Troll Attack! You May Be Next

    In case you didn't know it, according to the JoeUser point system you can lose points when any other registered user clicks that they think you're being a troll.

    Unfortunately, this can have dire consequences in the hands of malicious users. For instance, Muggaz recently lost over 800 (!!!) points in about 3 hours, apparently to a single malicious user (or malicious user and group of friends) who actively decided to kick him out of the top 10. In the comments to Muggaz's blog on the incident Anthony R. said a malicious trolling-presser once sent his points to around -10,000. (Did you catch that? NEGATIVE 10,000.)

    This is outrageous. This should not even be possible. Personally I see no real use for this feature. (Though, it should be pointed out Muggaz himself feels "It's a good feature to have, that's for sure.")

"Troll Feature" Against Spirit of Point System?

    Why does the point system even exist? In his article "The Point System Explained: Measuring Success on JoeUser.com" JoeUser founder Brad Wardell says:

"I wanted to set up a medium in which people with opinions could write about what they want and their articles would be distributed based on merit rather than purely based on having the favor of some popular blogger. Anyone who reads through the blogsphere knows exactly what I'm talking about.  There are a handful of blog overlords out there which get the bulk of the traffic in the blogsphere. These overlords, while generally benevolent, have vastly disproportionate power over determining which blogs and which articles will be read by the average blog reader out there. That struck me as unfair."

    This "troll feature" is the antithesis of that founding vision. By allowing a single user or group of users to launch an attack like this it,

• Makes a mockery of "distribution by merit." This activity is not based on merit, in fact the author's and the work's merit are under direct assault.
• Creates, at least in reverse, the very Overlords JoeUser sought to dethrone. The "troll feature" allows a single user or group of users working in concert to affect which users can become popular with a simple click of "trolling." Don't like that user? Kill him! Knock him into oblivion! If, as in this case, it knocks someone out of the top ten, it affects all their articles, because by no longer showing up in the sidebar of "top users" it must have some impact on their site being read and hence negatively impact the scores for their articles.
• Is just plain wrong. No-one should have the power to hurt someone else just out of jealousy, envy, or spite.

Introducing Fairness to the Troll Feature

    Personally I'd like to see the troll feature removed, but if it must stay let's at least introduce some fairness and safeguards so these types of abuses can never take place.

• Your score drops too. According to Brad's article on the point system, troll-buttoning someone currently costs them 2 points. ("A regular user can give + or - 2 points.") Accordingly, if you cost someone points, your score should also decrease. This would encourage its use only in extreme circumstances and discourage abuse. I suggest your points should decrease by at least half as many points as you're costing others. Under the current rules you cost them two points hence you would lose one point.
• Score limit in order to troll-button. A registered user should have a minimum score number in order to troll-button someone. If you don't have at least, say, 100 points, troll-buttoning would have no effect, just as it currently does not for unregistered "guest" users. That, combined with the above suggestion, would create a floor beyond which you could not troll-button anymore.
• Fewer points deducted. I'm sorry, I think 2 points is too much of an impact. Lower it to 1 point at most.
• Limit number of troll-buttonings per day and hour. A user should be limited in the number of troll-buttonings he can give or receive, per day and per hour. For instance, the most times someone could accuse anyone (single or multiple users) of trolling should be once an hour or four times per day. I find it highly unlikely someone could find that many cases deserving of being labeled trolling (which, when you think about it, is a harsh indictment) in a day. Anyone else is probably being a crank and out to cause harm. Likewise, in order to prevent a single user from being gang-trolled by a malicious group, there should be limit on the number of troll accusations a single posting or individual user can receive at one time, say, at most 10 per day.
• Retract the points for the posting, but no more. You get points for posting comments to other users' blog articles. Theoretically someone could up their score by posting a flood of low quality comments. If the troll feature is meant to countermand that, it would be far better to remove the points only for the comment considered trolling. Establish a "troll threshold." Then if, say, 10 users consider a comment trolling, the troll threshold is triggered and the points for that posting are taken back. This could only happen once, only for the offending comment, and no other points are affected.

Bye-bye: Time for the Troll Feature to Go

    As Muggaz said in his original post, "Personally, i dont use the trolling feature... i dont like to put other people down... if they are idiots, they wont get up in the ranks..." Agreed. Let people rise by exceptional content and the trollers, flamers, and other lowlifes die where they lay, unable to rise due to their own foolishness. That should suffice. The troll feature should die.

    Yours,
    Gene Nash