If you have been out in the social spaces for more than few minutes then you may have encountered a Troll.  Seriously, if you have a significant number of people following you and many of them are very influential in the social space you more than likely have encountered a Troll or two. 

In talking to the support people of a few of the major social spaces I found they full denial they have problems with Trolls roaming their space and they are also open with tell me that IF there was a problem they would be seeing more blogs and threads posted on them becoming a Trolldom.

So, maybe more of you who have encountered a Troll need to post your experiences.  Maybe the following will help you.

So What is Troll!

Well, since the social spaces of Facebook and Twitter seem to feel they do not have a Troll problem maybe they it needs to be defined a Troll.  Then maybe they will eventually get the message and find out how much damage Trolls are doing to their platforms.

From Wikipedia – In Internet slang, a troll is someone who posts inflammatory,^[2] extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community, such as a forum, chat room, or blog, with the primary intent of provoking readers into an emotional response^[3] or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion.^[4]

From Urban Dictionary – The art of deliberately, cleverly, and secretly pissing people off, usually via the internet, using dialogue. The most essential part of trolling is convincing your victim that either a) truly believe in what you are saying, no matter how outrageous, or b) give your victim malicious instructions, under the guise of help.

From CureZone.com – An "Internet troll" or "Forum Troll" or "Message Board Troll" is a person who posts outrageous message to bait people to answer. Forum Troll delights in sowing discord on the forums.  A troll is someone who inspires flaming rhetoric, someone who is purposely provoking and pulling people into flaming discussion.  Flaming discussions usually end with name calling and a flame war.

From TeamTechnology – Internet trolls are people who fish for other people’s confidence and, once found, exploit it.

From GuineAFowl.com – In Internet terminology, a troll is a person who posts rude or offensive messages on the Internet, such as on online discussion forums, to disrupt discussion or to upset its participants. "Troll" can also mean the message itself or be a verb meaning to post such messages. "Trolling" is also commonly used to describe the activity. For more discussion on definitions, see below.

Expanded Definition!

Since many people have had Trolls approach them outside of the public view, they more than likely have run into someone out to defame them.  These people who really think they are being smart by taking their defaming troll like comments to a more personal level are actually breaking the law..many which are international laws that makes it impossible for them to hide in another country lobbing defaming insults. 

Most of the time the tone of their words is enough to be seen as defaming.  The volume of these type of people online is growing and the volume of reports to the social spaces on troll activity are mounting up.  The cause of this type of defaming behavior is mostly related to how or what a person wants to believe. 

If a person states something of fact or information based on fact and someone else does not agree or does not want to believe what is being stated is true they generally make the mistake of publicly spewing unflattering remarks towards the person making a public statement.  Then that person out to defame someone will take a private shot at the person in a private email or personal message.  These sometimes can to the defamation by beings seen as threatening.  A vey POOR move on their part since their action violates nearly EVERY Terms of Agreement for every social networking platform.

Defamation on the RIse

This action of making negative remarks using words that reflects on a person’s character has been defined by law as Defamation and many Trolls are adapting this behaviors to their attacks on people.

Definition of Defamation – from internetdefamationlawsuits.com – Plainly stated, defamation is a communication that discredits or causes shame to an individual or business.

As it has been explained to me, the social spaces have to take the defamation of character reports seriously.  Let’s hope they do since most action I have seen the social spaces generally take care of the defaming trolls quietly but effectively by also going to the troll’s service providers and domain registers to file formal complain of someone using their service to break the law.  This results in the troll being cut off at the knees since it takes away the tools they use to blast out at people they do not like.

Social Spaces Need to Take Notice

With the failed global economy pushing more and more people onto the internet more of the people who have a hard time adapting to an openly public platform are going to come online as well.  This will naturally increase the volume of trolls, stalkers and other criminals who find it fun to berate others.  The social spaces will need to step up their actions of policing their platforms and removing these people permanently. 

If the current volume troll like behavior continues increase the social networks may have to resort to some sort of screening of the people they allow on their platforms.

The consequences for a social space not wanting to control the people roaming their platforms defaming others openly will result in the more active people on their site packing up and leave the platform to the Trolls.  This will prove anti-productive to the platforms who depend on sponsor revenue.

I hope more people will post a blog or their thoughts on Google+ on their experience with Trolls and people who just don’t understand that when they see something they don’t agree with they just need to move on.  The report of the growing population of Trolls will be seen and will force the social spaces to take action if they are wanting to keep their platforms as a viable revenue source.

So, let’s hear what you have to say.  Let me know how I can help.