The AnandTech hoax


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Thread: The AnandTech hoax

  1. #1
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    The AnandTech hoax

    I heard about this this morning. I've been doing research on it most of the day, and I admit that it's really made me think.

    Is this man a villian, a psychotic, or the most awesome troll of all time? That's the big question.

    First, I feel very sympathetic for the people who were hurt by this man's actions. I can only imagine what it must be like for them. I've always believed that anything done in the name of trolling is fair, and I still believe that, but this still chills me to the bone.

    I read all the threads in question, including hunting up a bunch of old ones from over the course of the past year, to try to get the fully story, and a proper historical perspective. Let me say first of all, as someone who's trolled (sometimes professionally) for three years -- the man's story and his apology are bunk. He may be sorry about it NOW, or he may not (I hope he's not -- remorse is a bad trait if you want to be a good troll), but the motivations he described are part of the ruse. He made his confession not out of guilt, but because someone had found hard proof of the hoax, and was about to reveal him. If his story were true, I'd classify him as a headcase with serious psychological problems. But his story is not true: he's a world-class troll who crossed a certain "point of no return" that isn't usually crossed.

    I did something similar once, but not to such a mind-boggling extent. I can't describe it in any detail at all, because the victims never found out, but I once infiltrated a message board using a female persona, and played it up for quite a while. One of the reasons I did this was to seek justice against these folks for a wrong they'd done me in the past, but as usual, it was mainly just for the fun of it. I gained people's trust, got in really close with a few, and had some great discussions as this completely fake female person. And although I was steadily trolling them along with subtle hints, nobody ever suspected a thing. And of course, all the lamer nerdboys worshipped and drooled all over my persona just because she had a female name, in typical message board fashion. (Assuming the fake persona and integrating her into the community wasn't the central goal of the trolling project -- rather, it was just a means of getting access so I could launch the real attack, which I can't speak of for security reasons.) I couldn't wait to drop the bomb and say "Ha ha... gotcha!!"

    But I couldn't go through with the final phase of the plan. Even though I had a personal grudge against the people of this forum, I never had my "Hey, you know how I pretended to be your friend, gained your trust, and oh yeah, pretended to be female? Well... HA HA HA!" moment. That was my original plan, but I couldn't do it. I knew that it would cause emotional pain to at least a few people of the forum -- and causing emotional pain to a human being is something I swore I'd never do. Unfortunately, the people of this particular forum classified as human beings (some of them barely), and I couldn't bring myself to do it. Despite my desire for vindication, I knew it would be wrong to cause emotional pain to these people. I knew a lot of them would be upset if I revealed the truth.

    But I didn't have to. I HAD my moral victory. My persona dropped from existence. I'd beaten them, and they never had to know about it: revealing what I'd done to them would not have been an act of justice, but of vengeance. I knew that I had fooled them all, and that was victory enough for me.

    Our friend at AnandTech made quite a different decision. I have no idea what his motivations were. I imagine that his motivation was probably just fun. Perfectly understandable.

    But by announcing the "death" of his persona, he left himself without an exit. He crossed a "point of no return," beyond which there was no possible way to terminate the hoax without anyone finding out. He claims that he intended the death to be the END of the hoax, but that's pure bunk -- just another part of the hoax. He quite probably had the death planned well in advance. He probably even had his "confession" planned out well in advance of the death, and was just waiting for the right moment. The death was just Phase 2. It's something I don't think I'd ever do, but if the guy thought it was the right thing to do, I salute him for it. No regrets.

    He did a smashing job. I spotted a couple previous instances of him trolling the forum, so I know it's not an isolated incident -- the man is GOOD. In hindsight, I can spot flaws, but to the people involved, it must have been incredibly convincing. He continued the troll for months after the "death", up to the present day. He did nearly everything right.

    I understand that people were hurt by this hoax. That's sad, but I'm not going to judge the man. Does the good of pulling off such a bewilderingly brilliant troll outweigh the cost of the emotional trauma to those involved? Obviously, the victims don't think so, but the perspective of the victims isn't the only perspective that exists. I wish he'd used his troll-powers for good instead of (what appears to be) evil, but I acknowledge him as my superior and trust his judgement better than I trust my own. They say "to make an omlette, you have to break some eggs." That's true.

    As always on these matters, there are no clear matters of "right" or "wrong." There are no clear answers. But although I'm chilled by the incident, I'm going to support this man 100%: he is a genius for all the ages. Everyone involved now understands a little bit more about life, humanity, and reality, and that's what the game is all about.

  2. #2
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    everything on the internet is true, right?
    people must be responsible for their own gullibility

    i got an email about a small boy that has malaria, he needs a kidney transplant to save his life. the email said to forward the letter to at least 50 people, so i pulled up the thread with everybodies email addresses and took care of it. the email says that a hospital will donate a heart-lung machine if they get at least 500,000 email addresses

    did you know that before the internet, a popular "hoax/scam/joke" going around was that there were poor kids that needed dialysis, and that by pulling the tabs off of aluminum sode cans and saving them up, then sending them off, the kids would get free dialysis time. most of the time i was in the navy, everybody would save up those tabs, big bags of them. nobody ever sent them anywhere, nobody knew where to send them i guess
    people would get pissed off and make nasty comments if you didn't pull your tab off and put it into the bag
    Use the right tool for the right job!
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  3. #3
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    I found the whole AnaTech situation quite interesting from an outsider's point of view. I've found the internet to be an avenue to observe people without having to (or needing to) get personally involved. Even the events here at LNO over the past few weeks have been interesting to observe.

    Craig, at what point do you decide that it's trolling to that extent is a good idea? Curiousity on my part. When someone does something, I wonder at what point does it click in someone's mind that "Hey, this is a good idea." I ask this because I can't seem to be able to string someone along as a troll needs to be able to. Not that I intend to, since it would require time and energy that I would prefer to devote to other parts of my life.

    FoBoT, do you still have those soda tabs?
    Seriously, I've spent time in the past sending replies to people with links to sites debunking their certain chain letter. Doesn't seem to do any good. And the cutsie ones that "require" you to send them back to the person that "loves, cares, thinks" about you usually get no response either. So I do my part and delete it.

    But LNO over that past few weeks have been quite interesting. I've been away from my computer for days at a time, but come back and have seen some of the threads.

    People have denied LNO for other forums based on the premise that this forum will disappear. But it's still here (so far). An amazing piece of mob mentality has been displayed, with people jumping to the other forums and then coming back to get everyone else to follow them (I'll get flamed for that, I'm sure). Any similarities to the soda pull tabs?

    So I guess my question would be -- "How can someone get so emotionally attached to a text interface displayed on a computer screen?"
    Now, I take full blame
    For all that came next.
    For I continued the story...

    ...but departed the text.

  4. #4
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    Originally posted by Bills_a_bub:
    <STRONG>Craig, at what point do you decide that it's trolling to that extent is a good idea?
    </STRONG>
    It's all about enlightenment. Other than the obvious fun-factor involved, it's done more for the trolled than for the troller. The primary objective is to force people to challenge, question, defend, and/or articulate their beliefs and ideas through subtle application of misdirection, manpiulation, and misinformation.

    Moreso, it's to make people understand that they shouldn't take everything at face value. Particullarly bright students will come to the conclusion that they shouldn't take ANYTHING at face value. I've reached the point where I no longer see things as "true" or "false," rather, I see everything around me as one giant, elaborate troll. Reality is much more fun that way. Of course, you can't convince others of this just by TELLING them: that's why they have to be trolled, over and over, until they figure it out!

    But mainly, it's just fun.

    Of course, it's only fun until somebody loses an eye. Always weigh the short-term gains against the greater good.

    My favorite chain letters are the ones that say "I wish you peace, love, and happiness! Forward this to 200 people and your life will be filled with bliss and joy because you've let people know that you love them! If you don't forward this, you're an ignorant @%@%^!*% who's going to die alone!"

  5. #5
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    Craig,

    Thanks for the insight.

    I guess it'd be similar to my occasional desires to learn cracking to get back at bastards that scan computers. But that'd be like pissing on an electric fence in the long run.

    So what's the most outrageous character you've posed as?

    "It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye". -- One of my all time favorite quotes.

    [ 02 June 2001: Message edited by: Bills_a_bub ]
    Now, I take full blame
    For all that came next.
    For I continued the story...

    ...but departed the text.

  6. #6
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    Originally posted by Bills_a_bub:
    <STRONG>An amazing piece of mob mentality has been displayed, with people jumping to the other forums and then coming back to get everyone else to follow them (I'll get flamed for that, I'm sure). Any similarities to the soda pull tabs?</STRONG>
    yes, it could be a case study for this type of internet stuff
    the way people will follow things so quickly
    i didn't realize the power of suggestion that could be used on a post
    Use the right tool for the right job!
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  7. #7
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    I really need to try that out over the summer. Could be fun.
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  8. #8
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    Well, you can understand why the people at the forum were upset.

    A lot of people were quite close to "her". Imagine how you would feel if you found out that one of your best friends, who you'd been talking to for months, didn't actually exist.

    Imagine how you'd feel if one of your best friends died -- then months later, you found out that she'd never even existed to begin with.

    I think finding out that a friend never actually existed is much harder to deal with that finding out that a friend has died. With death, there's at least hope of reunion in the afterlife. There's at least an accepted grieving process. Finding out someone you were very close to never even existed means that they're totally and utterly gone. To find out that someone you loved dearly wasn't even real -- that's a hundred times worse than death.

    What would it be like if you found out that your mother didn't really exist? What would it be like if you found out President Millard Filmore never really existed? What would it be like if you found out I didn't actually exist?

    Scary stuff.

  9. #9
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    I've always thought Anand's forums were full of lamers anyway, so this bit of "drama" comes as no surprise.

    I cracked up when I saw the chick's nick was Nowheremom. Does anyone remember that cat Nowhereman from the early days of LNO? At the time, he was the only one using Blackbox and he ran the Bloodyfist Quake3 server.

    I just hope Nowheremom wasn't writing a browser that doesn't suck because now we'll never get to use it.
    You are the contents of your mullet.

  10. #10
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    I'd read about that - hadn't really checked out many of the original posts, though. So, Trolling has a philosophical side to it? Interesting, and something else for me to digest.

    I can see what you mean about Reality being a big troll. I might argue that we are all just trolling ourselves though - but then I'm rather partial to Taoism ...
    There's no place like /home (click) ... there's no place like /home (click) ...

  11. #11
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    I feel no sympathy for people who cannot make reality work for them.

    I think that the internet is great and I believe that BBS like this are great and have a real purpose. But (and people will be offended here) if you use the internet to make friends, then you get what you deserve. I am talking about real friends. If you want to make casual aquaintences on the net, great. But to trust somebody who you cannot see just sounds naive to me.

    [ 05 June 2001: Message edited by: MandK_10 ]
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  12. #12
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    Quality trolling is kinda like chess...outwit the opponent, predict his/her arguments, try to lead them where you want them for the killing blow. Of course, in order to have a quality troll thread, you must be met with adequate resistance...otherwise it's just an intellectual slaughter. Me, I don't troll much, but I think if I practiced it a little more, I'd like it
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  13. #13
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    Craig is the ultimate troll. The prophet to trolls that spread the gospel.

    after all, you cant get over 6300 posts without troling at least 70% of the time...

  14. #14
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    Sure ya can...GOT and Rants...that's how I skyrocketed in my first few months Although I guess that would qualify as trolling a lot of the time.
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