Trolling/Lurking ?

Hi all,

Here's a question that has been bugging me ever since I caught mention of it somewhere.

What exactly ( in your guys opinion ) is trolling or lurking?

The reason I ask is that I'm new to the AF and have been reading up on a lot of interesting posts that have been made.
There are so many different viewpoints in here about a lot of different topics.

For example, I was just reading some posts about " Is mankind a Disease"? I've had my own ideas about this and when I seen it here I was like " Wow, I never thought that anyone even thought about stuff like this let alone had discussions about it".

Mind you I'm skipping over the whole idea of AF as a car problem/solution thing.
That's how I stumbled on this site as I had a problem with one of my trucks ( which I received great reply that helped a lot, thanks again ) and noticed the Coffee Break section.

There's stuff in there that blows my mind and some very smart people with great ideas...plus there's a few morons but that's another topic altogether.

I have posted replies to some articles that I thought I could make a valid point, I would never post just to piss someone off or to make them look like a dick, but after reading the reference to "lurking/trolling" it made me wonder if I fell into that category in your minds?

In my own mind I know that I'm not doing anything wrong, I am just expanding my mind and being open to new ideas and opinions, but I was wondering how the rest of you felt about it.

L8R

/me feels the flames coming already..

IMO, Trolling and lurking are completely different activities.

Trolling is basically flame-baiting, in that the troll only makes inflammitory, inappropriate, irrelevant or offensive posts. They're only here to start fights or trouble or rile people up, or to spew their point of view with no intention of listening to anyone else.

Lurking is simply reading without replying. I don't think there's really any negative connotation to that. I do that all the time in this forum in particular. Sometimes someone has already made the point that I would like to make; sometimes I can't decide how to articulate the point I want to make; sometimes I don't have a point, and I just want to read other people's opinions and arguments...

Lurking = :sunglasse
Trolling = :nono:

Well said Jay.

IMO, Trolling and lurking are completely different activities.

Trolling is basically flame-baiting, in that the troll only makes inflammitory, inappropriate, irrelevant or offensive posts. They're only here to start fights or trouble or rile people up, or to spew their point of view with no intention of listening to anyone else.

Lurking is simply reading without replying. I don't think there's really any negative connotation to that. I do that all the time in this forum in particular. Sometimes someone has already made the point that I would like to make; sometimes I can't decide how to articulate the point I want to make; sometimes I don't have a point, and I just want to read other people's opinions and arguments...

Lurking = :sunglasse
Trolling = :nono:
yeah some of the forums i visit just has different people reiterating the same point over and over or 45 people reply to tell someone "good job" or "nice car". it gets retarted.

Lurking.... 40 yr old males hanging out in #teen, reading away at other conversations...

Lurking... hanging around, not contributing/participating to the community while taking your share of the info.

Lurking... a reason why many forums make you register to be able to view?