Board Thread:Wiki Improvement/@comment-5518179-20150711162535

In the aftermath of two users being trolls (because apparently that is Armageddon to us), I've noticed a lot us (including a couple admins/moderators) pretty much when off and threatened these users and gave complete hostility to them. While you all think that is great, since you're trying to make them feel unwelcomed, these people aren't doing it because it is hardwired into our brains to go off and be trollish with their twisted humor.

Before SFW, I came from Encyclopedia Dramatica and Eclipse Origins. Before I claimed the name Dark Lunaros (now Zoran), I was a chat troll named MakutaCreptoke00 and I pretty much went onto chat and spam-pasted Wikipedia articles about sex positions. Yes, very funny, I know, but I solely did it to see the reactions that were put in place by the people in chat. Of course, I had a kick out of it, Minato banned me heaven knows how many times through multiple accounts and it didn't really end until Xi banned me, in which case I returned long after Wikia glitched out and reverted all the bans.

As a person who takes pleasure in causing flame wars and trolling, and I'm going to tell you all how to properly act around a troll so they don't keep coming back.

This part is directed to all users, admin or not.


 * DON'T threaten the troll with bans, they don't care, they just want to see your reactions.


 * DON'T try to humiliate or ridicule these people, they are masters of social engineering, they'll turn your words back onto you.


 * DON'T show them the 'truth' of their existence or their argument, they'll get a kick at it.


 * DON'T try to act incompetent, they'll laugh at your denial.


 * DON'T counteract arguments (especially about autism), they already know how autistic you are, no offence.


 * DON'T leave while they are trolling unless you have to, they'll think you ragequit.


 * DON'T insult them openly or treat them like complete trash, they can read.


 * DO pretend they don't exist or ignore them, think of them as the drunk guy walking home at 1 AM.


 * DO try to notify an admin with calmness and little to no hostility.


 * DO revert any edits without any sense of hostility towards them, just revert and wait for more edits.
 * DO remind them only ONCE about the rules they broke, after one time, just give up and let the admins handle it.

This part is just for admins and moderators.


 * DON'T assume that having the ability to ban them scares them, it doesn't.


 * DON'T try to act all badass and be like, "over my dead body" and be all Scarface, just ban them.


 * DON'T remind them about how many rules they are breaking, they already know how the policies work.


 * DON'T insult them in the ban reasons or try to clarify crap like you have autism too or something.


 * DO ban the person and shut up.


 * DO revert edits they made, and clean up whatever stuff they did.


 * DO leave the issue alone once it is done. It's done, nobody cares any more.


 * DO notify other Sonic wikis (esp Sonic Fan Character) if you think they are targeting more than just SFW.

Honestly though, just shut up and deal with the troll, okay? They want you to get angry and you people think that being angry and hostile towards them will scare them off, and it won't. Don't automatically assume that the new person with a funny name is a troll either, it isn't right to just ban people on the spot because they slipped up on swearing, keep watching them, see what they come up as, if they vandalize, troll, spam, or swear like they mean it, then it is the time to take action.

I hope this was useful, because I know we seem to forget what a troll really is and our actions at stopping them does the complete opposite, our wiki gets close to 10,000 visits a day and several thousand edits per week, we gain at least a new user or two every day, so we're not some lowly community in the back of the internet's bookshelf. 