Foruming

Forum Debating

Forum discussions often involve informal debating. The fundamentals still apply, but much of the performance and structure that come with face-to-face public debates are eliminated. Forum debates have a number of properties all their own, many of them negative: Critics of Internet forums often joke, "Arguing on the Internet is like competing in the special olympics. Even if you win, you're still retarded."

• Flame wars erupt at the drop of an ad hominem so the importance of etiquette is heightened.
• Beware of posting something that may be perceived as off-topic or annoying.
• Try to frame what you have to say in a personal context as a relavent post.
• Funny Video: Posting And You explains why before you start a new thread you should search for existing threads and stickies before asking a question that is already answered.

Forum Defense

Forum defense is the practice of countering misinformation in the millions of messages posted every day to online forums such as blog comments and news discussions. A forum defender sees a subject of importance being discussed

Blog countering, reporting, rebutting

People who find forum attacks could do more than just weigh in personally, they could flag it for other group members to wade in.

When you come across an article or blog post where the comments tell the writer something you disagree with, defend the truth as you see it. When you’ve done this, post a link to the Forum Watch to invite others to wade in on the issue as well. If you don’t have time to respond to the forum yourself, just post the link and let others with time and interest do it for you. Or if you haven’t managed to come up with a good counter-argument, post the address here, so that others can help you or see what you’ve written.

Active Forum Defense

Go to Google News or some other news site, and search for your controversial keywords. Then go to any headline and check the comments. There are most often a few negative comments, which is what you’re looking for.

When you’re replying, please don’t lie (we’re representing the truth you can trust, remember?), and if there is an argument that you can’t think of a way to counter, just flag it for others to address.

Countermemetic Forum Defense

Search engines can help you find a wide variety of forum messages on various topics. You can use this to post your ideas and counter opposing ideas across a broad spectrum of the Internet.

Forums

Forums are a great way of spreading ideas and talking to diverse groups of people online. Most forums have very limited reach to a small community, which often makes the discussion more topical and interesting. There is a lot of “trolling”, or garbage posting, that happens on forums. And “flaming”, or vehement personal attacks.

GNN has an excellent forum that keeps short posts short with clean lines like an ewspaper so you can access information easily. It could be improved upon by showing alternate forums and threads horizontally above the current selection or vertically in a left-hand column like the Mac Finder. That might be the ultimate view. http://www.gnn.tv/forum/index.php

Chats

Chats are lively and short-lived conversation spaces. Unlike forums, chats only allow the participants to hear each other and provide no permanent log of past chatting. People also write in informal abbreviations rather than polished written posts. Chats are better suited to direct conversations between small groups of people online at the same time.

Message Signatures (SIGS)

“Sigs” are humble but ubiquitous spots to spread ideas. Every email and post you send can spread a Sig message at the bottom. Sigs are like an elaborate version of “yours truly” or “best regards”. You can put anything you like there short of being annoying. Your sig can contain empowering links, but don’t overdo it. Most sigs are just amusing quotes and jokes but at the least, they make the reader thoughtful. Metamoderation Forums In metamoderation forums, the best messages rise to the top, increasing their reach share amongst forum visitors.

Examples of Foruming

Countermemetics

Spread Firefox

Firefox community marketers set out to counter every unfavorable review of Firefox they could find online.

Godwin's Law

Schilling

Foruming must never cross over into the dark side and become schilling and astroturfing.

http://www.hypecouncil.com/

Wanna know about marketing, ask a Marketer. Here's a couple nifty bits for ya: 1) I have in my possession a marketing plan for NBA LIVE 2004 (don't ask how I got it... ). This marketing plan actually refers to "Hiring viral specialists to advocate NBA Live online via chat rooms targeting gaming fan sites" and "Placing offensive, defensive and PR shills into common gaming chat arenas." It goes on to outline a full page of tactics for said "Guerilla Online Marketing for Core Gamers."

2) I actually hired a company called Hype Council (http://www.hypecouncil.com). These guys do a TON of gaming related stuff -- I actually wouldn't be surprised if it's the company referred to in your news post. Their technique is quite insidious. Let's say they were hired to pump up PA (not like you need the buzz, but whatever...). Using one of the hundreds of shill accounts they have across the net, they post a new thread that says something like "hey guys, I've been looking for some new web comics to read. Anybody have any recommendations?" This is non-threatening, and gets the community engaged. They then wait a couple days and post again, this time with "Well, I asked some friends and they suggested I check out Penny Arcade <insert link>. I thought it was pretty funny, although I didn't like all the cuss words. What do you guys think?" Again, seeking engagement, they now have stealthily inserted the client's link, thereby encouraging trial. It's all very measurable and very effective. You should see the monthly reports you get from these guys: everything is detailed. Spooky.

It's all very insidious and, I'm sure, widespread. So much so that I don't trust anything I read. Unless it's a board where I "know" the posters, I always assume everyone on the board is a shill.

[End Somewhat Terrifying Message]

Hey guys,

I interviewed for a guerilla marketing business in San Francisco that targeted web forums.

I was told that if I accepted the job, I was to have at LEAST 50 identities on as many forums as I could muster (they wanted 100 eventually), with a goal of 5 posts an hour. The posts had to be well thought out, and the idea was that I was to establish multiple identities with a history on the forums, so that when the timing was right a well written but subtly placed marketing post could be finessed in. And regular visitors would recognize the post as coming from a long time poster.

They had 12 people working there full time, and were hiring 10 more. You do the math. No wait, I'll do it for you: that's 880 posts a day (if minimum was met). However he said the better ones could do around 8 or 10 an hour. And they had different "verticals" so there was the sports guy, and the games guy, the hentai, excuse me I mean anime guy, etc.

But the most critical point was this: develop and integrate the identity. No random "HEY EB GAMES IS AWESOME BUY THIS" stuff.

Kinda spooky.

Didn't take the job. It was a fucking mill.