A combination of varied personalities, along with the anonymity of the computer presence, will inevitably lead to online arguments between users. While it is great to encourage healthy debates on your wiki, an outright "flame war" is a problem that spreads quickly. The easiest way to stop hurtful and personal attacks on discussion threads is to delete the thread or post in question. Secondly, registered users who are repeatedly causing problems can be permanently banned from the site.

Warning!! Please Do Not Feed The Trolls

Someone who purposely joins an online community to cause problems and to irritate other users is often referred to as a "troll". As suggested by the popular sign above, the easiest way to get rid of a troll is to not feed him, i.e. do not encourage a trouble maker by responding. It is your heated response that fuels a troll- they want you to notice them. They want you to be irritated.

What to do

Don't give them the satisfaction. Instead, delete any troll-like comments they post and if other users are responding to the troll, suggest to those users (in private, if possible) that they should ignore them, as well. Soon, the troll will grow bored and move onto another site.

If you think the troll has moved to another Wetpaint website, contact the site's moderator as soon as possible and alert them the presence of a trouble maker; this can be accomplished by clicking on "To-Dos & Activity Reports" (on the left side of all Wetpaint sites) and sending a message or posting a discrete comment on the moderator's profile. Try not to be too dramatic in your message or comment, as this might make your warning seem less credible.