“Conspiracy is the common man’s way of believing he is intelligent” ~ Oscar Wilde

Do you believe that 6 people control the fate of all mankind and make every major decision in the world? Do you believe that “orbs” aren’t just dust particles catching the light of your flash when you take a picture? Have you, or anyone you have ever talked to (that you trust) seen an actual ghost? Have you been abducted by aliens? Does Bigfoot roam the forests of San Fierro?

If you believe any, or all of these things the internet is the place for you. Get your patch panel and start surfing the world of conspiracy and paranormal fun. Become the person who doesn’t believe anything that anyone in the government ever says. Believe that there are shadows that are people, or creatures. The internet is the only place you can find where there are actually other people that agree with all of these things with out doing any research whatsoever to disprove them. Theory is not just theory. It is accepted as truth with no experimentation, or proof.

If you can scream, make weird noises, or just scratch on a wall, and record the audio…You have witnessed a haunting. You must share this with everyone and tell them about the house that is beyond haunted.

Watch Loose Change and pretend that it is really true!

Tell tales of Mudkips. Of course Mudkips are actually real so if you try to say they are paranormal, or a conspiracy you are INSANE.

2012 is the end of the world!

JFK was shot by aliens!

Even though it would take thousands of years for an alien to make it here (traveling at the speed of light) from another solar system, it IS possible that they come here everyday to anally probe Earthlings!

The Illuminati controls your thoughts.

Dog Boy is the offspring of a man and his love of beastiality.

There is a lot of money in conspiracy, paranormal, psychic abilities, and anything else that is off the beaten path. As your career counselor, I would recommend that you study sales, marketing, and psychology if you are interested in making up conspiracies. You may want to learn a bit about making videos as well since a solid videos on Youtube of selective news footage, blurry images, and computer imaging skills you too can create a DVD for purchase by other conspiracy enthusiasts. You may even be able to reach the Holy Grail of conspiracy marketing by being asked to interview on the Coast 2 Coast AM radio show. Millions of people can’t be wrong. At least when you have a conspiracy DVD to sell ;).

This seems to be a fad that comes and goes. Every once in a while a poster gets the idea that this is hilarious and begins to declare a thread winner on every topic on the board. I find it rather amusing myself actually, but it seems to annoy some readers. I guess they are just jealous that they have not been handed a trophy for being the best poster in a thread about Financial Consolidation Software, ways to scare your friends, or most outrageous arrest.

The very best declarer has little trophies they hand out which I love. They can also declare a topic over at any time by saying that this poster has won the award and the topic is no longer worth discussing. Of course other users tend to keep posting since everyone on the internet doesn’t like to be told what to do. Nonetheless I find the the guy that declares topic winners to be one of my favorite posters.

The best place in the world to make up stories and fool people is on the interwebs. First, no one can see your face which usually makes for the most difficult part in a lie. Second, you can reach a mass audience.

I run into the BS stories mostly on sports message boards where every once in a while someone just starts a bogus rumor to see how many people they can fool. Only the worst of the worst liars gets blown out of the water right away. The way to get your answer right away to whether this story is complete BS is to post one of these:

Link please.

or

Link?

They will likely try and make up some ridiculous story about hearing it on the radio and you have about 30 minutes maybe of getting away with that in this day and age. That’s about how long it takes some horrible AP writer to butcher the story and get it flowing a crossed the net.

A good rumor guy who wants to totally piss off a ton of people is tough to find. When one comes along those of us that have started these silly rumors and had them drag on for a few days recognizes them immediately most times, but the average forum user falls for their odd tale.

The Rumor Master in sports posting is always referred to as an “Insider”. They have inside info and a “contact” with in an organization. At least that is what they say anyways. If done correctly a rumor by these masters can spread far and wide and make millions look like fools. This master can even expose lazy reporters on occasion who take this moronic report as true with out doing the research. That is a banner day for The Rumor Master. He has taken it to the masses and is going to piss off millions.

A good team of liars is always helpful when trying to pull off a bogus rumor for a few days. It is always good to have a group of people that will spam other message boards with links to your outrageous trade rumor, firing, or any other lie you want to perpetrate. It is also helpful to have some decent computer memory so you can run a billion windows at once and spam boards and keep up with all the details of your lies.

I suppose it is time to announce one of my other favorite message boards as well. We Roll Hard is a Detroit Sports message board full of total assholes. We are all banned forum members from such places as ESPN.com and RealGM. Instead of getting the bankstick everywhere we went we decided to make a dump of a board and spew our fandom the only way we knew how. With a lot of vulgar language, and no regard for human decency. Feel free to troll this board. There are no rules and no one gets banned.

Anyways, that is the kind of group I am talking about. This group will supply a never ending supply of bullshit on every sports message board online and keep up the charade forever if they can.

Trolling is what happens when you go onto message boards, or any sort of forum where you can leave comments and just try to stir the pot. A troll is someone who has too much time on their hands and likes to screw with people. I have actually thought of getting business cards with my title being “Troll” before since it is so much fun.

There are several ways to be a good troll. You can take many different angles, but ultimately the most important aspect to it is that you can piss as many people off as possible to the point that they can’t even just ignore you anymore. No this isn’t just going somewhere and spamming with a bunch of topics, or just posting the same thing over and over again. That is a method, but a fairly weak one. That is more aptly referred to as bombing.

Trolling on the other hand is well played jabs at other posters. Ones that will get other posters to even jump in and gang up on you. Trolls are attention whores really. Only difference between talking about themselves like most beauty queens and post whores do is that they intentionally try to piss you off instead of just being too stupid to realize that no one cares what they have to say.

So…how exactly do you be a troll? Not everyone is cut out for it. Most can do what the little annoying spammer does with out a problem by bombing boards with the same crap over and over, but it takes a bit of a bullshitter to get some staying power. You do want to make people that don’t believe the Internet is Serious Business chuckle over your antics. You are there not only to annoy, but also entertain. You may also take the stance that will get others to mock you. This doesn’t piss anyone off usually, but you still waste a lot of their time with your stupidity.

If I were to go trolling on a random board somewhere I would have to give it a bit of a once over. Read a few topics and see what people there really care about. What kind of people are posting there, what their interests are, and pick a topic that will enrage them, but not necessarily get me banned right away. After all I want to come out with some sort of satisfaction by inciting as much hatred towards me as possible by the other community members. I don’t care if my stance is right or wrong. As long as it is different from everyone else there I can get them to jump on the drama train.

You can go after this a few ways. For the novice troll you can simply just take an opposing view to generally accepted ideals of society. You can act like a racist, talk about blowing up poor countries and taking their oil, or even just take a stance as a Bible Beater with no resources. These are all things that will get you mocked and hated by other users. It is up to you to make them keep mocking you with your stupidity. Those are simple solutions to your trolling. Just being an all out ignorant fool.

What takes a bit of skill is just to be able to go into any topic and change the conversation into something totally ridiculous. You pick out a post that to you is kind of silly. Maybe someone says:

“Today I was reading this book about blah blah blah, and I blah blah blah…”

You don’t care and neither does anyone else, although they will say they do. Say something little just to get everyone to start thinking you are a jerk like:

“Nobody cares.”

Now you are on your way. You have not only told the truth in most instances, but message board posters seem to have the uncanny ability to fly off the handle at any little comment that shouldn’t be there , or is sort of rude. It ruins the normalcy of the thread. A normal person wouldn’t be so rude so when someone sees a comment like that they too become a troll and start to talk shit to you. Keep it simple to start. You just want others to direct your trolling.

It’s like sales in a way. The best salesmen out there don’t talk all the time. They listen and utilize what someone else says to them to come up with an answer, or a pitch to their problem. It is exactly the same way with trolling. The other posters are who keep it rolling. You just have to incite it with a very little comment. Then the gloves are off and you have all the fuel you need to keep it rolling. One pissed off poster and this could turn into the worst thread that board has ever seen.

I really like to wake up the Internet Tough Guy on boards. If you can pull that guy out of the shadows you have made a serious impact. There is nothing better in trolling than to get someone so upset that they actually resort to telling you they will physically harm you.

Many people see trolling as a bad thing, but think about this. Community posters never unite more than when a troll is present. Those that take online forums far too seriously tend to get that feeling that they are better than you, and well they probably are since you are being an ass pretty much. You give these people a feeling of accomplishment. You are doing a great service to the group overall no matter what anyone says. They have a sense of belonging. Since you have such whacked out ideas that defy common sense people have to be right when they argue with you. They get out some frustrations when ultimately you get the banstick and earn their eBadges. You get to laugh like a little girl the whole time you troll. Win-win situation for everyone I must say.

OK…I have given Atheists a bit of a hard time for their stereotypical behavior online, but I suppose I should give equal airtime to the religious fanatics out there as well. Though not as bad as other groups typically there are some real idiots that like to push their beliefs on others online.

Typically you just see those that are of a certain religion to be very laid back and respectful of others, but there are those that are just as nuts as any other anti-religious person you see. Religion is not really popular on the internet forums and most people that even bring it up are ostracized by the overwhelming number of “Enlightened” thinkers online, but they are still there.

The religious extremist seems to be even crazier than the “it’s simple logic” guy that has to say that every 5 minutes in a debate. The religious fanatics are just out there though. They are closer to the conspiracy theorists than anyone. Some of them I wonder if they even understand the scriptures they post on boards, but none the less I find the more extreme they are the more entertaining they are. I absolutely LOVE the end of the world Bible beaters and the guy that has to rat you out as a sinner every time they post.

Anything you talk about is met with a Bible verse that is supposed to tell you why you shouldn’t do that. What I never understood about the fanatics is that they feel that they are the judge of you. In my understanding, if you are a follower of a certain faith, you are supposed to believe that “God”, “Zeus”, “the Spaghetti Monster”, etc. is Judge and Jury over others and not you. Apparently many of the fanatics have had the hand of their Creator laid upon them and they are now free to become the executioner.

These guys are the best though. No other group can spark more debate and ultimately hate online when they start to tell you how you are supposed to live and that they are perfect. This is the time when I actually do side with the more anal retentive Atheists in such circumstances. Extremists in any fashion are bad, but those that use God as their way to spew hatred towards others are worse than any.