There does seem to be a certain tendency for the mildest conversation to be sidetracked into quarrels. I think it's   a characteristic of the Internet as a medium, rather than the Mudcat in particular.

I think the jargon of "trolling" and "flaming" sometimes gets in the way of communication, because these are words which are used in a number of different senses. I think when we want to accuse people of being unfriendly or frivolous or provocative or whatever it's better to spell it out in old-fashioned English.

For checking out how the Mudcat has developed over the years, here is the place to go - the Mudcat archives on the Wayback Machine, all the way back to ancient history in 1998...