What "creates" "trolls"?

One question; many answers?

That depends on your definition of what "troll" is.

Meta Note to Mods: May want to move this out of General Discussion before Jon starts cursing in Cyrillic.

In contemporary Internet usage, the word "troll" comes from the idea of "trolling" -- trailing lines of fishhooks in the water, waiting for a bite. It refers to the practice of posting something (originally to USENET) that was specifically designed to elicit a strong response from the one or more regular readers. An example might be "There is no doubt that Casey Stengel was the best ballplayer who ever lived, and ever will live", to which you get a chorus of angry disagreement ("No, Babe Ruth!"). A troll wasn't -- in this usage -- an ogre who waits under a bridge asking for a fee to cross.

The problem with Wikipedia, is that "troll" has become an all-purpose epithet for anyone who asks an inconvenient question, or asks a question in a sarcastic or cynical way.

Asking Jimbo, for example whether trading sex for edits is better or worse than being paid for them -- that is trolling.

So, what creates trolls? Well, of course, Wikipedia's many internal political struggles, their double-standards and inconsistent application of rules, their kangaroo-court judicial procedures, and -- above-all -- the utter hypocrisy of the place -- that is what creates trolls.

Now, off to cut some bait.

You should have given us an example

"Trolls" are created in the Troll Factory, which as everyone but Mr. Emesee probably knows, is located in Germany. (All prices are in Euros.) While the factory doesn't produce a specific product called "Emesee's Brain," that's probably because it's a key component of all their other products, and it wouldn't make sense to try and sell it as a separate item. (Also, they seem to have relatively few problems with initial capitalization or title case.)

There's also Five Arts Studio, an outfit in Tennesse that makes trolls by hand, but I'd say this would be more of a "high-end" option.

Manufactured? I thought they were mined(?) in the Troll gas field using the Troll A platform.

Yeah, the krauts even wrote a book explaining this process.

(I've been meaning to write an article about it, as it's apparently notable enough for the German and Esperanto (!) WPs. Really though it sounds like a dog food brand or something. Could make for some fun photoshopping if Uncyclopedia wants to beat enwiki to the punch.)

ha

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hmm..