Trolls: weaker and cut short

My seven-year-old stepbrother once told my father, "I'm gonna beat your ass, Dad."

I could not believe my ears. I was even more surprised when my dad only wagged his finger.

The family dynamic has certainly changed since I was a kid, but so has the rest of the world — especially the Internet, where armies of renegade trolls roam in search of people to upset or slander. Like my stepbrother, trolls say the darnedest things on Internet forums, comment sections and other places where reasonable people congregate. And much of the time, they get away with it.

Oddly enough, after Topix.net removed its registration system, comments skyrocketed and comments posted by trolls decreased.
Graph: Topix.net Weblog

Trolls create real problems. Remember the pornographic images posted in Los Angeles Times editorials? How often do you see a potential libel suit in an online newspaper's comments section?

Webmasters cannot just leave these ne'er-do-wells alone. They have to think about ways to foil the crafty trolls, who, if they aren't seven to 17 years old, seem bent on reliving these years. Topix.net has learned how to decrease the number of trolls while increasing their number of comments.Their method has been so successful, the MSM has caught on.

Too bad they don't have technology that stops kids from cursing outside the Internet.