…have social skills? You’re hired!

Thursday, July 31st, 2008 | teh internets | No Comments

Since my days as a n00b on the Internet way back in 1998, I always wondered why there were jerks on the web. When forums were all the rage, you’d have at least one jerk either posting some off color comment or a all-out feed war. But now, with these community sites, there seems to be more politics behind the negative posts. Flaming, as its called, seems to be a smart way to manipulate situations to a users advantage.

Take YouTube for instance.  Lets say you post a video of your daughters baptism.  Harmless right.  Well after a few ‘cute’ responses, some anti-[insert your denomination here] user decides to flame you and your sect.  You naturally fire back.  Then another user post…claiming you’re trying to convert the community with your propaganda.  And the cycle continues till your user name is ruined.  Thus ending your community reputation.

..so what the !@#$ is that supposed to mean?

If you’re online and get into those type of situations, don’t reply.  Silence keeps the conversation from beginning.  If you work for a community website, the same applies.  Don’t fall for the old bait-and-switch that commonly happens out here.  The down side with employees of community websites and getting flamed is that when you get attacked, the company is attacked as well…and then you have a PR nightmare on your hands….like Vimeo and their decision not to host certain game-play videos.  I hope their smart enough to keep quiet and ride out the storm.

Tags: community websites, flaming, hostile users, public relations