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Outing the Internet's worst troll.

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40hz:
There's a really interesting article posted by Adrian Chen on Gawker last Friday telling the story of how Michael Brutsch (aka Violentacrez), the worst troll on Reddit (and possibly the worst troll in history) was finally "outed."

What is especially interesting is Brutsch's reaction and attitude in the wake of being exposed. Along with some notes on how sites like Reddit are sometimes willing to to give passive "permission" to trolling in order to get their clicks up.

Fascinating.

Link to full article here.



Unmasking Reddit’s Violentacrez, The Biggest Troll on the Web
Adrian Chen   

Last Wednesday afternoon I called Michael Brutsch. He was at the office of the Texas financial services company where he works as a programmer and he was having a bad day. I had just told him, on Gchat, that I had uncovered his identity as the notorious internet troll Violentacrez (pronounced Violent-Acres).

"It's amazing how much you can sweat in a 60 degree office," he said with a nervous laugh.

Judging from his internet footprint, Brutsch, 49, has a lot to sweat over. If you are capable of being offended, Brutsch has almost certainly done something that would offend you, then did his best to rub your face in it. His speciality is distributing images of scantily-clad underage girls, but as Violentacrez he also issued an unending fountain of racism, porn, gore, misogyny, incest, and exotic abominations yet unnamed, all on the sprawling online community Reddit.
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joiwind:
Fascinating - and edifying ...

wraith808:
But the thing about this 'outing' (not saying whether bad or good) is that if he works for a financial services company, and someone truly outed him (i.e. said Michael Brutsch if XX company), he'd most likely lose his job.  Its happened before...

40hz:
^Depends on the company. In my home state it might not be that easy unless you could show it affected the person's ability to perform their job. Unless the company had some ethics clause in their employment contract about personal or non-job related activities that might reflect unfavorably upon the company - or foster a "hostile work environment" by your presence. (They'd probably be able to make that one stick now that I'm thinking about it.)

Not that it will matter. SOBs like him tend to land on their feet. He'll probably just sit and wait for the movie or book deal. Or do a big "I Repent!!!!" act and then hit the motivational and pop psychology circuit giving lectures on how to keep what happened to him from happening to you. (He'll probably say it started out as a joke, but soon got out of control and eventually destroyed his entire "moral compass.")



Plus - he's trendy! He's the guy your mother warned you about. Cyber-bullying is a big hot button topic these days. Parent's groups and talk shows can't seem to hear enough stories, anecdotes and analyses on it.

Besides,  America just loves "Prodigal Son" stories and tearful repentant scenes on afternoon talk shows...


Awwww! Group hug everybody!!! :-\

wraith808:
In my home state it might not be that easy unless you could show it affected the person's ability to perform their job.
-40hz (October 14, 2012, 11:06 AM)
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Is your state an exception to the At-Will employment laws?  It says he's in Texas, so he's pretty much screwed.

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