A "Slashdot Troll" is entirely different from a just plain "
troll." Whereas a
troll can be described as someone who carefully crafts messages to entrap the less
experienced in an
embarrassing (and
humorous) display of their state as a
newbie. Those reading the thread who
aren't newbies can laugh along with the troll. It's a mild form of
hazing that gives
old timers on the 'net a common bond.
A "Slashdot Troll," on the other hand, pretty much refers to anyone who doesn't post relevant, easily digestible, and somewhat moderate posts. I've been reading slashdot since the beginning, and I still can't figure out how these people came to be known as trolls. As noted above, it started with the "First Post" phenomenon which, I might add, did indeed start out as a simple joke but became burdensome before too long.
One of the definitions that is missed in the above writeups is that of the "surreal" post. Any post that is somewhat irrelevant, bizarre, and obscure is sure to be marked a troll. For example, in a story about how "Motif Is Not Dead," I posted this short note, which was moderated as a troll:
Oh yes it is...and I killed it...with my little Motif-stained hatchet right here. Shhh, don't tell anyone.
Now, this was intended to be a completely offtopic and scary piece of humor in the tradition of
superbad. However, it occurs to me that the pure weird nature of this post (and I admit that it was weird) is something that has become part of the definition of a "Slashdot Troll."
So in conclusion, a "Slashdot Troll" is a poster who does not make a reasonable contribution to the signal to noise ratio of Slashdot.