Troll Discussion

[annaswirls]

Thanks. Considering I'm being chastised for whining and having an overinflated ego, that really helps. I've no doubt that when I finally do post something new, it's going to be voted into oblivion rather quickly.

Impressive, look at your sig line. I think the voting system has been very good to you overall

 

[annaswirls]

You look so cute in that av. An adorable poet.

I think I must be ovulating. Giddy and glowing.

 

[Maria2394]

Impressive, look at your sig line. I think the voting system has been very good to you overall

No Kidding , anna!!! I mean, damn, someone loses a COUPLE of little red H's and they freak out, just imagine what might have happened if they experienced the same thing you and I and cordie did last year, I mean jeez, someone call her a therapist, please!!!

 

[Maria2394]

I think I must be ovulating. Giddy and glowing.

ya know, I have had my AV and sig line options turned off for months and just turned them on to see what was so cute about anna's av...damn!! anna banana, you are ten times cuter than I ever expected!!!I mean, I knew you were beautiful, but hell, now Im in love:<swoon>

 

[impressive]

just curious, will you continue your crusade for justice against the troll nation once your H's are restored?

If you'd read what I posted earlier, you would know the answer to that question. However, it's much easier to jump to conclusions about my motives and my mental state.

 

[ishtat]

Perspective

I am primarily a lurker and learner at this stage of my career on this site. I have only posted one thing so far. My expertise is mathematical particularly of sampling and I am absolutely certain that there are so many variables in these polls that I would confidently undertake to show that none of these poll results has any significant meaning whatsoever.

Why does this site like many others have polling? It's a marketing ploy. To be successful the owners of Lit need members and hits. People who will read advertising. It's the basis of pricing. People like to be involved, like to vote, especially in competitions. Lit has voting and competitions because they both drive advertising revenue through involvement. I am sure that Laurel will try to fix blatant problems but that is her main priority.

The biggest problem the Lit sampling system(voting) has is not abuse of the system but the fact that so few people vote at all . People look at pictures, they open stories do they read them? Who knows .Is the ratio of readers to voters/ commenters constant for particular types of stories or poems? Check the numbers .You may be suprised. Free sites are driven by their market - readers not writers

To expect Laurel et al to change the system I think you would have to show four things :

1 that it was cost neutral
2 that it was likely to be revenue positive
3 that it could be applied retrospectively
4 that it did not inadvertantly allow even greater abuse.

Sorry about this little rant but I do have a lot of experience in knowing just how difficult it is for teams like Lit to run a fair voting system.

Finally the first person to ever comment on the first piece I submitted said it was pretty good with certain flaws which were pointed out, a useful and accurate comment. . The person who made that comment was 'Impressive' I'll value that comment long after all the votes have been consigned to perdition.

 

[twelveoone]

The fact that you have attracted some means you are doing something right...or some whack job has a crush on you and is doing the written equivalent of pulling your pigtails at recess.

I've felt the love...

thank you Impressive for this thread...fan clubs...five bombers

How good to see Maria again

How good to see annaswirls; could you lean forward a little, there

How good to see Tathagata post more than four words

Most low score anon's probably think they are doing you a favour i.e. "They're not as good as the thing they are" some even think that it is honest feedback but fear retaliation. Cowards.

 

[impressive]

Finally the first person to ever comment on the first piece I submitted said it was pretty good with certain flaws which were pointed out, a useful and accurate comment. . The person who made that comment was 'Impressive' I'll value that comment long after all the votes have been consigned to perdition.

 

[Tathagata]

Or drinking buddies.....

We prefer " Imbibing associates"

 

[Tathagata]

How good to see Tathagata post more than four words

The cheese stands alone on that one my friend


Besides you have to have at least 5 characters or the fucker won't post.

 

[impressive]

I received the following reply from Laurel. I found her comment (bolded, for emphasis) about the amount of registered voting quite interesting:

Hello,

Thanks for writing, and I hope you are well. Blocking non-member voting is something we've discussed many times before, but we've decided (after talking to other sites with similar issues) that it would cause more harm than good. People who downvote or upvote will (and do) simply register multiple accounts, so "trolling" will continue. And because the number of registered votes is a tiny fraction of the total, the number of votes would go down dramatically.

We are considering possibly making is so authors can choose to allow only member voting. This would put them at a disadvantage for contests, since 50 member votes is very very rare, and it won't eliminate "registered trolls". It may, however, be an option. For now, please continue reporting and we will remove any fraud as soon as we are able.

Thanks again, and talk soon!

I would be all in favor of the option she mentions, preferably on a per submission basis (as is currently done for PCs and voting) -- but even if it was one option applied to all submissions, I'd still favor it.

Thoughts?

 

[PatCarrington]

Thoughts?

fretting over small people shrinks you down.

just write.

 

[Tathagata]

I'll take my chances with the trolls.
Restricting it to "members only" has an elitist feel to it and, in many ways, is like having only your friends vote.
It won't eliminate low votes, you may get less of them but, trust me, every member isn't going to like everything you post and many of the " trolls" I suspect, are members anyway .

and as she points out there are always registered alts who will continue to do what they do.

Just my opinion

 

[Trent_Dutch]

I received the following reply from Laurel. I found her comment (bolded, for emphasis) about the amount of registered voting quite interesting:



I would be all in favor of the option she mentions, preferably on a per submission basis (as is currently done for PCs and voting) -- but even if it was one option applied to all submissions, I'd still favor it.

Thoughts?

Thoughts huh? Well, I still don't think the numbers have a place here. We're doing art with words, painting pictures or sculpting sculptures from language, making music from voices... and other hackneyed comments... IF this was a competition site, with only those poems with 4's or 5's or whatever, getting any attention, then yes, I would see the whole trolling thing as problematic. But as it is, it aint a problem for the enjoyment of poetry to me.

Someone show me a good poem written in numbers and then I'll maybe see a part for the numbers somewhere.

 

[Rybka]

Will "Characters" Do?

Thoughts huh? Well, I still don't think the numbers have a place here. We're doing art with words, painting pictures or sculpting sculptures from language, making music from voices... and other hackneyed comments...

Someone show me a good poem written in numbers and then I'll maybe see a part for the numbers somewhere.

Just to "contest" your statement. . . will "characters" do?

*.*
by smithpeter

This is
Star
Dot
Star

welcome to this poem

it is because of thought

characters have no thought
but they exist
because they come to be

somehow characters come to be
on paper
in space
and upon space
friendly

with clubs and dot orgs
so friendly
with clubs and fists
all the characters

welcome to the end of this poem

may I remove my hands
from your shoulders
so we may hug?

Or if it must be numbers, how about this from the book entitled "1x1".

one's not half two. It's two are halves of one:


one's not half two. It's two are halves of one:
which halves reintegrating,shall occur
no death and any quantity;but than
all numerable mosts the actual more

minds ignorant of stern miraculous
this every truth-beware of heartless them
(given the scalpel,they dissect a kiss;
or,sold the reason,they undream a dream)

one is the song which fiends and angels sing:
all murdering lies by mortals told make two.
Let liars wilt,repaying life they're loaned;
we(by a gift called dying born)must grow

deep in dark least ourselves remembering
love only rides his year.
All lose,whole find


~*~ E.E. Cummings

 

[impressive]

fretting over small people shrinks you down.

just write.

I'm not "fretting" -- I'm working for change, and I'm finding (here, as elsewhere) that most people would prefer to just accept the status quo (and cut down the "agitator"). Ever the optimist, I always believe that most folks will at least try to make systems work as they are intended -- and I'm usually underwhelmed by the response. *sigh*

And I haven't stopped writing -- poetry, porn, OpEds, essays, etc. In spite of the general consensus, I do have a life -- and a very busy, productive, rewarding one -- outside of Lit.

 

[Trent_Dutch]

Just to "contest" your statement. . . will "characters" do?
Or if it must be numbers, how about this from the book entitled "1x1".

I was thinking more along the lines of a poem made from Binary or hex code or whatever (and nothing in leet type please).... Those poems you quoted only highlight the inadequacy of numbers to enlighten and communicate on subjective form, thats why there written in words. Its like quantitative versus qualitative... a Number is pretty useless to an author I think.... a comment on the other hand... can be worth an unquantifiable number of votes.....

while we're on the subject of numbers though....

'Three is the number of those who do holy work,
Two is the number of those who do lover's work,
One is the number of those who do perfect evil,
Or perfect good.'
From the notes of a monk of the order of St Oco. Name Unknown.

Also, did you know that in around 16th/17th Century England the number ZERO was outlawed, condemned as heresy, and all who used it for calculation where killed (If they where caught).

Other useless number facts include:

1 metre is one ten millionth of the distance from the North pole to the equator.

A flawed mathematical proof of the power of God/Allah/Y(a)hw(e)h....
A/B = C
1/100 = 0.01
1/10 = 0.1
1/1 = 1
1/0.1 = 10
1/0.01 = 100
As A stays constant and B gets closer to zero, C approaches infinity.
A / 0 = Infinity
Shows you can get something from nothing.....

 

[Rybka]

. . .

Other useless number facts include:

1 metre is one ten millionth of the distance from the North pole to the equator.
. . .

I question that one. That distance is not fixed. I read somewhere recently that the tsunami moved the pole a measurable distance.

 

[Trent_Dutch]

I question that one. That distance is not fixed. I read somewhere recently that the tsunami moved the pole a measurable distance.

I read a book not too long ago... about the two French scientists, Delambre and Mechain, who tried to establish the measurement. I think the author did bring some flaws up, but I never got to read the second half too well, had to return it to the library. Was called 'The Measure of All Things'.... I'll quote a little here....

'Amidst the chaos of the French Revolution, two intrepid astronomers set out in opposite directions from Paris to measure the world, one voyaging north to Dunkirk, the other south to Barcelona. Their findings would help define the meter as one ten-millionth of the distance between the pole and the equator, a standard that has since swept the planet. The Measure of All Things is the astonishing story of one of history's greatest scientific quests, a mission to measure the Earth and define the meter for all nations and for all time.'

Unfortunately Pierre-François-André Méchain made some errors in his measurements to Barcelona, thus the metre was either too small or too big. Delambre had to decide which was more important, the truth or the appearance of the truth......

This all reminds me. When are America gonna get with the rest of the world and adopt the metric system? That was one of its original intentions, that it would be a unifying and constant measurement system. Instead the Americans waste millions in Global economies due to conversion...

 

[impressive]

This all reminds me. When are America gonna get with the rest of the world and adopt the metric system?

There's some arm wrestling to be done regarding "-re" or "-er" endings. It's holding up the show.

 

[Rybka]

According to Google. . .

I read a book not too long ago... about the two French scientists, Delambre and Mechain, who tried to establish the measurement. I think the author did bring some flaws up, but I never got to read the second half too well, had to return it to the library. Was called 'The Measure of All Things'.... I'll quote a little here....

'Amidst the chaos of the French Revolution, two intrepid astronomers set out in opposite directions from Paris to measure the world, one voyaging north to Dunkirk, the other south to Barcelona. Their findings would help define the meter as one ten-millionth of the distance between the pole and the equator, a standard that has since swept the planet. The Measure of All Things is the astonishing story of one of history's greatest scientific quests, a mission to measure the Earth and define the meter for all nations and for all time.'

Unfortunately Pierre-François-André Méchain made some errors in his measurements to Barcelona, thus the metre was either too small or too big. Delambre had to decide which was more important, the truth or the appearance of the truth......

This all reminds me. When are America gonna get with the rest of the world and adopt the metric system? That was one of its original intentions, that it would be a unifying and constant measurement system. Instead the Americans waste millions in Global economies due to conversion...

Here is a quick google (Notice the extra "l"s and "u"s, "s" instead of "z", as well as the "re"s. ) :

The metre is the basic unit of length in the International System of Units (SI: Système International d'Unités). It is defined as the length of the path travelled by light in absolute vacuum during a time interval of 1/299,792,458 of a second. It is equal to 10000/254 inches, approximately 39.37 inches. The symbol of the metre is m. Metre is also spelled meter in American English.


History
The word itself is from the Greek metron (μετρον), "a measure" via the French mètre. Its first recorded usage in English is from 1797.

In the eighteenth century, there were two favoured approaches to the definition of the standard unit of length. One suggested defining the metre as the length of a pendulum with a half-period of one second. The other suggested defining the metre as one ten-millionth of the length of the earth's meridian along a quadrant (one-fourth the polar circumference of the earth). In 1791, the French Academy of Sciences selected the meridional definition, using the meridian of Paris, over the pendular definition because of the slight variation of the force of gravity over the surface of the earth, which affects the period of a pendulum. In 1795, France adopted the metre as its official unit of length. Although the first prototype metre bar was short by a fifth of a millimetre due to miscalculation of the flattening of the earth, this length became the standard. So, the circumference of the Earth through the poles is approximately forty million metres.

In the 1870s and in light of modern precision, a series of international conferences were held to devise new metric standards. The Treaty of the Metre (1875) mandated the establishment of a permanent International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM: Bureau International des Poids et Mesures) to be located in Sèvres, France. This new organization would preserve the new prototype metre and kilogram when constructed, and would maintain comparisons between them and the basic units of other, nonmetric, weights and measures. This organisation created a new prototype bar in 1889, establishing the International Prototype Metre as the distance between two lines on a standard bar of an alloy of ninety percent platinum and ten percent iridium.

In 1893, the standard metre was first measured with an interferometer by Albert A. Michelson, the inventor of the device and an advocate of using some particular wavelength of light as a standard of distance. By 1925, interferometry was in regular use at the BIPM. However, the International Prototype Metre remained the standard until 1960, when the eleventh General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM: Conférence Générale des Poids et Mesures) defined the metre in the new SI system as equal to 1,650,763.73 wavelengths of the orange-red emission line in the spectrum of the krypton-86 atom in a vacuum.

To further reduce uncertainty, the seventeenth CGPM of 1983 replaced the definition of the metre with its current definition, thus fixing the length of the metre in terms of time and the speed of light:

The metre is the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299 792 458 of a second.
Note that this definition exactly fixes the speed of light in a vacuum at 299,792,458 metres per second. Definitions based on the physical properties of light are more precise and reproducible because the properties of light are considered to be universally constant.

The original international prototype of the metre is still kept at the BIPM under the conditions specified in 1889.

 

[My Erotic Tale]

Holy Toledo~

All that from a One Bomb!
the other day my Poem came out in the negative ...
<laughing> hey it was at 0 then 3 then 2 something...
I laughed thinking the poem is coming out in the negative <grin>
I give up trying to reach a rating I just except where the ball
bounces <grin> and write for the enjoyment not a number
although that was a hell o'va read about the metric system.

 

[Trent_Dutch]

Ok Rybka... I'll accept that, whatever it says.... I just take it that scientist have found solid, unchangeable, CONSTANT measures for the metre (although some recent experiments would call into question the fact that 'the properties of light are considered to be universally constant.'). but anyways, its METRE. COLOUR. FLAVOUR. and ANALYSE.... just for clarification. And I prefer Proggramme, to program...

However, you did say that.......

'...the circumference of the Earth through the poles is approximately forty million metres.'

Ergo, one metre is (approximately) one ten millionth of the distance from a pole to the equator (and that distance times four is the distance from one pole to the equator, to the other pole and back to the original pole).... Wavelength measurement and the precise measurement of light in vaccuum etc probably weren't possible in Delambre and Mechains time......

 

[Syndra Lynn]

everyones life doesn't orbit around
beaches and beer.

You're NOT serious!

I'm crushed and confused. What else is there?

Syn

 

[sandspike]

You're NOT serious!

I'm crushed and confused. What else is there?

Syn

Sister, sister, sister there are people who miss the point. Life should
be a day at the beach. When they forget that it's hell in a handbasket. I guess
the left and right coasts aren't that different if you're looking in the same
direction: SEAWARD! You can't worry about trolls or dickheads when you have
your back to them. Because you're looking SEAWARD! Take care my dear
have a glass of merlot (?) for me.