{"id":30,"date":"2016-09-30T09:20:52","date_gmt":"2016-09-30T08:20:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.wearecentrifuge.com\/?p=30"},"modified":"2017-01-02T12:00:20","modified_gmt":"2017-01-02T12:00:20","slug":"the-trouble-with-trolls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/2016\/09\/30\/the-trouble-with-trolls\/","title":{"rendered":"The Trouble with Trolls"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the problems with having a game that allows player-generated content is \u2013 you guessed it \u2013 trolls! In Interference<\/u><\/a> We start with a description, then let a chain of players take turns to draw and describe – but each player can only see the previous step in the game. It won’t take long for the original message to get lost in translation and turn into something completely different (and hilarious!). Well \u2013 that\u2019s how it\u2019s meant to go!<\/p>\n

Trolling takes many forms from being new and not sure what to do\u00a0to\u00a0just wilfully derailing the game \u2013 for example we recently had a troll who wrote and drew nothing but \u201cPeeps\u201d \u2013 in game after game. This annoyed many players who had been looking forward to how their games would turn out or wondered how the next person would describe their lovingly crafted drawing.<\/p>\n

\"peeps\"<\/a>
Picture by Aisha Yahia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Now I do like Peeps \u2013 they\u2019re \u00a0marshmallow sweets from the USA, usually in the shape of chicks \u2013 but they were derailing every game.<\/p>\n

This was quite a mild form of trolling \u2013 however, there are others where the words or pictures are totally obscene. This game is meant to be for players 16+ – even so, some of the pictures we have seen have ranged from child-like to actually talented and realistic depictions of genitalia and rude acts. Or as Nathan calls it \u201cThe Giant Schlong Problem\u201d<\/p>\n

Obviously we cannot be looking at what it being drawn every minute of the day and night (Interference is very popular in the USA and tends to be most busy when we are asleep.) So, how do we tackle trolls?<\/p>\n

Firstly, we had to put in a Swear Filter \u2013 so that most obscene words could be caught and held for moderation before anyone saw them. That\u2019s not so easy with pictures until we invent software that can recognise rude shapes and body parts. So, we have a reporting system \u2013 so that when a player is presented with a picture to describe \u2013 there is an opportunity to skip it and report it to the moderators. This will hold the item in a queue until either of us has time to have a look.<\/p>\n

\"smoking\"<\/a>
Drawing by jeunslo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It is interesting because while some players will happily let something dodgy go through and describe it, others report things like a picture of someone smoking for example \u2013 because they do not like to see that sort of thing either! That makes it hard to try to think of players who will be good moderators. Which means that so far we do that job ourselves.<\/p>\n

So, we need to check what the transgression is \u2013 and either let it go through \u2013 or delete it, restart that game and deal with the troll.<\/p>\n

What happens to trolls when we catch them? In the first instance we send them a warning and ban them for 3 days. Quite often it can be a newbie who hasn\u2019t understood how the game is played and what the rules are. If they behave after the first ban then all is well.<\/p>\n

If it keeps happening again then the bans are for longer and longer\u2013 until a 1 year ban is put in place. Occasionally, when the trolling has been really bad and prolific (gross misconduct we call it) \u2013 then we go straight to the 1 year ban. This is when it is obviously deliberate and the troll is intentionally trying to ruin the game.<\/p>\n

It can be quite nerve-wracking when, for example, we have been put forward for an award* and we know that judges will be looking at the game \u2013 it would be just typical if the first thing they had to describe was the aforementioned giant genitals. Arghhhh!<\/p>\n

We are wondering about restricting new players to just being in 5 games until they have some likes from other players and we can see that they are well-behaved. Any helpful comments would be gratefully received! (No trolls please!)<\/p>\n

*luckily when the TIGA judges tried Interference recently it must have been all good \u2013 as we are shortlisted for 2 TIGA awards!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the problems with having a game that allows player-generated content is \u2013 you guessed it \u2013 trolls! In Interference We start with a description, then let a chain of players take turns to draw and describe – but each player can only see the previous step in the game. It won’t take long … Continue reading “The Trouble with Trolls”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,13],"tags":[4,6,5,7],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65,"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30\/revisions\/65"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wearecentrifuge.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}