There was an interesting comment posted recently on the Unz Review under one of my recent articles. It said the following:
Kiza’s comment mirrors something I did indeed observe: every time I post something at the Unz Review the exact same group of commentators immediately rush to post an X number of negative comments and the real conversation begins only further below.
Unlike Kiza, I am not sure that this is the result of some targeted Hasbara effort, though this is very possible, of course. What I thought, at least until today, is this:
Thanks to the efforts of my moderation team there is a not trivial amount of folks who hate my guts which have been shown the door and which cannot spew their hatred of me on this blog. That state of affairs immensely frustrates them, and so they go to other “related” sites (Unz, Russia Insider and others) to keep up their personal little anti-Saker crusade elsewhere in the hope that somehow this will “unmask” me. To the extend that this affects me me, it only results in me having a good laugh at their frustration and rather lame efforts (-: like when they call me by my first name – Andrei – or full name – Andrei Raevsky – not realizing that this is a pseudo-secret everybody knows about and nobody cares about :-). I am also very encouraged that these anti-Saker crusaders have failed to get anybody else to join their crusade (which can be clearly seen by the lack of support their posts get from others).
I think that it is important to recognize that the only thing standing between us all (me, and you, the readers and members of our community) and these rabid hate-filled maniacs are the moderators. I personally simply do not have the time to deal with moderation. As for the moderators, they provide me with a 2nd opinion of sorts since they only “set aside” the posts which they flag and then send them to me for final decision (fwiw, I estimate that I overturn their decision in no more than 1/5th of the cases, which means that in 4/5th of the case I can only agree with their decision).
As I wrote many times already, moderators are truly the unrecognized heroes of our community. Think of it, their role is the only one in which you never, ever, get a “thank you” and the one where the only form of “recognition” you get is in the form of an angry criticism.
So let me say this: I have had MANY cases of people emailing me to complain about the mods (even though that by itself is a blatant and direct violation of moderation rule #13), but NOT A SINGLE ONE where somebody would offer to step in and actually do a better job. Not ONE!
I am deeply grateful for the invaluable service the moderators provide our community. If not for them, our comment section would instantly turn into a cesspool of name calling, trolling, “hasbaraing” and plain idiocy. I can promise you this: if I ever get any semi-decent form of financial support from some kind of private or corporate sponsor (hope dies last), the mods will be the first ones in line to get some kind of compensation, however small, for their efforts (right now they are all volunteers!).
In conclusion, my request to you all is this: try to imagine what the comments section would look without moderation and please keep that in mind if you ever get moderated in a way you do not approve of.
Hugs and cheers,
The Saker
Message to The Saker: Keep up the great work. Being attacked by trolls should be taken as a great compliment. It proves that you present articles of quality, and there are, ofcourse, people and institutions which do not like to see the truth being presented. Your website is one of the best, while your personal analysis of events is first rate. Greetings from Europe.
Yes, the internet is filled with trolls, luckily thesaker has an army of volunteers to squash any troll activity, only the most educated, intelligent, non-trolly comments are allowed through.
Thesaker has with a lot of hard work created a safe-space here and shut all the deplorable out, the uneducated, the idiots, the trolls.
Lets all face it, freedom of speech doesn’t work.
Have you noticed that there is not a single comment here that disagrees with thesaker or the article itself? You know what that means? No trolls.
I have to call BS on Anonymous. What looks like praise is twisted propaganda. I think this must be from one of the senior Hasbara trolls because the sarcasm shows a degree of sophistication.
Here’s the lies:
1. The most important lie is “freedom of speech doesn’t work.” In fact, the Vineyard is a great working example of free speech.
2. The claim that only the very best comments are permitted here. In fact, lame and lazy comments show up frequently, as everyone knows who actually reads the comments. Lame comments, maybe even robot trolling, is a destruction waste of everyone’s time, and that’s just what the trolls in Herzliya want. It appears that if robot-level lame comments get filtered out, then the Hasbara has brought in a real human for higher quality trolling. Since the Hasbara trolls are paid with US tax dollars, I’m not happy.
2. To write that there is not a single comment here that disagrees with the Saker or the article itself” is obvious BS that can be disproven to anyone’s satisfaction with a few minutes of quick scanning of randomly chosen comment sections. This lie is so ridiculous that it proves the Hasbara provenance. No ordinary person would make such an easily disprovable lie, but Hasbara trolls keep a different score than normal people.
3. The “safe space” and “the deplorable” (sic) are an attempt to work people on the Left and on the Right.
Tip to trolls whose native language is Hebrew: You should have written “the deplorables” because it’s always in the plural. Everyone else in the Vineyard gets a Free Pass on language issues, but this particular error seems to point to Hebrew as a native language. Many languages have characteristic difficulties in translating. For example, Russian-to-English often get the English articles wrong, such as a, the, some, his, her, or their. I hate to think of how many characteristic difficulties I have when going from English to Russian. ;-)
Thank God for moderators, and those Hasbara trolls can go to hell.
Not true, I’m an anarchic non Believer and once i had to argue about one Sheikh Imran’s interview. He personally wrote me and we had a good decent discussion. No one banned me for my different opinions on the issue. I’m not very active on the comments cause the language but always very pleased to read a lot of informative stuff from the other readers like was RT back in the first Years. Now it’s a mess. A bunch of alt-righters and leftist anglozionists shouting at each other it’s not my favorite show. So a great thanks to the moderators for filtering all this nonsense
“Lets all face it, freedom of speech doesn’t work” – well it does.
I’ve said things on this blog in disagreement, and I’ve been posted. It might depend on whether one is abusive and, or, purposely divisive. I’m not ‘educated’, but I have a sense of courtesy and hopefully a pleasant disposition, and from what I’ve seen on this blog, so do the others that comment.
Its actually pretty easy to imagine what the Vineyard would look like without moderation.Look at RT,or some of the other not or only loosely moderated sites.They have a “cesspool” comment section.Where every second comment is Russophobic. And posters attack and insult each other regularly. Its a sad fact that allowing absolute “free speech” brings out the trolls,hasbara agents,those with a hate agenda,etc. Not at all what the people arguing for absolute free speech intended the concept to mean.We live in a world of excesses.In which those sowing hate,misinformation,disinformation, and division can hide their ideas,behind “free speech”.Thus ruining for others the noble ideal of people able to give their opinions on issues important to them.And carry on reasoned intelligent conversation with others.
When it comes to RT, it’s logical that it’s attacked by trolls on a daily basis. There are two categories of trolls, private and government, where the government ones post insults written in true bureaucratic style,proving they are government controlled. I myself post numerous comments on RT, and so far my user name on RT has been hacked about six, maybe seven times, with government trolls impersonating me. I had this sorted out with RT. The point is that the Internet has become a very powerful information tool. When it was introduced nobody understood what it really was, and few people could grasp the power a single website could have. The result is that today in the US and Europe newspapers are seeing a fall in sales, while websites are becoming very popular, with the inevitable call that the Internet be regulated for security and moral reasons, a tactic to apply censorship, so that the “sheep” don’t get too well informed with the truth. As for RT, it is ofcourse under immense attack both in the US and Europe, as it provides information other TV channels conceal. The Western elites are frustrated, as they cannot control it.
I’d say RT purposely allows it so they get full world exposure to get certain messages across.
Thank you mods!
Although they’re quite liberal in their leaning, the best explanation I’ve found on how Internet trolls operate is at “Who, What, Why”.
https://whowhatwhy.org/
“DISINFORMATION PART 1: HOW TROLLS CONTROL AN INTERNET FORUM”
https://whowhatwhy.org/2016/01/27/disinformation-part-1-how-trolls-control-an-internet-forum/
“DISINFORMATION PART 2: DETAILED TIPS FOR TROLLS”
https://whowhatwhy.org/2016/02/02/disinformation-part-2-detailed-tips-for-trolls/
“DISINFORMATION PART 3: COINTELPRO UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL”
https://whowhatwhy.org/2016/02/11/disinformation-part-3-cointelpro-up-close-and-personal/
Saker and others are clearly targeted by these techniques.
And, if no one else has said it, a big THANK YOU (pardon the caps) to Saker and all the Moderators at the Vinyard!!! Bravo!!!
Hutch
Hutch:
Very useful reminder and links.
I recall clearly when Ron Unz had the chutzpah ((:-)) to run a couple of stories about Pizzagate , one or two particular trolls were out in force very much discombulating the thread, throwing curveballs, etc. Somewhere along the line I became aware of the Trolling 101 docs at WhoWhatWhy and read them. It became so much easier to see what this Pizzagate Troll guy was up to, how he was framing his posts. In fact, one could go right down the line checking off boxes, so to speak, from the “disambiguation” of trolling techniques. Pointing out how this Pizzagate Troll guy was using the techniques was actually kind of fun.
Really worth a read and also to keep handy for quick reference.
Katherine
Yes, I have to say this is one of the best forums to read a discussion in, and it’s because of the moderators. I remember the old blog during hot times in Donbass, and your growing visibility, with hundreds of comments in a thread. That was a Charlie Foxtrot – I can easily imagine what a tragic mess this would be without the mods.
I disagreed with one or two of your thoughts when you were establishing the moderator system, but I see you were right. I even agree now with allowing Anonymous commenters, because so many of them are actually very powerful and informative comments. Some people prefer to be unrecognizable each time I guess.
You were right, Saker, and the sanity that prevails at the Vineyard is the proof of it. Well done. Thanks, Mods!
Yes Grieved, exactly my thoughts!
But ‘Anonymous’ commenting would be easier on the rest of us when some or other Saker server script would number them, possibly based on IP address or other means. So every next anonymous commenter would show up as ”Anonymous_*”. The * being consecutif alphanumerics of Saker’s choice.
Cheers!
Absolutely agree, I almost never see anyone disagreeing with anyone else on this forum, it is wonderful. I feel so safe and secure here knowing that everyone whose opinion I don’t like are trolls. I didn’t know it before, but now I know.
That is very funny, thank you.
it is funny but very jaded too. Personally I don’t like the nasty comments – it brings the whole conversation down. And the conversations here at Saker’s are well known in the Alternative Media community – for instance Pepe Escobar often re-posts Saker’s articles on his FB page, and always says – ‘the comments are worth reading too….’
So your sarcasm isn’t really well thought out.
I noticed recently, that the web site www [dot] answers [dot] com may be used as a targeting system by the same.
I could relate specific detail, of a strange question about a famous individual of a notable… tribe, and the even stranger “answer” that was a direction to a web site, which… could possibly be construed as… well, presenting inconvenient facts… to some people, but this would further alert these people and specifically to my observation, since they are here (obviously).
I don’t know if this kind of information will help, but there are methods of communications occurring to coordinate these people, and perhaps somebody could start a service to identify them?
I don’t know if this comment itself will get by the mods, but I respect the decision, what ever it may be.
Thanks Mods.
Dear Saker,
How many of your readers comprehend just exactly what is happening throughout the world today? The ‘War on Terror’ was initiated not against terrorists but against any person who dared oppose the thinking of established governments. This means that simply telling the truth is an act of war, and many have died in this war that you are fighting. Michael Hastings of ‘The Rolling Stones’ died when a bomb in his car went off.
Hastings had been preparing his second article on General David Petraeus and was concerned in regard to actions taken by the FBI. Many years ago I was introduced to a retired English policeman residing in a Scandinavian country who was opening eyes when he suddenly developed cancer and died.
How many journalists have died on the battlefield for telling ‘the truth’?
We are told that it is ‘the victors’ that write the history, but that is not quite correct. The truth has always been written but frequently hidden by the victors
During the ‘Great War’ at Christmas time in 1916 the Germans via Zimmerman offered the ‘Allies’ peace, and the front line troops of both sides sang Christmas carols and exchanged ‘Christmas’ gifts, but the newly appointed British Prime Minister Lloyd George would have none of that and so the mass killings continued.
After that war the ‘slogan’ ‘Lest we forget’ was coined and within minutes everything the ordinary soldier had learnt was forgotten.
However, for those that seek the truth, it is out there and for this little piece of truth we must thank ‘the saker’ and those that support him. “Thank you” every one.
@Andrew: “During the ‘Great War’ at Christmas time in 1916 the Germans via Zimmerman offered the ‘Allies’ peace, and the front line troops of both sides sang Christmas carols and exchanged ‘Christmas’ gifts, but the newly appointed British [Liberal] Prime Minister Lloyd George would have none of that and so the mass killings continued.” Exactly; Liberal Intervention Mark 1. I have often admired the courage and determination of the laissez faire Liberal Capitalists in FUKZUSA, who so stoutly defied feelings of human common humanity among their troops, and so skilfully manipulated public opinion by their MSM, and so resolutely continued to feed millions of young men into the mincing machine of WW1 until FUKZUSA aims were accomplished: the crippling of Germany as an economic rival, and the takeover of the ME oilfields. These Mammonite forces of evil are still at work, still as inhuman, as determined, as skilfull and as powerful as ever, after “A Century of War”. Their only opponents are the seekers after truth in little blogs like these.
“Ye shall know the truth, and truth shall set you free”. (gnosesthe aleetheian, kai aleetheia eleutherosei)
Moderation is a method for greater efficiency of communication; but even without pre-cleaning of the ore by moderators, many truthers are experienced prospectors who know how to pick out nuggets of truth from the dross.
College definition of Geologist: A man who knows how to distinguish virgin metal from any old ore.
“In conclusion, my request to you all is this: try to imagine what the comments section would look without moderation and please keep that in mind if you ever get moderated in a way you do not approve of“
Well the answer to that question Saker it would probably look like RT’s comment section nowadays where poor or non existent moderation have turned it into a loony club, where one can not have a normal decent discussion with anyone anymore, sadly but truly.
Is there a chance of having Andrei Martyanov posting artciles on your blog?
Quite enjoy reading his brilliant analysis relatef to military affairs.
Okay, I will ask him :-)
I wish the comment section of RT would have mods like these,it is a playground for trolls
‘RT is a playground for trolls’ … exactly.
How many serious thinkers waste their time commenting there anyway?
Why should RT waste precious resources by employing mods?
Let the trolls roll together in their own slanderous mud and enjoy ‘freedom of speech’.
I think there have always been at least 2 different troll teams commenting on RT and yelling at each other. Whether they are US and European, or US and Israeli, or both are puppeteered by US, is hard to say. Anyway, I have never bothered to comment there. Mod teams are necessary to keep out noise.
Thanks, mods! I’ve learned a great deal from the different commenters here.
Bruce Morley is a troll. His stick is playing the wise old man. He drops lines like ‘gray hair is the frost of wisdom’. He is an obscurantist. His job is to act as a redirector and soother. He swings into gear when home truths are prosecuted about the US in the comments section. There are a couple of purported women writing here too. Their game formulaic: some scripted blurt containing a series of memes with an uncanny number and arrangement of scrambles and wrongs throughout. They write this shit to have men engage them in recapitulation of base reasoning. This process increases scroll length of page and can dissuade a reader from usefully commenting on an article. Plus we have another group who have turned up to do damage to this blog. There are several fellows commenting regularly now who are rapid recapitulators. An article gets posted. Shortly after a lengthy comment or two is posted. The commenterse aim in these instances is to bash the readers mind with banal recapitulation and to increase page scroll length. I hate the bastards. Sorry but i do.
My life is too hectic and unformed to offer you any reliable service. But i could do audits of comment responses on particular articles from time to time to point out to you what games are playing through your comments section if that would be of any help to you.
I also think this blog could be of help to rt, sputniknews, tass, by doing analysis of important stories published by them with damaging spelling and syntactic errors. It is my belief there is a highly visible pattern to be seen upon examination of these errors and what each of the consequences are for the reader, the reputation of the media outlet, and the reputation of Russia and Russians in general. The errors are intended to make Russia seem brutish, illeducated, risible. The errors have consequences for republication because other outlets can’t let into publication on their pages such badly editde stuff.
:)
Thanks to you all moderators! Let’s face it, The Saker, you, moderators, us readers and commentators make a “gestalt”… Learning to live in this “force field” and grow and evolve “from/with” it is being “greater humans”.
I pray that we can all exchange thoughts in a peaceful manner…
LOVE and JOY
i add to all the praises of the moderators from everyone.
it shows what good moderation can do (voluntarily!)
when you look at RT’s comments – utterly useless.
there is no comparison. heartfelt thanks to the mods and
the knowledgeable commentators also.
it’s almost an internet university.
Of course Bruce Morley is a troll.
Andrew S Macgregor is a troll whose job is to introduce misdirections and spout banalities. He neatly places a few little conspiracy theorist morals ie rolling stones and Scandinavian connections to have readers here bite pneumonia these lures either by responding to them or by going off to immerse oneself in the quagmires of nonsense filling the web. He sets out to splinter people off the truthful path into the swamps.
Daniel is 100% right about the comments section of RT. It is abysmal. It really hurts the reputation of RT. The only way to get the message across to RT is to regularly post analysis of the various assaults being made on RT and Sputniknews. For some reason the boss of RT and for Sputniknews must be unaware of the seeming fact that the editing department is compromised and even though the metrics regarding responses to articles seems ok by numbers in reality those numbers don’t reflect on the quality and content of the comments allowed to be posted. The bosses need to have printed out to them that the chain of command beneath them in editing and in comment moderation have well positioned liars in them.
Yes of course Andrew S Macgregor is a troll
This tactic is used pretty much all over the internet.
always try to push ppl into a certain way of thinking.
If not successful, they throw in lines such as “Hitler was right”, so that ppl are too disgusted to even follow the conversation.
Or they start talking about aliens or reptiles or bigfoot and nonsense like that, poisoning the discussion and turning it it in to crazy talk.
The list of dirty tricks is endless.
If you don’t even entertain the possibility of a rigged conversation, you will most certainly fall for this kind of manipulation.
Q: What are the Saker’s views (if any) on the recent requirement for RT and others register with the US Justice Department as a foreign agent and is there any future risk of he/this blog (and others – moderators?) being swept up in such trends to shut down free speech and dissenting opinions?
Dear Saker,
As the wise men of ancient Christianity taught, there are three ways to attack the truth: to veil the truth, to make mistakes or to lie.
Yourselve, Saker, attack errors and lies, the moderators take charge of preventing the enemies of truth from covering it with their vomiting!
Thanks be to the moderators for this work of truth, no matter how painful and hidden it may be.
My heartly thanks to all what you do, you Saker and the moderators.
As the wise men of ancient Christianity taught
Another peddling mysticism as the truth. Oh dear, we have a long way to go.
Congratulations, you sure have a lot of censors, perhaps you can rent them out to CNN and teach them a thing or two about how to deal with “trolls”
If there is no proof for wrongdoing on the part of israel as a state, or as a people, or as an elite, or a religion, then there should be no false accusations, propaganda, gossip, hate speech, and other crap.
Facts, there is a neo fascist faction,anti zionist faction,anti jewish faith faction and anti jewish elite conspiracy faction.
And they use every opportunity to do their thing.
While rightfully criticizing any person idea or thing keep it straight and righteous do not become a tool for evil.
I agree with you.
But……
Fact, there is an active Neo-Liberal faction, Zionist faction, anti-Russian faction, anti-Arab faction, anti-Muslim faction, a Zionist Jewish elite faction, an anti-relgious faction, a US-Western Zionist Jewish faction and an anti-human, anti-goyim.
And they use every opportunity to do their thing.
Did I mention that is Israel is a Western Zionist crusader colonial state where Western Zionist Jews have occupied parts of the Holy Lands and where they will be fought by Muslims until they are finally kickesd out of these lands just like the past Crusader scum ? :-)
Israel is a rogue state in a number of ways—legal/objective and humanitarian/moral/also basically objective— that are clearly documented.
Katherine
“Objectivity always favors the oppressor.” Franz Fanon
About the importance of Moderation. Moderation is necessary and of virtue :
Moderation in all things. … The essential thought is found in the work of the Greek poet Hesiod (c.700 BC), ‘observe due measure; moderation is best in all things’
And about the Importance of Being Ernest :
Lady Bracknell: Never speak disrespectfully of Society, Algernon. Only people who can’t get in do that.
A hundred percent agreement with this, Saker! Surfing around, I observe again and again that good moderation is the absolute backbone of a quality website. Those that allow comments to be an unregulated cess-pit of idiocy and belligerence are just not worth attention. Idiots and hasbarollocksers will always be with us, doubtless, but the quality websites will see them off, quite rightly. (BTW, that odd-looking word just above is a portmanteau word made up from ‘hasbara’ and ‘bollocks’, which in case you don’t know is a profane, not-quite-obscene British-English word meaning ‘absolute bloody rubbish!’ Hence ‘hasbarollocks’ – the zionist version of absolute bloody rubbish; and a hasbarollockser is one who does hasbarollocks. :)
My favorite site. Not because i always agree with opinions of Saker and other writers ( many times i actually party agree, partly disagree with them). I follow this site to learn new perspective.
I’m waiting for big one about future of Russia-Baltic Sea – Sweden – Finland – Artic Circle – Nord Stream 2 -EU/NATO scenario. What will that corner of Eurasian integration look in 2020’s and 2030’s? First cargo train from Kouvola Finland direct to Xi’an China via Russia &Kazakstan started 10th of Nov 2017.
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2017-11/11/content_34404277.htm
“Freedom of speech” is the freedom to go post on a website that’s OK with the nonsense you want to post.
Saker isn’t under any obligation to provide a platform for trolls. Nor is anyone else, for that matter.
There’s a balancing act requiring the need for the moderators, who do their most splendid work, and the ability to argue, debate, to differ, to make points that may cause discomfort. If this is done with humor and good will, so much the better, but if not, it is still better than submitting to an unspoken conformism.
Thank-you moderators!
– Best regards, Shyaku.
Saker
“every time I post something at the Unz Review the exact same group of commentators immediately rush to post an X number of negative comments and the real conversation begins only further below.”
This was a standard websayanim spamming tactic on the old guardian talk forum. When somebody posted something they didn’t want posted, the websayanim would swarm and post a bunch of textual dirareha. The point of the attacks was to drive away the writer and dissuade others from reading the material.
It is interesting that “Kiza” wrote that Petras articles don’t get the same treatment from the websayanim. What Kiza doesn’t realise, is Petras is one the formost and long-standing critics of zionism and has done a lot of work exposing their influence.
The trolls leaving Petras relatively alone is an indication these bum bandits are unaware of Petras’ body of work, as well. Furthermore, it indicates the trolls are site specific. IE: they react to the material at on the site and what writers post there, but don’t go afield to see what the writer has written elsewhere or in the past. This indicates these trolls are assigned to the site as part of a larger centrally controlled operation. IE: they are “foot soldiers” carrying out their specific task in a command structure, not individuals working on their own expressing their own opinions.