T.W. Farnam, The Wall Street Journal, February 24, 2007
FORT MITCHELL, Ky. — In Norse mythology, trolls steal babies and leave their own shape-shifting offspring behind. On the Internet, they just steal attention.
As candidates increasingly use the Internet to build political bridges, their message boards have become homes for trolls, users of an online community who leave messages that are ideologically opposed, off-topic or off-color.
Brian O’Neill, a 33-year-old part-time bartender and full-time college student, has been marauding on Sen. Hillary Clinton’s Web site for the past few months, even though his posts attacking the candidate are frequently scrubbed from the site within hours. Mr. O’Neill turned to Mrs. Clinton’s site after being booted from online forums of former Sen. John Edwards, Sen. Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee.
Although Mr. O’Neill says he isn’t familiar with the term “troll,” he has been labeled as one — and not just once. “I thought they were calling me like the, you know, little garden trolls,” Mr. O’Neill says, “and I’m, like, ‘I’m not a garden item.’ ”
Mr. O’Neill, who lives in this small town outside Cincinnati, has a “special blogging place” two levels underground at the library on the campus of Northern Kentucky University in nearby Highland Heights. On a break between classes, he sits down at a bank of computers in the back corner of the stacks, places his large cup of nutmeg-seasoned French roast coffee on the table and logs on.