Trolling by non-Apple users

Really? I can't say I've come across much of anything like that over the years.

 

I didn't click on these apparent links to thread titles? However, the 1st seems fine to me, if the poster is saying we are all being used as sheep. It's an opinion that does not seem to be the intent to insult...least that is how I *chose* to see it. Unfortunately intent is very difficult to prove in legal system with regards to fraud, kind of needs to be full on 'smoking gun' type evidence, anything else is mostly, if not all subjective to the moderators...just sayin ;p

Now this may get me banned, but shouldn't MR as a site be irrelevant and moot based on those definitions of "sheep".

Reason I say that, is Apple itself (not trying to be 'negative' lol) is the ultimate troll company. Need proof of their sheep trolling. Exhibit 1:


Apple's superbowl commercial. I guess users cannot use that ad in a reply, because to imply that anyone is sheepishly influenced by group think/advertising...makes the contender a troll? Suppose if you want to define it as so.

What I surely would like of mod team is if they would take the time, and post up what they consider excellent examples of offending content. <that would be most helpful to get a 'sense' of where the mod team wants to control content.

Steve was such a force, you cannot simply remove his DNA on Apple, so expect that from the passionate and general complainers. Sure it does no good to speculate blindly 'what would Steve do', 'what would Jesus say'...but everyone does that. They actuall want to ban the usage of that phrase on Appleinsider, because it so bothers some of the Admn/mods. Shall that be the case here also? I think it is far more useful for ppl to post up those types of comments, with links to quotes by Steve himself, videos of him expressing his opinions; to see if those thoughts are valid to the discussion of today/tomorrow. 2nd hand quotes from sources such as Tim Cook, or others that interviewed or knew Jobs, are helpful, but still those also are opinions.

Used SCO Xenix ported to IBM PC circa 1982, PlexusP40 minicomputer, as well as Seikosha-Epson boxes we were developing Oasis 8/16 on. I"m Cook's age, little younger than the two founding Steve's and I didn't get into computer until college, not a 'geek' I gues, was pre-med.

There was another post on MR where the member mentioned they had used Apple's since 1980 orig AppleII. My supervisor in 1984 where I worked, when I went to her home, she showed me how she had an old AppleII that she was letting her 6yr old daughter learn to use...so which my parents would have the same insight, they refused to buy me a $1500 IBM clone in '82, when all my college classmates had their parents buying them. My parents were of the attitude, that if I wanted something so expensive, I needed to work and pay for it myself. The boss of the company I was working at, a young professor who left his current university job, had me doing data entry at his home, for a consulting job, on an old Altos running CP/M, dual 8in drive floppy>little did I know that clunky box cost $9,000. Can I do a super negative thread somewhere here, about how I hated the orig IBM PC we had at work, running DOS 3.0? with that idiotic C: drive, totally out of order, why oh why, not A: drive?

I haven't seen too many members that have that expertise, I see many that claim to be knowable, but are in fact less than they would have you believe, and when I can point that out, sometimes I do, with links to sources that I think are more correct/knowledgeable ...much to the chagrin of those who follow blindly the 'experts' here and on other forums, on other tech sites.

The whole contention about what people who are not 'pro' 'powerusers' and as such do not "need" more than X amount of RAM is my #1 peeve, PCworld reviewers are really guilty there. They talk the talk, but apparently have never used Safari of any other browser with more than a couple of tabs open, and gone to a site like Motortrend.com, which in know way should every try to consume nearly 8GB of RAM for that single process, but it does...I posted up a screenshot showing it does. "unless you have many open tabs"< BS, I had less than 6tabs open when I took a look at Activity Monitor and was stunned to see Motortrend.com using nearly all of my 8GB installed RAM, which cannot be upgraded. 16GB is not enough to do teenage/non-pro stuff, like surfin the net.

Ya, like the other poster said, there is this amazing filter, and it's a totally free app...called your brain. I use it as the best 'filter' there is...don't feed the trolls, move along to the next post, resist the urge. Don't need any big boy pants, just simple common sense, step away from the keyboard...easier said than done I suppose.

We are all sheep being lead to slaughter, in one way or another...don't get so excited about that...soon your life will be over, death is the great equalizer none of use escape from. Social network and forums are not really all that important..ppl are dying & suffering from hunger and human strife all over the world, perspective.

I came upon this site/post when searching on sheep to slaughter, before replying here. Thought this was really good insight, not that I agree with 'the order' 'man up' 'be a (family)man' type analogies.
https://www.orderofman.com/like-sheep-slaughter/

"
What do I mean by this when I say “Like sheep to the slaughter?”

What I mean is that I think there is a tendency for men and women in society today to put the blindfold on, to blindly follow other people, to go with the status-quo, and to do what everyone else is doing.

There’s a lot of reason we do this but at the end of the day, the pack or herd mentality is designed to keep us safe and alive. It’s been programmed into us since the dawn of man – that if we stick together we’ll survive.
"

But is it an insult to say we have blinders on...just look at every day life now, the politics of division are everywhere, and ppl are quite factually acting like sheep in constantly promoting so called 'truth', when it is simply opinion. Use your brain filter, you're going to have to do that the rest of your life anyway, not just on forums.

Ban all Apple users I say, we are all lemmings/sheep as could be seen in the famous Apple commercial, Guess it comes down to intent again, but if you are trying to get ppl to stop simply repeating constant drone of the 'experts' , those you don't need more RAM...cause only a very limited amount of Apple users will ever really need it<<<that's how the group think/lemming mentality starts.



yah, yah. I no, TL;DR ...can't laugh, poke fun at yourself or others...what is life then?

 

1985? A 33 year old commercial is used to prove a point? Holy Cow, I wonder if anything has changed in 33 years.

 

It does prove the point Apple has changed. You have to admit that it's rather ironic comparing what they were against then is what they have now.

 

Right, I've done the same with some posters, who - from my perspective and reasonable familiarity with this site's rules - are clearly "trolling", and a quick review of previous posts show a pattern of such behavior. I've got a L O N G online history (participating, moderating, heck, writing custom BBS plug-ins back in the dial up days ... ), so it seems pretty conspicuous to me.

However, I also realize that there has to be a notable amount of tolerance on a large, high traffic site like this, and given the [moderation] resources available, you kind of have to focus on really flagrant rule violations, and I'd image they're looking for posts that are being flagged my multiple users - so while a few of us may think (and rightly so), "That's clearly a trolling post", the mods can't spend a ton of cycles on it if it doesn't pass their litmus test of: 1) clear violation, 2) lots of reports, logic (due to the aforementioned site traffic/so-many-hours-in-the-day).

Heck, there's quite a few people who __like__ to engage with trolls (vs. reporting), and clearly there's a handful of users whose names I could post (and you'd go, "Yeah, that person!") who constantly troll, aren't reprimanded, so we may be in the minority with our slightly over attenuated troll detectors

 

Sorry, many people will agree with the moderation is crazy, here. Can't give examples, of course, but good members are banned from the site or just PRSI for next to nothing while others get away with the most hateful posts possible.

 

Can't say why of course, but moderation is just getting worse. Some of the jokes they let some people get away with are insanely offensive and then they just get all worked up over little things.....there is no standard whatsoever on this site. Its sad since the rest of the site is better than any other apple site I've seen so I stay here.

 

Read any article on the front page, iPhone forum, or PRSI and you’ll run into it. There are other communities that specifically call out MacRumors toxicity when trying to curb negativity in their own forums.

https://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/5omss5/its_high_time_we_have_a_fireside_chat_with/

 

Not sure that makes it truly widely known and severly toxic, but, sure, there's all that (with PRSI being a whole separate thing of its own really).

 

Reading part of that reddit thread above makes me appreciate even more the work that goes on here to keep the place livable for all of us. As for the down vote button, in retrospect, I think eliminating that button was a smart move.

Seems like that reddit thread points to more toxicity than ever would have been allowed here due to less or no moderation of insults, memes, or beating a dead horse until the cows come home, etc. As far as MacRumors one has to hope that posters whose main purpose is trolling and negative opinions/thoughts about apple, over time will be recognized and dealt with appropriately.

MacRumors is still my #1 go to place for news about things Apple.

--- Post Merged, Sep 23, 2018 ---

Looking back on that though, it was pretty bold of Apple with this entire Microsoft/Apple war thing. However, that does not translate into the same type of fun in 2018 by posters using generalized, negative stereotypical, statements to troll customers who like/buy iphones.

 

My experience as well, summed up nicely. I'd add my dislike of thread titles that troll rather than just indicating the topic or problem that the original post will supposedly address. In my opinion a provocative thread title plus a little snark in an original post will provoke some irritated responses... probably the point of the thread title anyway, and then it's off to flame wars between fanboyz and haterz.

Meanwhile the person who drops into a forum because of a legit problem with a specific model of gear has to wade through pages of "... and yo mama..."

Or, more likely, one just abandons scanning the thread and fires up a search engine to inquire about a "problem with [whatever] on new Apple [whatever]."

Lately when I do that sort of search of the web first, if I do have an issue with some new Apple gear, I've noticed I don't even get as many hits on MacRumors threads so often any more as I did in the past. I think that discovery may support my objection to thread titles here that aim to be provocative rather than helpful. That's too bad, because there are a lot of helpful posts in some threads here about new gear, but too many of them live under snarky thread titles that few serious users might bother wading into when they're looking to resolve an issue.

Maybe we should stop shrugging and start bothering to report flamebait thread titles in gear threads. Otherwise it would seem there's no bottom to the slippery slope trolls love to take advantage of when they see they can get away with it.

 

I am 100% against suppression of free speech. Even if I disagree with it. I think part of the problem is that today's generation needs to grow a thicker skin. They are too triggered by just about everything and seem "fragile". So let the trolls come and waste their time, as long as they don't threaten or viciously attack others. The last thing we need are moderators who "coddle" crybabies. Toughen Up!!!

 

So basically let the people just litter the streets as long as they aren't actually hitting someone with the litter?

 

Great points. I complete understand and agree.

Some posters have so much personal rage against apple that they are taking it out on its users. And frankly that’s unacceptable.

The personal attacks have become rampant, especially if the posters argument is not well received. Some feel it’s ok to be overtly agressive against apple and it’s users, and when said arguments are not unanimously received, accepted, and revered as the beginning of a personal epiphany that leads apple users to abandon apples ecosystem and its products...they throw what is equivalent to an internet temper tantrum and proceed to denigrate and disparage apple users, on an apple based forum.
It’s always the same posters, that no longer hold or never held any desire to use apple devices or apples ecosystem. Posting under the guise of “owning one or two apple devices that they either bought or were given back in 2011” or “that they might be interested in a new apple device,” that they never seem to actually purchase.

It’s quite tiresome in and of itself.

 

And if that expression of free speech involves deliberately offending and insulting others, do you still favour that?

Often, it is not an expression of "disagreement" that gives rise to testy and intemperate threads, rather, it is the deliberate baiting or insulting or offending of others.

Myself, I think "free speech" should be tempered with a bit of respect, - and I have no quarrel with systems that require that this be the case.

 

So much of this is motivated by the anonymity of the internet - it's unfortunate that triggers some people to engage in a way many would, never, ever - let me repeat, never - do in any kind of real world, personal, face-to-face communication (or even identified written discourse).

 

Living in a sterile pristine world has it's cost. And that cost is a slippery slope when it comes to censorship.

 

Plenty of room between one extreme and the other.

 

Did you not read my post? "as long as they don't threaten or viciously attack others". There is a difference between some Android guy trolling over here and someone threatening someone on the forum.

 

Take our word for it. Even in the days when MacMinute was king, MacRumors was well-known for it's toxic community. If you don't see it, maybe you don't spend alot of time in the news threads. That's where a majority of the trolling comes about.

 

When Comes to ‘trolling’ on a site like this, there are so many variations of it. But I see the majority of it in the iPhone forum and other branches of this site. You Have to be one step ahead of those who troll and outsmart them, and how do you do that? By using the Report tool. Engaging is what a troll wants you to do, they are reactionary, and will do anything they can to elicit a response, but a simple course of action like using the report feature, usually rectifies those issues quickly if there is sufficient evidence for the moderators. From my cases, its been rather successful and its encouraged to Report versus engage. However, It can be difficult sometimes, as trolls tend to camouflage very well, especially the more diverse/experienced ones, but its more of a matter of time before they are suspended for their actions.

 

There’s a lot of crybabies here.
If they take up too much space with it they go on ignore. I don’t parent people on internet, nor expect the moderators to do it.

That is exactly why I put people on ignore. It’s about mindsets, the consciousness. Internet is a reflection of everything that circulates in the world. Different awareness levels.

When I’ve come to the point of ignoring people, it isn’t personal. How can it even be. I don’t 'know' people here for real.
But everyone stands for different mindsets, that I either can relate to in some way, find intriguing, 'see what this is going', it doesn't bother me, or that I find immature in different grades.

 

Unfortunately, nothing is going to change. The moderators in this thread are being completely disingenuous, or lack the objectivity and perspective that would typically be expected of a moderator.

MacRumors wants to generate as much traffic as possible, while keeping it just above the fray of youtube-level comments that will drive more users away than they attract. They keep out blatant spam, and keep it "civil" in regards to direct name-calling, etc., but MacRumors has no interest in stopping someone from posting 500 times that "Apple sucks" (or some variation on that theme) because it generates replies, and members return to that thread over and over again reading the replies and posting further responses and of course the addiction to "likes" that most of us crave affirmation. "Apple sucks" posts are always guaranteed to get a bunch of "likes"... I've regularly seen the typical snarky quips on a "news" article get 50+ likes for a single post.

The mods play ignorant here, but they are well aware of these type of posters, they've read the threads, and they know who they are... they simply do not care at an official capacity (whether that's their own preference or how they've been instructed to interpret the MacRumor posting guidelines is anyone's guess). Moderators are selected by the site administrators, and they are selected because they fit the mold of what the admins want to see... which is keep the forums from chaos, but otherwise do nothing that might hurt page views.

On top of that, if a mod agrees with the "Apple sucks" posts, then they are more likely to turn a blind eye. Or they are selective in what they see as "personal" attacks. So, calling everyone who buys "X" Apple product "sheep" is fine. Calling out people who have posted the same thing 500 times "nutty" is a transgression of the forum rules.

There's really only one answer here folks - if you don't like it, start your own forum.

Seriously, my best advise is when the forum becomes annoying, take a break from here (in a way, it's "voting with your wallet"). No matter how much complaining about the mods and trolls, the site is not going to change how they conduct their business. So I have to change the way I conduct my business. E.g., this is my first post since June. I'll occasionally skim through a thread or two, but it's like a tv series that's run its course and seems like the storylines are just repeating themselves. Enough time passes, and maybe I'll want to re-watch some episodes.


FTR, I've tried the ignore button. I concluded that it not only doesn't solve anything, but just creates additional work. Because the issue isn't the occasional poster. It's the posters that post the same thing 500 times... in every "relevant" thread they can find... and that invariably leads to back and forth arguing (and often thread derailment)... so then you're still seeing the "replies" to ignored posts, you're still seeing the thread go off the rails. The context of the discussion is lost because the post that started it is ignored, so you end up giving in and viewing it anyway, and sooner or later, you give up and stop using the ignore. In another case, I had someone on my ignore list who happened to start a very popular hundreds-of-posts thread (that went well beyond the OP's posts) and the whole thread would be hidden unless I took the OP off my ignore list. It's just not practical outside of isolated situations.

 

One thing I can tell you from experience is that the moderators are not directed in any way to turn a blind eye on stuff, especially as it relates to page views and money.

In fact, there is generally very little interaction between the moderators and the editors who write the stories.

Arn and Eric and the editorial staff have their things that they do to put stories up and keep the page views going. They have access to that side of the site and the moderators do not.

The moderators and the administrators have their things that they do to keep the forums running. The editors, save for the chief editor, do not have access to the moderator side of the site.

Rarely does each side collaborate on things in the back rooms.

It's very disingenuous to surmise that the moderators do anything, one way or another, for the benefit of Arn's pocketbook. In some cases, it's quite the contrary.

 

Back some months ago, there was a thread started by a regular member, and then one of the first posts in the thread was from another member chastising the OP’s ‘IQ/intelligence’ with some juvenile remark, part of me wanted to actually respond to the member who was being deliberately rude, but then I realized that wasn’t my place to do so and would have derailed the thread, in which I used the report button and let the moderators handle it from there. To say the least, it was handled appropriately, and that’s why I feel the ‘Report tool’ is much more useful than most anticipate or simply don’t realize its core functionality.