Quote from: gen. specific on August 27, 2011, 02:29:42 PM

How come everyone that points out bitcoin weaknesses are called trolls? I mean I have seen some entirely well thought out posts simply showing supply/demand based cons of bitcoin (sorry, no citations for this thread) but the first reply is always a reference to the OP being a troll

EVERYONE in here long at Bitcoin/USD $30 and absorbing a huge paper loss? The only reason I can come up with for this kind of behavior is that people are married to their speculative positions

Are there any references you can point to? Without having some examples, it's impossible to tell.

There are a lot of blatant trolls of many different agendas here, and they seem to constantly increase in number. You see, there weren't almost any until the USD/BTC climbed to above 10 (Check the archives, you won't find a comment like the one netrin posted above me and won't find people who are shouting "troll".). After that, really caring and knowledgeable people got less and less responsive for obvious reasons, and trolls seem to be taking over. In a trollish atmosphere, people who normally post valuable information start to get lousy as well. Trolls killed a lot of forums this way (kuro5hin comes to mind).

There are also genuinely concerned non-troll people who point out flaws that have been pointed out many many times before, without even checking about previous discussions, and act extremely self-confident and write in a condescending tone. This invites negativity, since it's common sense that people who seek genuine information act humbly. I'm not saying core Bitcoiners respond to them negatively, they usually don't respond at all and posters only get negative responses, are called trolls, etc.

This forum is flooded with criticism since its inception and it's a very good thing. Even at this low point in this forum, I wouldn't expect a well written argument of Bitcoin's flaws to be greeted negatively. That's why I was asking about examples, maybe I've been missing something.

EDIT: What I wrote above reads as if trolls are only critical about Bitcoin. I don't think trolls have a side, it's just easier to piss off people by acting negatively towards it since this is the Bitcoin forum. People shouting "troll" inappropriately are also trolling, aren't they?