OMG EVERYONE LOOK! My name is George Carlin. I am 72 years old and have grey hair. YOU HAVE STARTED READING BUT PHYSICALLY YOU MAY OR MAY STOP READING BECAUSE I AM NOT GOD!! I was murdered June 22 by the intellectual deficiencies of most of North America. If you do not paste this into 10 other comments, nothing will happen at all because I'm dead and nothing will change that, besides the fact that nobody will ridicule you for being a mindless sheep. You have 5 hours to do whatever you please, because I have absolutely no power over you. Don't believe me? See if I give a shit. Google some names or something LOL and nothing will be proved because I am full of shit. I didn't want to type this, but you idiots made me so I did it just to be sure.
I think one factor that determines if a comment will be rated up or down is the initial vote, or perhaps the initial few votes. If people see a comment that is already in the negative, they will be predisposed to have a dismissive view towards the comment, which would affect the likelihood of the person to vote the comment up or down.
Alas, the humble newcomer finds his place after all. Shifting into that rightful corner of the social order of the gray box, where he will spend his lonely nights smoking a clip and debating a topic to death, until he can't even remember what sparked the original conflict. There will be many such arguments, each ending in either a grudging friendship, a bitter defeat, or an uplifting victory. Each of these victories will have a chance at gaining the respect of his fellow chatters. Each defeat will make him appear childish and stupid. There is a sort of balance between them. Some people always win, smoe always lose, but most, like himself, will experience a win to loss ratio of something close to 1. He will face those who don't seem function socially as humans, and he will face those whose wit will be unmatched. But a little trolling can cut the smartass down to size. Why hasn't he done this before? It certainly works in a pinch. And thus, the troll is born.