LOL. LULZ. Amazeballs. LOLcats.

All invented by trolls. Yes, trolls.

Because not all trolling is the same, and not everyone trolls for the same reason.

At one end of the spectrum you have the cyber bullies and the hate-mongers, people who get high on taunting the families of dead children.



At the other, you have people posting pictures of cuddly, adorable kittens with funny captions on them.

Experts claim that trolling can be a force for good, that it enriches the internet daily and can improve the way we communicate. Even the sick side, they argue, can shine a light on how social media works.

Stefan Krappitz, an expert on trolling and the author of Troll Culture: A Comprehensive Guide, believes trolls’ contribution to the internet has been undervalued.

"Trolling is fun," Krappitz told news.com.au. "The internet is a playground. Don't let anybody tell you something else!

"Trolling is simply a part of culture that deserves more respect. By infiltrating systems, trolls spark a discourse on how to make things different."

Trolls are responsible for the creation of new words, many of which have entered into common use.

"Conversation on the internet has developed its own subculture specific languages,” Krappitz said.

Words trolls have contributed include "Lulz", which means "just for fun", "LOL", which is an anagram for "laugh out loud", and "Amazeballs", which doesn't need explaining.

Dr Axel Bruns, associate professor of creative industries and social media research at Queensland University of Technology, claims trolling is an "art form similar to the radical situationist artistic movements of the early 20th Century".

"Trolling is a kind of radical experiment with the boundaries of what you can do online."

The largest collection of "troll-art" is housed by infamous web forum 4Chan.

"On 4Chan they have these weird and wonderful conversations that are quite abstract and random and weird, but by doing that they are inventing memes and developing things that have been widely adopted across the internet," Dr Bruns said.

However, these art forms shouldn’t be used to excuse unacceptable behaviour.

For every accomplished troll there are hundreds more who enjoy disrupting the web for disruption's sake. But even these trolls served a purpose, Dr Bruns said.

"On the internet there’s always a tendency to say, 'I don’t agree with you so you must be stupid'," he said.

But trolls do actually give something back to the pockets of people on the internet who spend all their time online talking about how right they are.

"The trolling can actually be quite healthy," Dr Bruns said. "That troll is actually doing a service. They inform them, try to get information through to them.

"But yet the people who are there who all share similar views might still see you as a troll simply because you present an opposing view."

In some cases, trolling is not only acceptable, it is encouraged.

"If you end up disrupting a pro-whaling discussion group, or a white supremacist site - technically you are going there to disrupt that board...but I imagine a lot of people would have sympathy for that," Dr Bruns said.

One such troll is Peter Gross, who poses on Twitter as a very, very racist wallaby. He said he set up the account, @RacistWallaby, as a way to cope with racist attitudes in his workplace.

"It got me thinking about racism and offensiveness in general, and how absurd it can get," he said.



"I got so frustrated that I tried to think of the most offensive, reputation-damaging tweets that could be issued through Twitter."

He said his proudest moment was getting Malcolm Turnbull to issue a public apology for insulting squirrels.

Australia's most famous troll, David Thorne, who became an overnight sensation after he tried to pay for a bill with a drawing of a seven-legged spider, told news.com.au he trolled to "encourage argument, discussion and factions based around humour" rather than simply to offend.

The 40-year-old graphic designer from Adelaide said they were other benefits to trolling. His online activities had earned him a small fortune - "a New York Times bestseller listing, a Range Rover, and a house with a pool, solid gold deck chairs and cups carved from solid diamond".

Even the site most associated with the worst excesses of the internet, 4Chan, has its defenders. Andres Monroy-Hernandez, fellow at the Berkman Centre for Internet & Society at Harvard University, said contrary to popular opinion, most of the people on 4Chan weren't there to attack or humiliate.

"They mostly share funny pictures and engage in highly creative collaborative work," he said.

Professor Monroy-Hernandez said that the most popular memes were created by anonymous communities on 4Chan. And not for fame, or money, just for the Lulz.

"Some of those memes have taken a life of their own and have even turned into discursive tools for political discussion," he said.

Trolling can be used to communicate thoughts and feelings that people typically wouldn't feel comfortable with, such as racism or child safety.

One of the most controversial memes the internet can thank trolls for is Pedobear, a cartoon mascot that critiques the culture of fear.

"On the one hand you can read it as a joke that trivialises a serious issue, but on other hand you can understand that Pedobear pokes fun of what some people might perceive as an exaggerated fear that the internet is a place where child predators are hiding," Professor Monroy-Hernandez said.

Pedobear's presence on a website can also signal to site moderators that some content may be illegal or inappropriate.

For example, Pedobear was photoshopped into an advert by French fashion label La Redoute that featured four young children on a beach and a naked man in the background. La Redoute removed the advert but not before the Pedobear image and countless others like it went viral.

Professor Monroy-Hernandez warned against knee-jerk responses to trolling.

"Making fun of others, in-jokes, witty commentary are as old as human culture - and so is the outrage that results from it," he said.

"New technologies have always caused outrage. With telephones, people were afraid it was going to corrupt the minds of women - who would more easily cheat on their husbands."

Rather than casting stones, people should try to understand trolling in order to be a better "netizen" - citizen of the web.

"It would make you a better informed person and a savvy consumer of information," he said.