What is a Troll?

From Barbelith

From the Jargon Dictionary:

    
*troll*

1. v.,n. [From the Usenet group
alt.folklore.urban] To utter a posting on Usenet
designed to attract predictable responses or flames; or, the
post itself. Derives from the phrase "trolling for newbies"
which in turn comes from mainstream "trolling", a style of
fishing in which one trails bait through a likely spot hoping for a
bite. The well-constructed troll is a post that induces lots of
newbies and flamers to make themselves look even more clueless than
they already do, while subtly conveying to the more savvy and
experienced that it is in fact a deliberate troll. If you don't
fall for the joke, you get to be in on it. 

2. n. An individual who chronically trolls in sense 1; regularly posts
specious arguments, flames or personal attacks to a newsgroup,
discussion list, or in email for no other purpose than to annoy
someone or disrupt a discussion. Trolls are recognizable by the
fact that they have no real interest in learning about the topic at
hand - they simply want to utter flame bait. Like the ugly
creatures they are named after, they exhibit no redeeming
characteristics, and as such, they are recognized as a lower form
of life on the net, as in, "Oh, ignore him, he's just a troll." 
Compare kook. 

3. n. [Berkeley] Computer lab monitor. A popular
campus job for CS students. Duties include helping newbies and
ensuring that lab policies are followed. Probably so-called because
it involves lurking in dark cavelike corners.

Some people claim that the troll (sense 1) is properly a narrower category
than flame bait, that a troll is categorized by containing
some assertion that is wrong but not overtly controversial.

The use of `troll' in either sense is a live metaphor that readily
produces elaborations and combining forms. For example, one not
infrequently sees the warning "Do not feed the troll" as part
of a followup to troll postings.

Essentially, a troll is somebody who posts controversially and/or offensively, but without any real interest in discussion or exchanging ideas. A devoted troll can carry on doing this for a long time, and in some cases somebody may be replicating the activities of a troll without noticing (see below). Trolls want either to generate lengthy and pointless threads for their own gratification, or rot existing threads in the same way. It is sometimes hard to tell when somebody is trolling and when they are just very dim, but the need for attention, frequently continuing to post after everyone else has given up or changed the subject, is often a dead giveaway.

Barbelith has had very few trolls of any serious duration or devotion, and as such response to trolling is generally surprise followed by contempt. It is rare for any action to be taken directly by the moderators or admins, such as banning the suit or deleting all posts written by the alleged troll (see: What_Is_a_Moderator?).

If you are going to accuse somebody of being a troll, be absolutely sure that you are not just very pissed off with them; trolling describes a specific set of behaviours, and undeserved accusation will get you something of a reputation.

Barbelith does attract a kind of subset of troll -- obsessive posters who are not malicious but just tend to rot threads by adhering to and frequently restating their own idiosyncratic beliefs on certain topics, like sextrolls or queertrolls, or PCtrolls or hiphoptrolls. The general form here is to remonstrate briefly then ignore, but of course it’s a lot harder than it sounds.