The Trolling Machine

Online harassment seldom consists only of a single offensive message. The Trolling Machine follows the organization of abuse across accounts, platforms and audiences, asking how repetition, amplification and bystander behavior turn attacks into an environment that shapes what a person can safely say.

The study draws on the author's documented TrollLab observation project, which catalogued 1,847 racist interactions involving 142 troll accounts over a twelve-month period. These are project-reported figures, not a claim that every interaction belongs to one centrally directed operation. The book examines incentives, techniques and the role of public spectators who may reward abuse even while declining to join it openly.

Readers will find an account of the social mechanics of intimidation, the difficulties of documenting coordinated patterns and the choices facing moderators, institutions and ordinary users. The emphasis is on recognizing mechanisms rather than turning abuse into another spectacle.