Credibility Nibblers
In the world of MSN communities there is an attack method I call "nibbling at credibility". That's a method of attack where through strategic criticisms, sarcastic questions, martyrdom quittings, deliberately sought bannings, etc. you create a rising level of concern and distrust of an otherwise good manager.
It is a favored method of attacking a group, for without the manager, most groups sink down rapidly, no matter how good the members are. Not because managers are gods, but because without some experience at the helm, groups lag and drift apart, or boil over and explode.
In attacking a group, you can't just call the manager an asshole, for that tells everyone you are mean, so they support and sympathize with the manager then. So you must resort to those nibbling attacks.
You can augment such an attack. Let the manager know or suspect you are an attacker so as to get a swifter more questionable reaction. Not for the manager falling for it, but for the manager knowing that if he doesn't act fast, the attacker will try to sow dissension, shift friendships, etc. To wait a week can often times make it too late. If you ban then, there'll be two others who made friends with the attacker walk out. Then three more who leave because of those two. Etc.
If the attacker doesn't wish to go to the trouble of making the friends, just letting the manager think that could happen can be helpful. This tsrainy had a nic and experienced hand that suggested to me an attacker. That I may have erred on which attacker, means not that she wasn't and is one. This I do not suspect, this I know.
Another way to augment the attack is to have an ally or two already. Or try to get them fast once in. Often times, this is as easy as the creation of a couple of nics. Nics that can be salted in a variety of groups, months in advance of any need of them. Nics that can be given their own posting style, nics that can have their own posting history.
Then you have one nic provoke management, then when a reaction is had, have two more nics protest in a "more in sorrow then anger" style. Have a third quit in a huff. Have a fourth defy management over the now large "issue".
You'd be amazed how many groups get lost to that. Regular posters wish a safe environment for fun, for learning, for friendship and sharing. For a manager to lose control, rarely do many members stay to "sort out who was right". They just leave and post elsewhere. The strong members, the regulars, already have other group memberships, they just shift their activities.
And the targeted group dies.
Another way to augment, and the most devastating, is for a large group to overwhelm a smaller one. To have real posters join en masse - though usually at staggered intervals. Soon, the large group of 500, with 50 active posters at home base group has 10 active posters at your group.
Trouble is, you don't have 500 members with 50 active posters, that would be bad enough. You have 100 members and 10 active posters - now twenty, but half are shills.
I've seen groups - the democratically run ones - "voted" into the rival group's hands. Other times, with more appropriately run groups, it's a matter of provocation and touching off of a massive flame war and spam fest.
Needless to say, those large group members can not only join, but they easily each join a few fake nics each.
Who would want to do all these things? God, I must be paranoid!
Hardly. There are plenty who do these things, they happen all the time. There are loners who take down hate groups, or at least groups they hate. Their success depends on their intelligence and how many nics they can field at once. If they can't be in chat with three of their nics talking at once, they can't do much.
They'll use the methods above, and be all the players. They'll even have nics that are obviously them, so that while those are banned, the other nics of theirs can praise management for doing it.
There are also, and even more frequently, religious and political wars. There are Christian groups on the farthest right, who will try to "Christianize" a group, and bring it into their sphere of influence. Many managers are not so caring, and so long as their numbers are high, they'll do nothing about it. They figure they'll have a group either way.
But when the last non-Christian, or the last nice Christian, is run out, then all the fanatical invaders are tired. And don't want to post any more. So they go back to home group, leaving the manager with a dumb look on his face and two forlorn active posters left.
Now substitute any other religious or political group name where I wrote "Christian" and know that they all do it, too. And yes, some who do it, will stay afterwards. For some will be trying for bona fide converts, and will try to spread out as thin as they can, so as to control as many groups as they can.
Ever notice how many groups seem to have at least one of each ideology? That's not a coincidence. If a militant group doesn't see a sympathetic member in another group, they'll place one in there. Doesn't mean that the lone socialist is a spy, just means that if there had not been one, one would have joined.
Typically. Not all groups are worth doing this with, and not all militant groups have the manpower or fake nic supply to do this.
There are also those who just like destroying. Both loners, and whole groups of nihilists. The groups will usually have a goal. They then don't seek to bring into control, they just take out a rival or threat.
The Race based groups will call it cleansing, the religious right will call it "destroying dens of iniquity", and those "dens of iniquity" will call their own destroying expeditions, "taking the fundies down a notch".
And so it goes.
I just thought I'd share all that. It may help explain some of the things you see when posting about the boards.
Dean West
It is a favored method of attacking a group, for without the manager, most groups sink down rapidly, no matter how good the members are. Not because managers are gods, but because without some experience at the helm, groups lag and drift apart, or boil over and explode.
In attacking a group, you can't just call the manager an asshole, for that tells everyone you are mean, so they support and sympathize with the manager then. So you must resort to those nibbling attacks.
You can augment such an attack. Let the manager know or suspect you are an attacker so as to get a swifter more questionable reaction. Not for the manager falling for it, but for the manager knowing that if he doesn't act fast, the attacker will try to sow dissension, shift friendships, etc. To wait a week can often times make it too late. If you ban then, there'll be two others who made friends with the attacker walk out. Then three more who leave because of those two. Etc.
If the attacker doesn't wish to go to the trouble of making the friends, just letting the manager think that could happen can be helpful. This tsrainy had a nic and experienced hand that suggested to me an attacker. That I may have erred on which attacker, means not that she wasn't and is one. This I do not suspect, this I know.
Another way to augment the attack is to have an ally or two already. Or try to get them fast once in. Often times, this is as easy as the creation of a couple of nics. Nics that can be salted in a variety of groups, months in advance of any need of them. Nics that can be given their own posting style, nics that can have their own posting history.
Then you have one nic provoke management, then when a reaction is had, have two more nics protest in a "more in sorrow then anger" style. Have a third quit in a huff. Have a fourth defy management over the now large "issue".
You'd be amazed how many groups get lost to that. Regular posters wish a safe environment for fun, for learning, for friendship and sharing. For a manager to lose control, rarely do many members stay to "sort out who was right". They just leave and post elsewhere. The strong members, the regulars, already have other group memberships, they just shift their activities.
And the targeted group dies.
Another way to augment, and the most devastating, is for a large group to overwhelm a smaller one. To have real posters join en masse - though usually at staggered intervals. Soon, the large group of 500, with 50 active posters at home base group has 10 active posters at your group.
Trouble is, you don't have 500 members with 50 active posters, that would be bad enough. You have 100 members and 10 active posters - now twenty, but half are shills.
I've seen groups - the democratically run ones - "voted" into the rival group's hands. Other times, with more appropriately run groups, it's a matter of provocation and touching off of a massive flame war and spam fest.
Needless to say, those large group members can not only join, but they easily each join a few fake nics each.
Who would want to do all these things? God, I must be paranoid!
Hardly. There are plenty who do these things, they happen all the time. There are loners who take down hate groups, or at least groups they hate. Their success depends on their intelligence and how many nics they can field at once. If they can't be in chat with three of their nics talking at once, they can't do much.
They'll use the methods above, and be all the players. They'll even have nics that are obviously them, so that while those are banned, the other nics of theirs can praise management for doing it.
There are also, and even more frequently, religious and political wars. There are Christian groups on the farthest right, who will try to "Christianize" a group, and bring it into their sphere of influence. Many managers are not so caring, and so long as their numbers are high, they'll do nothing about it. They figure they'll have a group either way.
But when the last non-Christian, or the last nice Christian, is run out, then all the fanatical invaders are tired. And don't want to post any more. So they go back to home group, leaving the manager with a dumb look on his face and two forlorn active posters left.
Now substitute any other religious or political group name where I wrote "Christian" and know that they all do it, too. And yes, some who do it, will stay afterwards. For some will be trying for bona fide converts, and will try to spread out as thin as they can, so as to control as many groups as they can.
Ever notice how many groups seem to have at least one of each ideology? That's not a coincidence. If a militant group doesn't see a sympathetic member in another group, they'll place one in there. Doesn't mean that the lone socialist is a spy, just means that if there had not been one, one would have joined.
Typically. Not all groups are worth doing this with, and not all militant groups have the manpower or fake nic supply to do this.
There are also those who just like destroying. Both loners, and whole groups of nihilists. The groups will usually have a goal. They then don't seek to bring into control, they just take out a rival or threat.
The Race based groups will call it cleansing, the religious right will call it "destroying dens of iniquity", and those "dens of iniquity" will call their own destroying expeditions, "taking the fundies down a notch".
And so it goes.
I just thought I'd share all that. It may help explain some of the things you see when posting about the boards.
Dean West
posted by Dean West @ 1:09 AM
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