Flame Warriors ~ View topic

It's something that no one ever wants to think of. Something so unthinkable, that at the first vestiges of the thought, they drive it from their minds. Yet sometimes, it happens.... and the forum will never be the same again.

***

All across the forum, the bells ring in their doleful tones.

Rebel Leader has his forces put the flag of the Revolution at half-mast.

Duelists sheathe their swords: for such a day is not a day for bloodshed.

Big Dog, Me-Too, Issues, Tireless Rebutter..... They are all either silent or weeping copiously.

Deacon has his fellow priests chant the requiem for the dead.

And all is quiet, as every single Flame Warrior mourns the passing of a friend.

***

Okay, now that I've gotten the story-blurb out of the way, I shall proceed to describe this event.

The Funeral is a very rare event on a forum. But when it happens, the whole forum is affected. Usually, this event is triggered by the real-life death of a well-loved forumer.

When this happens, Admin (or one of the mods) usually puts up a "sticky" thread to announce the sad event. There, many of the posters on the board begin to post their fond memories of their friend, offer their condolences, ask about the event, or simply register their shock.

When this happens, all other activity slows or stops, as the whole forum mourns. The thread may gradually grow to a great size, as every poster centers their conversation on the thread.

Seldom does anyone criticize the dead forumer at a Funeral, as it is considered bad taste. Those who do may find themselves on the receiving end of the forum's anger. (After all, "de mortuis nil nisi bonum"- speak nought but good of the dead.) If the forumer was a controversial one, people will temper their criticisms with praise in the name of etiquette.

Only the most heartless or the most foolhardy of Trollers would invade a forum during a Funeral. A Funeral is a sacred rite where the feelings of grief are released and where forumers come to terms with the loss. Those that invade a forum during a Funeral will come face-to-face with the wrath of the grieving forumers- a terrible force to be reckoned with. And even if the invasion is successful, the troll's comrades will not be happy with him: rather, they will most likely censure him for his irreverence.

Eventually, the pall of mourning will pass, and the thread will be un-stickied. But the memories of the late forumer will never fade away... for time may heal all wounds, but even so, scars may be left.....

NOTE: The Funeral does not denote the bustle of activity that happens in the wake of a banning. (I shall discuss that further under another topic.)

NOTE: If an Admin is the deceased forumer, an event known as The Coronation may happen.

WARNING: If the "deceased" turns out to be alive and well IRL, then he will immediately be attacked by the mourners!
_________________
Chaos Revenant:
Doing What You Don't Have The Guts To Since 2006

Hrm... I don't think I've seen anything quite this formal, but it seems plausible. It's been a long-ass time since I've seen a death announcement on a forum. I recall hearing about an extremely formal funeral held in WoW that got raided, too.
_________________

Tireless Rebutter / Archivist
The Grand Suggestion List

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

Gosh damnit, troller is not a fucking troll, he's a poorly named attention whore, get it right.
_________________
I've got good news:

I just saved a bunch of money on my car insurance by NOT BUYING ANY.

Nice suggestion. However, on the last part, I know first hand that's not always true; I've been declared dead online enough (usually due to rather short sighted assumptions of a certain person who assumes every "killer storm" in my area seems to have offed me) that when I post to correct matters, it's hardly even a big deal anymore.

Of course, the first time, I walked into my won e-funeral, blinked, then pulled a Samuel Clemens. The person in question who is a well meaning individual prone to constantly imagining the worst however got flamed to a crisp. I merely got questions on why I'd been offline for two months when I was normally posting 3-5 times a day at said site (should've been; it was afterall, mine.)

Aside from that and that long ass boring narrative, nothing to add.
_________________

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

Trolling is manipulation. Pissing people off is one thing you can use trolling for, but ultimately someone who annoys people has as much in common with a troll as someone who replaces their own windshield wipers has with an auto mechanic.
_________________

Tireless Rebutter / Archivist
The Grand Suggestion List

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

Well actually definitions across the web disagree with you. Such as this one:

http://curezone.com/forums/troll.asp

What you have to keep in mind is that, typically, the word "troll" is thrown at anyone with an even slightly controversial opinion. I somehow doubt you'd rush to agree that a troll is anyone who causes fights. Likewise, you can save the references to how many sites agree with you; it didn't work for SlashCo when we were arguing over what anti-hero means. It is true that popular usage eventually defines language. That doesn't mean if a bunch of people agree with you now that you are right. There is a good reason I say this, which hopefully you'll read over before hitting reply.

Obscure terminology, especially from the tech industry, is constantly abused by laypeople. I refuse to join in their misuse even if it is widespread, because failing to resist misuse it what allows this to keep happening. A perfect example of this is the term "hack." It's an engineering term that means to get a machine to do something it was never intended to. In short, it generally means a workaround. Currently the record-holder for Greatest Hack Ever belongs to Nicolai Tesla for hacking the entire planet into an electrical circuit during some free energy experiment he was trying out.

If you're not following where I am going with this, do a google search on "hacker." Tell me how many correct results you get, because thanks to the news media abuse, most dumbasses think it means "computer criminal."

This applies to "Troll" in the following way. A troll is someone who manipulates people for a desired reaction. This reaction is, of course, nearly always negative because there's not much people can find out they were manipulated into that makes them feel good afterwards. Genreally, yes, trolls sew dissent. How do they do this if not by manipulating people?

Herein lies the problem: Your original definition was that trolling was attention whoring to piss people off. I replied that pissing people off does not make you a troll. You've since changed your definition by posting --as proof for your stance-- someone describing trolls as people who cause forum members to get into fights with each other. That is not the same thing as pissing people off by trying to get attention.

Does my analogy regarding "changing your wipers isn't the same as being a mechanic" make more sense now? You cannot call yourself a troll if all you do is make people pissed off at you. With that loose of a definition you may as well start calling spambots "trolls." As for what the rest of the internet says, they can fuck off and die. Most of them don't know what the hell they're saying because all they're doing is parroting one another ad nauseam.
_________________

Tireless Rebutter / Archivist
The Grand Suggestion List

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

Lurker Joined: 28 Mar 2007 Posts: 9

Just to go off-topic a bit

I have only seen one funeral - at a computer forum
a few years back
it was one of the mods I believe

forker

Clueless Newb Joined: 19 Sep 2007 Posts: 24

We've had a funeral at the Fourth Turning forums. It was for Bill Strauss, one of the authors of the forum's book, The Fourth Turning. This was a book that peaked in popularity aeter September 11.

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

Possible Troller Joined: 07 Jul 2007 Posts: 132

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

The Voice of Reason Joined: 31 Jan 2005 Posts: 1368

Good Chaos, you guys talk WAAAAAAAAAY too much for your own good.
_________________
Chaos Revenant:
Doing What You Don't Have The Guts To Since 2006

Lurker Joined: 12 Feb 2010 Posts: 6

Which conjures the desperate tactic: Fake Own Death. You can get attention whoring all over the place, and leave a truly useless forum (crappy people, or your rep is shite), all in one neat package. Establish a few sock puppet "friends" who you force to say "Don't you miss SoAndSo" after your engineered passing, and the endless pity party ensues.

Lurker Joined: 13 Apr 2010 Posts: 1

I saw something similar to this happen on a forum (I'll see if I can find the thread). The user "who had died" claimed to be a friend using his account. He said that the user had died of a heart attack but had spoken about all of the other users on the forum before hand. He shared the guy's last words about them all. It was very sad and only one person thought it was a fake (that person was loathed by all due to that). Eventually, the thread ended.

A month later the user posted. Someone pointed that he had died and suddenly everything came crashing down. He immediately claimed he hadn't made that thread and that someone had hacked his account and made it. The skeptic never played this down, pointing out in future debates he was the only person smart enough to know the guy wasn't dead.
_________________
I classify myself as a fallen Big Cat who seeks to rise up again to his former glory. That or a Space Marine.

Wow, I was just going to post in this thread to bump the latest spammer thread (die motherfuckers, die) and had a nostalgic walk down memory lane.

Wow. I've seen a few real life incidents, where a well know and liked person died. there are even memory threads for them permanently on the forums.
_________________
-
--
---
----
---
--
-
"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."

I've gone through one of these myself, it was pretty sad, because this kid I knew on another forum who died was so young. He was about my age. There's a memorial there, and the site made a big donation to Make a Wish.
On a related note, if a death occurs to someone in an online game, there is a chance that raiders will attempt to bomb any virtual funeral held in that game for shits and giggles. Serenity Now's bombing of a WoW funeral is the most notorious instance, but there are others.
_________________

I'm Sisi's entertainment.