i think you'd save yourself a lot of headaches if you put conditions on your sign up page e.g you only want verified members that have filled out ther true information on their profile pages, as it is there is nothing of the sort on there ...unless i've missed it?

so when people sign up as they would normally(i dont read or post on many foums but take the boxing forums for example, i dont see people there with their actual names etc) then they're hit with this shit from you & a few of the disgruntled members that have filled in all their details, i would say that the majority that filled in their accounts accurately were more interested in being able to promote themselves & the few that add details after sign up do so in an effort to fit in, it could be viewed as being a part of a community or peer pressure or just being sheeple & following the crowd

as i said before i'm not all up on this internet jargon, im getting on myself(too many grey hairs) & dont feel the need to pick up the lingo to fit in with the youth, again i laugh at my friends when they come out with some of these phrases & fit hip words into what they are trying to convey in an adult conversation, u could say i was boring or a bit old fashioned or you could say i had a sense of my own identity..that may seem like a contradiction to those that have embraced this era of the net completely & feel the need to post online about every trivial detail of their life for the world to see

i used to live up the road where people are more friendly & do chat openly to strangers, down south this is considered crazy, people are a bit more stuck up & would rather sit alone in silence than chat to somebody they've ever met on a bus, now that aside, i wouldnt go annoncing details of my personal life to a stranger, i wouldnt feel the need to walk around with a sandwich board with my name & age, making announcemnets about myself in the high street, the non virtual version of what facebook is for many

now my understanding of the word troll, which could be way off, is that it's somebody intentionally trying to offend somebody in order to get a reaction, behavior that you've just held your hands up to brian, so if you feel you have too many trolls on your site then perhaps its best you address this head on & lead by example rather than indulge in trollish behavior yourself & think that its excused because you've some name on your profile page, who are you? your name means nothing to me, yet you feel you can insult people because you've filled out your name, at the end of the day you're still acting like this behind a screen, hardly brave is it?

as for the business aspect of your post well it would seem you've had long enough to implement something or at the very least address the issue properly(like on your sign up page) rather than just getting wee digs to members that have signed up to your site & do add to your numbers & member base, because it seems all you've done is hold this view for so long but done relatively nothing about it apart from moan & attempt to insult some of your members

i think its generally accepted & it doesnt take a rocket scientist or even a website owner to understand that the majority of the problems & rifts caused on your site are by the actual members you are trying to atttract, the same members that fill out their details so they can promote themselves, these are the same guys that have all the info about each other & the industry & get their digs in to others behind a blank profile, now i'm not tryin to offend you with this post brian, but if you are offended, so what? you see respect is a 2 way street fella, try leading by example