Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: How Do You Deal With Aggressive Forum Users?
Slashdot reader dryriver writes:
I've noticed a disturbing trend while trying to resolve a rather tricky tech issue by asking questions on a number of internet forums. The number of people who don't help at all with problems but rather butt into threads with unhelpful comments like "Why would you want to do that in the first place?" or "why don't you look at X poorly written documentation page " was staggering. One forum user with 1,500+ posts even posted "you are such a n00b if you can't figure this out" in my question thread, even though my tech question wasn't one that is obvious or easy to resolve...
I seem to remember a time when people helped each other far more readily on the internet. Now there seems to be a new breed of forum user who a) hangs out at a forum socially all day b) does not bother to help at all and c) gets a kick out of telling you things like "what a stupid question" or "nobody will help you with that here" or similar... Where have the good old days gone when people much more readily gave other people step-by-step tips, tricks, instructions and advice?
The original submission claims the ratio of unhelpful comments to helpful ones was 5 to 1. Has anyone else experienced this? And if so, what's the best response? Leave your best answers in the comments. How do you deal with aggressive forum users?
I seem to remember a time when people helped each other far more readily on the internet. Now there seems to be a new breed of forum user who a) hangs out at a forum socially all day b) does not bother to help at all and c) gets a kick out of telling you things like "what a stupid question" or "nobody will help you with that here" or similar... Where have the good old days gone when people much more readily gave other people step-by-step tips, tricks, instructions and advice?
The original submission claims the ratio of unhelpful comments to helpful ones was 5 to 1. Has anyone else experienced this? And if so, what's the best response? Leave your best answers in the comments. How do you deal with aggressive forum users?
In spite of the horribly rude tone, there's a hint of truth to that. A big reason why people get snarky is because so many people don't even bother to try to figure things out before they ask for help. A sizable percentage of people seem to be completely helpless when anything goes wrong. They don't know how to do a Google search, they don't know how to read for comprehension, and they don't know how to figure out what things to look for when skimming/searching documentation for solutions to their problems. This lack of critical thinking skills is quite alarming.
As a result, even those of us who still try to help tend to point people to the right piece of documentation first, waiting to re-explain things until after they come back and say that they still don't understand something. And after a few rounds, even I have to say, "Read the doc and figure it out." After all, my job is not to write your code for you. I'll try to help, and I'll try to steer you in the right direction, but there are limits.
Cynically, I place the blame for these problems squarely at the feet of Apple for trying to dumb down programming, technical documentation, computer use, etc. to the point where people don't have to think to code, rather than saying, "You must be this tall to ride the ride." The result is a bunch of people who don't bother to think and who expect others to do the thinking for them. They've bred a whole class of "duh-velopers" who literally can't do much more than piece together code snippets and tweak them slightly. Heaven help them if a snippet contains something like "insert your customization here", because they go slack-jawed. And this results in everybody who actually understands what's going on having to waste a lot of time explaining things that should have been obvious.
IMO, you can't fix one problem without fixing both. People are jerks because the newbies have driven all the nice people away by incessantly asking questions whose answers should be obvious to anybody who actually read and comprehended the docs, and most of the people who didn't comprehend the docs are still not going to understand it no matter how many times you explain it. Fix the clueless question problem, and people who are able to actually figure out what they're doing will stick around and will continue to be helpful. Short of that, nothing will help in the long run.
To some degree, that is probably best solved by reputation-bssed segregation. Anybody should be able to answer any questions, but until you get rep, your questions should be initially seen only by other newbies (and if no newbie can answer them, they would then bubble up to folks with more rep). Rep should be awarded for asking good questions or giving good answers. Clueless people who are incapable of asking good questions and giving good answers should thus remain stuck in the newbie question cesspool while the adults discuss real issues.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
VBulletin, very popular forum software, has a feature called "Global ignore" that does what you describe. I used to run a large well-moderated professional discussion forum and if we got a jerk in the rolls we would first warn him, then either put him on global ignore or "miserable users", which is hilarious. It would take people sometimes months to realize they were being muted, sometimes they never did figure it out.
Miserable users was pretty funny, if you decided the person had to go but was big enough of an asshole you wanted to still have some fun, you would turn this on. It would:
1. Slow response (time delay) on every page (20 to 60 seconds default).
2. A chance they will get the "server busy" message (50% by default).
3. A chance that no search facilities will be available (75% by default).
4. A chance they will get redirected to another preset page (25% & homepage by default).
5. A chance they will simply get a blank page (25% by default).
6. Post flood limit increased by a defined factor (10 times by default).
7. If they get past all this okay, then they will be served up their proper page.
After that you just waited for them to get frustrated and leave of their own accord. Passive-Aggressive Nirvana!
-- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
Aggressive forum users are a sign of the failure of the moderators. You'll see that on commenting systems where there is peer moderation (like on slashdot) or very relaxed, almost non existent moderation such as youtube aggressive forum users are never really a problem. On youtube where moderation is non existent, users know not to make aggressive, provoking posts because they know that the reply they get back will be 2x as aggressive and nothing will be held back, plus the aggressive forum will be rediculed by the rest of the forum commenters discouraging them from a repeat offence.
On a forum where there is active moderation but the moderator takes a favorable/ignorant stance on aggressive users, this leads to a really bad culture on the board because nothing is really done about the said aggressive forum user and it just kills serious threads and drives legitimate commenters off. Once the aggressive user knows he can get away with belittling and being rude to others he continues it in other threads because he knows the moderators will do little if anything about it.
Unfortunately there is nothing you can really do about aggressive users like that because it is moderators failing to do their job/doing a half assed effort at it and if you complain they will take action on you instead of on the perpetrator. In some ways I think some moderators even LIKE having aggressive users around because they lighten the load on the moderators by killing off discussions and driving off people so there is less for them to moderate/reply to in threads.
Examples of failing forums:
IMDB forums. I am not surprised the IMDB forums are shutting down. IMDB is owned by Amazon and their forums are a disgrace, filled with trolls and the moderators do a extremely poor job about it.
The Steam "Help and Tips", and "Suggestion/Ideas" forums. Just like the OP describes, when people ask for genuine help they get shitposts. When they make a suggestion they get replies to the line of "Why would you want to do that in the first place" or the vanilla response that the suggested idea will only help griefers/phishers/spammers, ignoringthe fact that they are acting like griefers themselves with their responses. It's like the MPAA trying to curb copyright infringement by using the keywords like "funding terrorism". They can't just reply to someone civily, they have to be insultive and negative to the person they are replying to. It is this sort of negativity that ruins discussions by serial discussion killers such as Start_running http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198043285599, Satoru http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197970218004 and Zetikla http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198001062896
In the Doom board someone asked for a Linux port and the windows trolls swooped in:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/379720/discussions/0/357286119106149442/ . The moderators did nothing about it.
I know that this post now is going to attract all sorts of trolls but the posts I'm talking about people write genuine lengthy on topic posts that have nothing to do with other users and they get attacked/griefed for it. That is what I am talking about that drives forum contributers off and stonewalls discussions.It is a big problem on discussion boards where the moderators are poor at doing their job. If they can;t moderate then they should let the users as a whole do it for them like on slashdot.
I just wish they wouldn't pollute search results with a bazillion messages suggesting that people google it, such that any attempt to google it will fail.
Let's just skip the inevitable bullshit and cut right to the chase here. There are a lot of people with mental health issues. Inherently, some of these have a lot of internal aggression from unresolved issues and they will take it out whenever and on whomever they can.
Let's also be realistic, there are a bunch of these people here at /. and we have had a surge of anonymous jerks flood in here to troll because they can, it's what they do. They do so because they are too cowardly to face their own issues and resolve them. Consequently they are so full of bile and vehemence that it overflows from them.
Asking for help is seen by these "people" as a sign of weakness, as opposed to the humility of learning that it is. You have to make yourself vulnerable to ask a question and that is what these pathetic trolls do.
You can do something about it by dealing with your own issues so that you are mentally stable enough to endure the trolls, then turn it around on them so that they never bother you again. You must confront bullies otherwise they will keep bothering you. Even though you are making yourself vulnerable to appeal for help you must be armed with the knowledge that these people will attack you if they see what they perceive as weakness and be ready to answer, in kind, if necessary.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
The exodus of the previous crop of moderators hasn't helped. The ones here these days just let anything go
Methinks the "previous crop of moderators" lost interest after Trump got elected. Mission accomplished, so why hang around?
We all know the Slashdot moderation system is based broadly on karma, but beyond that, it is something of a mystery. Part of me wonders whether some groups have discovered how to "game" the system by modding up their friends, who in turn mod them up, creating a false meritocracy.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
It was far from typical. On the board we had about 8,000 users, and of them, only about 4 had to be dealt with this way. We ran a forum for professionals and good behavior was the norm, but we did get an occasional idiot from time to time. Otherwise the membership very much appreciated the professional atmosphere and the lack of trolls and morons.
-- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
Go to a forum dealing with, say, gardening or pets or childcare and you'll very rarely see this sort of thing, the standard response there is sympathy and advice.
I disagree.
I frequent a large parenting forum.
The bitterness and disdain for others I see there is unseen in the "techie" world. Newbie questions get not only mocked, but attacked on personal level and with psychological finesse that only comes with practice. The responders know that new parents are uncertain in their parenting skills and they attack this condition with precision. "What kind of parent could ask a question like this?" "MY child does ALWAYS obey the rules we have set. What mistakes must you have done for your kids to not obey yours?" etc etc.
The people on the parenting forum seem like Putin's trolls in training for me. They practice psychological forum-warfare, trying to identify the weak spots in other participants. People who come for advice in parenting MUST have the weak spots (otherwise they would not seek help in the first place) and thus provide a good training ground.
Thus this behaviour is universal to the 'net, not limited to "techie forums".
Aggressive forum users are a sign of the failure of the moderators...(..., ..., ...)
It's is absolute rubbish. That's like saying that criminality is a failure of the police.
Offending is often a result of lack of education, domestically or at school. It is also largely the result of the individual in question failing to apply him or herself in a constructive manner.
Yes, some forums are not moderator well, some not at all but the community is JUST AS RESPONSIBLE. There are simply not enough moderators, (or cops for that matters) to enforce everyone obeys the rules all the time. This is why there are fines and penalties to act as a detractor.
This is exactly why you have things like a neighbourhood watch in real life. That's the community getting off their ass and doing something. Slashdot has a great community system but stop expecting moderators or anyone else to sort everything out sometimes that just does not happen #becauselife
You are going to get shit posts anywhere on the internet. the frequency and derision often correlate with teenagers. Why do kids do stupid shit? because they are kids and no one is there to get them the proverbial smack upside the head.
Not everything you disagree with is trolling but if you examine your average school's classroom dynamics you will find that not much has changed in adulthood. Look, the most powerful country on Earth is now run by a bully that in his 50s still spoke like a teen in a locker room.
We're all just simply discovering human nature for what it is.
Once upon a time you HAD to work in a community to survive. Like being accepted in a village in medieval times. Excuse the over simplification but you could probably ask your neighbour for help if you didn't have any bread or they would share their apples if you shared your cheese and that built communities.
These days you can make it as an individual because your rights and default entitlements by paying taxes have most replaced the need for a community. You can go to a food bank, you can claim welfare, ask for loans etc. These things do not depend on a community or a small group of people per se they are just services.
Here's a basic question, why do I need you? why do you need me? I could die tomorrow and you'd never know, that's how important I am in your life. This basic reality also drives behaviour.
If without me you knew you'd have trouble securing shelter for your goats in winter then it would be a major blow to your survival if I died but today? -today there are far too many people that are just dead weight really but I digress.
What happens online is almost a direct channel of people's thoughts. There is no body language or polite in-person behaviour. Imagine what would happen if people's thoughts were exchanged directly. The content could be far far worse.
That last point ties up nicely with my start. Human nature. While some of us aspire to do better and some in fact do, we humans are still mostly savages.
So the population has changed from the technical and well-educated to 'everyone'. Nothing wrong with that either, potentially there are great benefits. However, we need to have a serious set of discussions and reflections about civility of discourse and free speech. For example David Graeber, one of our most interesting Brit economists, here: https://twitter.com/davidgraeb...
That's an obvious example, but makes the point. Discussion can be robust without being vulgar too, I actually feel sorry for people whose sole means of expression of **** ****$! (OK when hitting thumb with hammer, of course) etc., they probably have quite unhappy and emotionally poor lives.
As to remedies, I think it's clear from the simple example about that some forms of speech are not protected, so I am in favour of channel 'kicks', timeouts, invisibility markers and other suppression tools used judiciously by moderators. I also believe that, as part of school, we should be taught about debate as a core subject, it's the thing that keeps us from braining each other with rocks when we disagree.
On y va, qui mal y pense!
The specific behaviour the OP describes is more a sign of the type of forum they're participating in, it's, unfortunately, fairly common behaviour among geek/techie personalities. Go to a forum dealing with, say, gardening or pets or childcare and you'll very rarely see this sort of thing, the standard response there is sympathy and advice.
Yes and no. I have sympathy with both sides and I'm about to write an ill structured post, blathering my thoughts all over the place. With that out of the way...
Thing is, on those gardening forums, you're generally asking for free help from people who are world experts, very busy (the forum covers work too) and can command $2000 a day consulting fees. Tahe for example, Theo De Raadt. He is one hellofa smart guy and leads an absolutely world class operating system (one which incidentally seems to be plagued with freeloaders---how many megacorps rely on openssh and contribute basically nothing) on remarkably small funds. The forums/mailing lists aren't a social gathering, they're very much work, but work that happens to be visible and in theory accessible to all.
In a very real sense, butting into those forums, interrupting busy professionals doing work and asking for unpaid help when you can't be bothered to do the research is the height of rudeness. Someone telling you to "fuck off" is less rude. I have actually had the pleasure of conversing with Mr De Raadt on the mailing list. I was doing a "you probably shouldn't be doing this" kind of thing, but I probably spent 4 extra hours researching after deciding to write a post, reading the man pages, browsing the source and forum posts, to make sure I wasn't taking the piss. I actually learned a bunch more doing that and so was able to go in at a deeper level.
Theo himself weighed in on the thread after a few posts. He was polite, and helpful and it was an overall excellent experience. But I didn't ask a very busy, very overworked person to stop work and help me for free so I don't have to think myself.
On the other hand...
I don't tend to respond like that (yet?). I can command reasonable consulting fees in my area and I get massively n00bish questions from people trying to use my C++ library which makes it clear they're only passingly familiar with a C++ compiler and can't even answer basic questions like "what compiler are you using". But I'm not famous and my code isn't anything like as popular as OpenBSD, so while those are a relatively high proportion of questions, they are reasonably rare.
I am getting slightly annoyed by them though. I imagine if it was daily (or more) then my patience would have worn very thin by now.
But it goes all the way down. N00b questions on a n00b forum are fine. Actually n00b questions on any forum are fine, provided the n00b in question (and we are all n00bs) are not entitled. But after a couple of years of answering question from people who want a quick fix or their homework solved, I think people get really, really jaded and worn. At that point they tend to see bad behaviour even when there is none. For example, misunderstanding a question, then attacking based on that BECAUSE IT LOOKS LIKE ANOTHER FUCKING HOMEWORK QUESTION JUST FUCK OFF!!11!1one etc.
But they, don't want to leave the forum because there are also the good tech bits.
Oh and of course some people are simply raging assholes who believe that unpleasantness is a substitute for quality (or hides a lack of it), or just like to shit on others to make themselves feel good. The trouble is the aggressiveness from the competent, but deeply jaded people allows the assholeishness from the incompetent to flourish.
But bear in mind that it is assholey to ask a world expert for help when 10 minutes of googling would have solved the problem. Also bear in mind that we all have days where somehow we miss blindingly obvious answers.
Basically there are assholes on both sides, and there's a lot of jadedness.
I have no idea what the solution is.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
While it is a fairly common problem on tech forums, it might have something to do with the large number of people that we get to deal with who have no interest in learning, want us to solve all of their problems, and (very important) consider us to be sub-humans incapable of human interaction or emotion for the rest of their time. Technical people get to deal with lots of non-technical people who have technical problems, and who have zero appreciation for our efforts or our very existence other than as a way to solve their probems. This is definitely different from gardening or pets: the people asking questions there are already part of the community themselves, and don't look down on the people they expect to solve their problems.
There are other problems too: far too many students asking for help with homework (and always the same homework too! "Implement a linked list", how original). Too many people apparently completely unaware of how to use the search function of the forum. Too many people who just cannot bother to read. Too many people who get the help they want, but completely forget to post a "thank you" (or accept your answer, in the case of Stackoverflow).
Having said all that, yes, tech forums tend to be toxic. Entirely too many postings start or end with a sneer ("Are you a moron?", or "You must be Trump", for example). It doesn't add anything, it only increases hostility, so why add it?
As for Stackoverflow(/Stackexchange), it's no exception, really. I tried to help people in the C++ forum for a while - until I had a few of my answers modded to -5 (really bad) and then saw the same answer posted verbatim by another poster with a score a hundred times mine, who promptly received +30 or more for it. Suffice it to say, I stopped posting there.
When someone asks a hopelessly naive question in a pubic forum, the easiest thing for everyone is to ignore. The second easiest is to point to a FAQ. In a community of reasonable people, you'd kind of expect that the real experts learn to recognize real problems - like Theo de Raadt not bothering to chime in to your problem until it grew into a conversation - and that less expert people get to feel good answering relatively simple problems. One imagine that they get tired of answering the same questions and mature into the "more expert" tier, but get replaced by new people.
The question is, if someone doesn't have anything useful to contribute, why should they take valuable time out of their day to post an abusive, insulting response? There's no rule that you have to reply to every post.