I'm not entirely sure what to make of trolls. Sometimes it is funny, but sometimes, if you smack a troll hard enough, they find a way to mess with you at 3 in the morning. For guys like me (I have kids, a wife and I have a fairly high profile profession outside of drumming), I can't have nonsense from guys like Mark. I've already had one guy on here start stalking the crap out of me, calling me at 3 in the morning, calling my office and harassing my secretary, etc. I've removed all personal info from my profile, but someone could probably figure out who I am easy enough. A good number of people on this forum, Matt, Steamer, Jay and others know who I am in real life and a few people have even come to shows. All that being said, guys like Mark make it a little dangerous to have a real life name associated with you on a site if you have anything at all to lose.
And Matt has something to lose. So do a lot of these other guys on here. They have pro careers to defend. I agree with Matt that these guys have to be dealt with firmly. Its to all of our benefits that guys can come on here and impart knowledge, even if it isn't what everyone wants to hear. I've shared the stage with a lot of touring pros over the last year and none of them will post on an internet site because of trolls etc. Two of the best drummers I have ever seen play are young and upcoming guys. They don't come anywhere near drumming sites because of people like Mark.
Anyway, if I was a little rough with Mark in the Troll Playing thread and it offended you guys, I apologize. I was trying to do 2 things. First, I can't stand a bully and when he started slamming other players, many of whom I respect greatly, I was almost compelled to respond. Second, I wanted to bring him to a point where he would explode and get banned so I wouldn't have to listen to his crap any more. Maybe I was wrong in what I did but I thought I was doing it for the right reasons.