobiographical tweet and you meant Moron.

— THE Blocknesmonster (@Blocknesmonster) November 13, 2013

That's about what I'd expect from someone with the Twitter handle THE Blocknesmonster. It's neither creative, nor funny, nor particularly memorable or deserving of attention in any way. So you'd figure Trautwig would ignore this lame troll and move on, right? Nah, he called the guy's mom instead.

Al Trautwig apparently found the troll's phone number and called him. Except the troll doesn't live at that number anymore and hasn't for 20 years; he lives in Israel now. So when Al Trautwig creepily tracked down the number for a heckler who called him a moron on Twitter, and called to confront him about it, he spoke to the heckler's mom.

"I get a call from my mother that Al Trautwig just called the house to speak to me because I wrote something about him on twitter. My mother told him that I don't live there anymore (20 years plus) and can she have his number so I can call him back. He refused to give his number to her and said to her not to worry, that he will find me."

I'm a big fan of sports journalism and talk-radio, and every once in a while a friend or family member will ask me why I listen to a bunch of childish goons shouting things at one another while calling it entertainment. I typically argue that that's not all sports journalism is. Al Trautwig just made things much harder for me by acting as childish as the troll and giving him roughly infinitely more attention than he deserves. In fact, all it did was cause the troll to begin tweeting at Trautwig nonstop, all while getting attention fed to him in response to the story of a sports journalist stooping down to the level of a jerk.

Mission accomplished? Hardly. I imagine that Trautwig has a great many more mothers to call now that this story is circulating.

Filed Under: al trautwig, parents, trolls, twitter

Did Some Web Designer Troll Rick Santorum? 4chan's Moot Pictured On Santorum's Website

from the hilarious dept

This one is just funny. First noticed by folks on Reddit, former Presidential candidate Rick Santorum -- perhaps most well known among internet kids for the Google bombing of his name to associate it with... something unpleasant -- apparently has a picture of Chris Poole, better known as moot, the creator of the web's most popular home for internet trolls, 4chan (and yes, there's much more at 4chan, but... ). The folks over at Betabeat investigated and confirmed that a web design firm built the site, though it's unclear if moot's picture was the work of a sneaky, trolling web designer... or just an attempt to find "regular-looking" people to populate Santorum's site.

Patriot Voices used the startup Nation Builder, a web tool kit for community organizers, as a platform for the site. A representative for Nation Builder told Betabeat that the site was designed by an outside designer at the Pittsburgh-based political consulting and advertising firm Brabender Cox.

Dubbed “the premier Republican spin doctors,” Brabender Cox has a longstanding history of working to promote Republican candidates. In addition to doing work for Mr. Santorum, they’ve also created viral videos and advertising content for politicians like Republican Senator Tom Coburn and Republican Mayor of Indiana Greg Ballard.

Betabeat reached out to the organization but hasn't heard back yet.

Oh, and if you're wondering, it seems likely that the use of the work is copyright infringement. It was pulled from Poole's Wikipedia page, and the image is Creative Commons licensed, but part of that license is that attribution is required. There doesn't seem to be any such attribution. Oops.

Filed Under: chris poole, moot, pictures, rick santorum, trolls

Human Rights Group Deploys An 'Empathy Test' Captcha System To Help Sites Fend Off Trolls

from the because-i-love-being-talked-down-to-by-a-dialog-box dept

Fact: if you have a site with any amount of traffic and open comment threads, you're going to draw trolls. There's no method that's been proven to completely rid your site of trolls, though not for a lack of trying. (This one is particularly mischevious.) Various sites have tried anything from aggressive moderation to requiring Facebook logins... all to no avail. (Although the latter method has proven that certain people are more than willing to troll without the protection of anonymity.)

A new anti-troll tool from a rather unlikely source has just been unveiled, one that hopes to combine the "fun" of solving captchas with something akin to a "blush response:"

A human rights group is introducing a new take on CAPTCHAs, those little boxes that make you type in a word to prove you are human before you can comment or register for a site. Their version doesn’t just present a scrambled word to be deciphered, but instead forces a person to choose the right word to unscramble based on the proper emotional response to a human rights violation.

Civil Rights Defenders, the Swedish-based group that developed the tool, hopes the Civil Rights Captcha will help sites block spiders and bots, while letting humans in — and hopefully educating the humans at the same time...

But perhaps forcing a troll to repeatedly choose an empathetic response will, over time, soothe the ravages of comment sections around the net. Okay, that might also be asking too much, but at the very least spreading information about human rights abuses certainly can’t hurt, even if the jerks of the internet (see, for example, YouTube comments) remain beyond help.

That's right. It's Voight-Kampff for comment threads. Instead of trying to parse a set of badly scanned words and Street View cam house numbers, Civil Rights CAPTCHA instead asks you how you feel about certain horrific situations, hoping that you'll make the "right" decision before spewing your vitriol and ignorance into the now-unlocked comment box.

While its heart is certainly in the right place, the implementation still requires captchas, something most users would rather not encounter every time they make a comment. (Yes, I know. But sometimes, decent , non-trolling humans don't want to "create an account" or "enter an email address" in order to participate.) On top of that is the fact that each captcha has only one "right" answer, making the system more than a little heavy-handed in its moralizing. This assumes that your regular, non-troll commenters are going to be fine with being preached at while jumping through hoops. It also assumes that all dedicated trolls are morons incapable of deducing the (obviously) "right" reaction to each situation presented.

This particular captcha service might prove useful in limited situations, like being pre-loaded with questions related to a particular cause or event being discussed/promoted at the website deploying it. It also might prove popular with the sort of people who are willing to annoy a certain percentage of their community in order to "raise awareness." It will become a form of penance for those involved, much like forwarding "concerned" emails and switching Facebook statuses to show support. You know, the sort of thing that will morph into "I solved Captchas for world peace. What will YOU do?" t-shirts popping up on Cafepress.

I can't see this solving the troll problem, but I can see it annoying most of a user base, leaving the site deploying it with a smaller audience consisting of people who like being moralized at frequently. Like any other captcha, the spambots and trolls will find a way around it, with the only ones affected being decent human beings, which would seem to be the sort of "demographic" you'd want to annoy less. Pushing them through a "think our way or hit the road" filtering system doesn't make trolls any less prevalent or make non-decent human beings any more "decent."

Filed Under: captcha, empathy, trolls

4Chan Reroutes Promotional Contest, Lines Taylor Swift Up For A Concert At The Horace Mann School For The Deaf

from the not-your-personal-army-but-quite-possibly-your-personal-botnet dept

Hey, various musicians, celebrities and sponsors! How would you like a swift lesson in Crowdsourcing Your Ignominy? What's that? You'd rather not? Oh... I see...

OK. I'll pass that alo--

LESSON IN PROGRESS........
PLEASE STAND BY

Lessons (un)learned to date:

• Time Magazine says "Vote for Person of the Year" and opens the polls up to 4chan's robot army without so much as a captcha to slow them down.

• Cuban rapper Pitbull teams up with Big Retail (Wal-Mart) to push energizing breath strips in the store receiving the most "Likes." Boston Phoenix writer teams with army of goons to send Pitbull (and the writer himself) to Kodiak, Alaska.

• Edgy beverage company invites internet users to name new MTN Dew flavor and is somehow shocked the suggestions contain a mixture of grotesque sexual imagery and Hitler references. Local favorite "Methamphetagreen" fails to place in the top 10.

Enter corporate sponsors Chegg (textbooks) and Papa Johns Pizza (um... pizza), a marketing force deemed nigh invulnerable after drafting country music sweetheart Taylor Swift. The plan? Open up the polls to The Internet and allow It to choose which lucky school will be receiving $10,000 and a concert starring Ms. Swift.

Precautions were taken. Entrants could only vote once per day and had to log in through Facebook (and "Like" Taylor Swift) in order to select a school. Voters could gain extra votes by "Liking" other sponsors' pages and buying Taylor Swift's latest single. The polls were opened and, as is often the case, members of 4chan were the first several thousand people in line.

Shortly thereafter, a certain school shot out to an insurmountable lead. Pack your ASL interpreter, Taylor. You're headed to Horace Mann School for the Deaf!

Like most things 4chan reroutes, it makes you laugh before you realize how heartless you sound LOLing away at a potential bunch of deaf kids. ("Potential" meaning Swift has the option to turn down the winning school. But she wouldn't, would she?) Of course, there's some honest laughter to be had at the decidedly less cruel thought that Swift's music is best left unheard.

Horace Mann had cleared 50K votes as of last Friday night, so it's unlikely that (barring any sponsor interference) another school will suddenly outpace it. This isn't necessarily the most heartless thing 4chan has conjured up. If nothing else, Horace Mann will be receiving $10,000. There's also the good possibility that Swift will play a concert at the school. The effort won't be completely wasted, as this Redditor points out:

I get the humor but those deaf kids are going to fucking love it! Most deaf can hear a certain degree with residual hearing, hearing aids and CI's. Not to mention those deaf kids who are profoundly deaf and don't wear any assistive devices will enjoy the visual stimulation of the show.

So, there's that. The music will still be appreciated on some level by the attendees. Oddly enough, this looks like another PR win by the time all is said and done. Swift will play a well-received concert at Horace Mann. Five schools will receive $10,000. Visuals will be stimulated. And somehow, 4chan will have inadvertently trolled up a massively good deed, adding yet another incongruous layer to its mythology.

And, on the one-in-a-million chance that Swift turns this gig down, I humbly suggest these gentlemen fill in.

Filed Under: 4chan, deaf, horace mann, internet voting, taylor swift, trolls

State Department Wants To Troll Terrorists Online

from the because-that'll-make-them-change-their-minds dept

It's no secret that various extremists and terrorists groups use the internet just like everyone else. And, of course, there are places where they communicate. Some politicians, like Joe Lieberman, think that the way you should respond to this is by having companies censor any account that appears to be connected to terrorist organizations that he doesn't like. That this might cause such marginalized groups to feel even more persecuted and angry never seems to cross his mind.

Of course, that's not the only approach. Spencer Ackerman, over at Wired's Danger Room blog, has a fascinating story about a guy at the State Department (with almost no budget) who is trying to ramp up a plan, called Viral Peace, which is basically all about using social media to troll terrorists and extremists online in the hope of convincing some to give up.

The program, called Viral Peace, seeks to occupy the virtual space that extremists fill, one thread or Twitter exchange at a time. Shahed Amanullah, a senior technology adviser to the State Department and Viral Peace’s creator, tells Danger Room he wants to use “logic, humor, satire, [and] religious arguments, not just to confront [extremists], but to undermine and demoralize them.” Think of it as strategic trolling, in pursuit of geopolitical pwnage.

While I certainly appreciate this idea more than the outright censorship plan that Lieberman seems to like, I do wonder if the program might backfire by doing the exact opposite of what they're trying to do. Trolling has its place and can rile people up, but I'm not sure it's ever effective in getting anyone to change their position. In fact, it can often make people dig their heels in even deeper...

Filed Under: online, terrorism, terrorists, trolls

Police Send SWAT Team, Break Into Wrong House (With TV Film Crew) In Response To Internet Troll

from the wow dept

We've heard of police very frequently overreacting to things and sending in SWAT teams when they aren't necessary. We've also heard of them sending SWAT teams to the wrong place. But this latest story, found via Radley Balko (who tracks these things like no other) may be the most insane yet. It involves police sending a SWAT team and breaking into the wrong house (whose front door was open) in response to some internet trolls. I'm not kidding.

The issue was that on a Topix community forum for Evansville, Indiana, someone claimed that a list of police staff had been "leaked." Some trolls in the comments spoke out against the police -- and one certainly went too far, suggesting that a certain officer's house was going to be shot up. Rather than investigating the issue, the police got some info on where the comment came from (or, rather, where they thought the comment came from) and sent the SWAT team and a TV news crew to the home of Ira and Louise Milan -- whose front door was open. Now, they could have rang the doorbell and spoken to them. But, instead, they broke down the screen door, broke the front window, and tossed a flashbang into the living room.

And... all for naught. While they seized a bunch of computer equipment, it turns out that no one in the house had anything to do with anything. Something they could have ascertained by, you know, talking to people in the house. The police are defending their massive overreaction because.... the internet!!!!

“This is a little more difficult that a traditional crime scene, because we’re dealing with the Internet. They definitely weren’t expecting (a SWAT team at the door). The reason we did that is the threats were specific enough, and the potential for danger was there.

“This is a big deal to us,” Cullum said. “This may be just somebody who was online just talking stupid. What I would suggest to anybody who visits websites like that is that their comments can be taken literally.”

Yes, so because the police might overreact, you should watch what you say online. And also always be ready for a SWAT team to show up, in case a stranger you know nothing about says something bad online. After all, it's "the internet."

Filed Under: evansville, indiana, police, swat team, trolls

Valve Tries To Charge People Based On How Likable They Are: Trolls Pay Full Price

from the perhaps-we-should-try-that dept

We've talked plenty of times about unique business models and experiments by Valve Software. it's latest experiment sounds particularly interesting, if perhaps difficult to pull off well. It appears that the company wants to try to charge jerks more -- but let likable people play free (story found via Slashdot). The specifics are a bit vague, but the plan is for the game DOTA 2. Valve's Gabe Newell has hinted at this:

"The issue that we're struggling with quite a bit is something I've kind of talked about before, which is how do you properly value people's contributions to a community?” he said, reflecting on a discussion he had with Develop last year.

Last year Newell told Develop that “the games industry has this broken model, which is one price for everyone. That’s actually a bug, and it’s something that we want to solve through our philosophy of how we create entertainment products".

[....]

“An example is – and this is something as an industry we should be doing better – is charging customers based on how much fun they are to play with.

“So, in practice, a really likable person in our community should get Dota 2 for free, because of past behaviour in Team Fortress 2. Now, a real jerk that annoys everyone, they can still play, but a game is full price and they have to pay an extra hundred dollars if they want voice.”

And the latest news is that they are going beyond this crazy idea into seeing what's actually possible:

“We're trying to figure out ways so that people who are more valuable to everybody else [are] recognized and accommodated. We all know people where if they're playing we want to play, and there are other people where if they're playing we would [rather] be on the other side of the planet.

"It's just a question of coming up with mechanisms that recognize and reward people who are doing things that are valuable to other groups of people."

I'm curious as to how exactly this would work. I think there are lots of community-based properties would love to be able to charge trolls more. However, this could be really, really difficult to work in practice, and create some problems, depending on what the overall goals are. It would be nice, of course, if you could come up with a perfect system to get rid of trolls, but distinguishing true trolls can often be much more difficult in practice than in theory.

Filed Under: dota 2, experiments, gabe newell, pricing, trolls
Companies: valve

Lawsuit Against US Copyright Group For Fraud & Extortion Moves Forward

from the conduct-is-actionable,-it-seems dept

US Copyright Group was the first of the US-based copyright trolls, suing thousands of individuals in a single lawsuit, trying to get them to pay up (rather than going through an actual trial). US Copyright Group is really a front for a DC law firm, Dunlapp, Grubb & Weaver. One of its very first "big" lawsuits was against about 5,000 people for supposedly partaking in the sharing of Uwe Boll's Far Cry. Of course, as we had noted, there was a pretty big problem in the Far Cry lawsuit, in that the US copyright registration was filed too late for many of the accusations of infringement.

Partly on the basis of the registration problems, Dmitriy Shirokov (with the law firm Booth Sweet) sued US Copyright Group, DGW and its key lawyers for fraud, extortion and conspiracy back in 2010. DGW shot back angrily, claiming that it's perfectly fine for for lawyers to lie to the court, if it's part of the course of litigation:

"Although an attorney may be accused of defrauding opposing parties, knowingly committing discovery abuses, lying to the court, or purposely and maliciously defaming another individual, if it takes place during the course of litigation, the conduct simply is not actionable,"

Of course, the threats and extortion weren't actually "during the course of litigation." DGW also claimed that there was no "harm" for Shirokov, because he didn't settle, and thus hadn't paid up. DGW then went even further, asking for sanctions against Shirokov and Booth Sweet, claiming that it was actually them who were filing lawsuits for "improper purpose."

The court has now ruled in response to DGW's motion to dismiss, and it seems pretty clear that the judge is not impressed by DGW at all. The motion to dismiss was rejected and the class action lawsuit against the company moves forward.

Judge Boal recommended that the motion for dismissal be denied in significant part. The defendants had argued that Mr. Shirokov was not entitled to sue them at all, since he wised up before paying their demands, and his claimed injuries were out-of-pocket costs of investigating the threats. They claimed that the Noerr-Pennington privilege, an antitrust doctrine, prevented any liability. And they argued that lawyers and their clients have absolute immunity for even intentional torts, or in DGW’s words: “although an attorney may be accused of defrauding opposing parties, knowingly committing discovery abuses, lying to the court, or purposely and maliciously defaming another individual, if it takes place during the course of litigation, the conduct simply is not actionable.” Just think about that one for a minute.

Judge Boal thoroughly debunked each of those claims. The fees Mr. Shirokov incurred in investigating the trumped-up copyright claims constitute an injury-in-fact that gives him standing to sue. The Massachusetts litigation privilege does not apply to threats of litigation that are not seriously contemplated in good faith. And the Noerr-Pennington antitrust doctrine did not apply outside of antitrust law, and even the First Amendment right to petition isn’t an absolute protection for litigation threats.

It's important to note that, in this case, it's the specific issue of the non-registered copyrights that is key. That is, the lawsuit isn't about the general practice of copyright trolling -- but the fact that it was done using claims and demands that were not true (e.g., the statutory damages if found guilty of sharing, even though such statutory damages were not available for a work that hadn't been registered).

Along those lines, the court didn't completely side with Shirokov, saying that some of the racketeering and fraud charges should be dismissed. But, large parts of the lawsuit survive and will move forward -- which doesn't seem like a good thing for DGW or US Copyright Group. Perhaps, next time, they'll check the copyright registration before filing suit.

Filed Under: copyright, dmitriy shirokov, fraud, registration, thomas dunlap, trolls, uwe boll
Companies: booth sweet, dunlap grubb & weaver, us copyright group

BBC Tracks Down And Confronts An Internet Troll

from the in-case-you're-wondering dept

Lots of people wonder what internet trolls are thinking in trying to get their kicks out of being as obnoxious as possible online... and some folks at the BBC apparently were able to track down and confront an individual who had a reputation for highly obnoxious trolling -- writing mean messages on Facebook tribute pages for people who were murdered. I'm not a huge fan of "confrontation" journalism, which feels pretty manufactured, but there is something amusing about watching the guy try to ignore the issue for a while, before realizing he can't resist and he has to respond. It's kind of a form of reverse trolling, where he fell for it... When asked if he thinks about the people he's hurting online he responds, "Yeah, I think fuck 'em." Then he goes on to talk about how it's nothing illegal, and that Facebook is an open forum so he can say whatever he wants. The BBC points out that some of what he's saying may be illegal (under UK law), and he brushes it off, apparently responding to an earlier point that said someone got nine weeks in jail for similar statements, by saying "nine weeks, what's that?"

It's not the most enlightening of interviews, but given the general interest some people have in trolling, I figured some folks might find it interesting.

Filed Under: internet, trolls