Ayush Sharma
Mrs. Butz
English III AP
5 April 2013
The Autobiography of Ayush Sharma When I was a little 6-year-old boy, my kindergarten teacher read the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff out loud to the class. In the story, there is a troll living under a bridge, and when a few goats want to cross to get to a nice pasture of grass, he stops them and tries to eat them. The oldest and strongest of the goats manages to push away the troll, and the goats live happily ever after in their meadow of lush grass. At that time, I was ignorant when it came to much of American culture since I was born in India, and I didn’t actually know what a troll looked like. Once I got home, I asked my brother what a troll was, and he showed me a picture on the internet of a short, vile looking creature that was covered in green, moss-like hair. Despite being much older now, that same image pops into my mind whenever I hear the word troll. Although my mental image of a troll has remained the same, society’s definition has changed drastically over the years. The actual word “Troll” has been used for centuries in numerous fables and mythological stories. However, the connotation of the word has changed considerably with the introduction of new technologies such as blogs and forums. The Urban Dictionary, the world-wide leading source of definitions for slang expressions, defines a Troll as “one who posts a deliberately provocative message with the intention of causing maximum disruption and argument.” In other words, Trolls seek out conflict with other human beings on the internet for the sole purpose of self content. Even if this person actually looks like the classical definition of a Troll in the real world, he can pretend to be whoever he wants in the imaginary world of the internet due to the anonymity of the modern day blogs. Because of this, scrawny little wimps can pretend to be the strong, powerful, and rich people that they wish they could become. This sense of authoritative power pulls Trolls further and further into the vicious grasps of the internet until they can no longer leave the computer. At this point, the transmogrification is complete. The most common meeting place for Trolls is the famous video website, YouTube.com. On this website, Trolls are given millions upon millions of opportunities to show the world their true colors in the form of comments. To normal people, the comment section below a video is to post about how much they enjoyed the video or to ask the author questions. To a Troll, however, this section is an open invitation to share their “wisdom.” One of the most famous comments by Trolls is the word “First” (often spelled “FIrst,” “frist,” or “frst”). This comment is meant to show that that Troll, and that Troll only, was the original viewer of that video. With today’s YouTube celebrities being almost as famous as actual celebrities, this is quite a feat. Within seconds, the comment section of a video from a well-known YouTube celebrity is filled to the brim with comments about who the first viewer actually was. If a Troll misses the first spot, he will often comment saying phrases like “ur a gey faggg,” showing that everyone who tried to comment first is actually inferior to him, raising his own self-esteem as an effect. Another huge hotspot for Trolls is a website called Reddit.com. Here, people post pictures as well as links to articles and other websites. Most people scroll down the feed of articles and click on those that interest them. For example, people that like animals usually find themselves clicking on every picture of a cat that someone posts. People can also comment on and up-vote (the universal symbol to show