Journal: Slashdotter's Guide to Karma Whoring

Have you just joined Slashdot? Has your karma dropped from "excellent" since you've been swimming against the groupthink? Here are a few notes on karma-whoring.

1. Post early. This is the key thing. Even Soviet Russia jokes might get a stab at +1 Insightful if you`re one of the very first posters. The other rules are potentialized by posting earlier, while applying some of these too late can lead to -1 Redundant mods.

2. Mirror. Before the site gets slashdotted, copy-and-paste it, with a cynical note like "site already semi-slashdotted, so..."

3. Criticize the author of the post. Most Slashdot front page stories are badly-written, and will often misrepresent the true meaning of the article. If you can't find such discrepancies, you can always complain about the grammar or even the spelling. If there are words such as "color", you can be an arrogant prick about british spelling.

4. Follow the groupthink, but make it seem you're not. Wholesome agreeing is boring; mostly-agreeing-with-notes make mods feel we're a vibrant, rational community not afraid of dissent, but still convergent on the Main Thing. If it's a story about RPM hell, point out that RPM has inspired other package systems even if it has turned into yadda yadda yadda. If this seems too hard, criticize Linux, but point out it's the best OS anyway.

5. Post from Wikipedia. If you find an obscure word in the story text, such as "the", "that" or "this", link to a wikipedia article.

6. Mention "karma" or "mod" in your sig. Subliminal messages do work. You can use a popular karma pun, such as "Karma: coma" or "Karma: police", invent mod categories like in "Mod -3 Drunk", or just paste an overmodded post's history into your sig. This _will_ attract moderator attention, and if you have followed the previous steps, you can't fail.

7. Blame Microsoft. The extent of the conspiracy was unforeseen, my friends, as some people suspect Microsoft was behind David Koresh yadda yadda yadda.

These seven simple steps are sure to get you posting at +2 starting score in less than a week!