EffortPost [any]
This is a really cogent point. It’s interesting you have noticed a similar pattern with GenZedong. Any new tricks that are worth mentioning so we can keep an eye out?
Longer write up I did about this because your comment got me thinking, does any of this line up with your experiences?
This site seems to have a certain amount of ambient wreckers / trolls that are recurring, with the number definitely spiking around:
Event 1. Struggle Sessions
These can be either organic ones or manufactured. Noticed all three of the wrecker types (FAWH, Defrosted, Drive-by) during those and they followed a repeatable pattern of:
- making an exaggerated and inflammatory :bait: statement for position A
- responding with an equal inflammatory :bait: for position B
- escalate argument and get legitimate users to take :bait:
- get legit users on :both-sides: to argue with each other, ideally for the most bullshit version of the positions
Forget who I saw that laid it out this way, but it made a lot of sense to me, so I’m copying it.
The thing to keep in mind, is that the inflammatory positions don’t necessarily have to incorrect. In fact it works better if you find a nerve / topic the site hasn’t resolved contradictions around yet. That’s part of why early struggle sessions often made the site more pleasant afterwards and peeled off reactionaries.
Note: You can see FAWHs “fishing” sometimes if you look carefully, where they will cycle through controversial topics over 1-3 days trying to get one to “stick”.
Event 2. “Growth” Events
New community lifeboat comms, site gets a shoutout on a major subreddit, etc. Makes sense as a way for presenting the site as “not welcoming”. Can be done with either “this site is not safe” posts, “omg site is dead who was phone”, or creating a struggle session event.
Has historically been very effective here to the point Hexbear no longer does lifeboat comms.
Event 3. Software releases
Focused on stressing out and/or demotivating developers. This can take a lot of forms: Rage posts demanding certain features be built, direct focus on criticizing / harassing /griefing devs on the site, etc. Also very effective, ultimately contributed to near total burnout of both gen 1 mods and devs.
Considering past events with doxing and targeted harassment, I think certain amount of healthy mindfulness about wreckers is warranted.
My hope for this post is that it can be used as a community resource so folks can better identify questionable accounts and be less anxious on the whole. It’s a lot easier to disengage, ignore, and/or ppb someone once you can tell they’re just an angry clown.
On that note, this site’s public mod log is a great source of slop and available at the bottom of every page.
:popcorn-time:
If you check now, there’s a batch of removed comments from someone who definitely checks a lot of the boxes for “wrecker”. :quark: