To wonder why the twitter "troll" got arrested?

[VivaLeBeaver]

The one wo posted the nasty things about Tom Daley saying that Tom had let his father down by bot winning gold, etc.

I want to make it clear that I'm not defending him and think it was a horrible thing to say. But he didn't threaten Tom, etc so ow come it's an arrest able offence?

What's got me thinking is our village magazine. The village bobby has a column in the magazine and this month he has warned us all not to partake in malicious gossip on Facebook. He refers to the Tom Daley incident and warns us that malicious gossip could get us arrested. I don't do gossip on Facebook so I'm not expecting to be dragged away in cuffs but is it a crime? Threats of violence, racist insults, etc I can understand but not general bitchiness.

McHappy
that is no use, cause you can change IP addresses. Anyone who is going to the hassle of setting up multiple accounts will set up dynamic IP addresses. It only takes a couple of minutes.

The Police were right to get involved and should do on all ases brought to them regarding this type of hate, just think how many people have sadly attempted and committed suicide due to cyber harrassment/bullying.

cases.... sorry typo

Am wondering whether eventually we will get to the stage in this country where there will be the equivalent of mostly unpaid,volunteer magistrates in some cities to help deal with the problem.

I doubt it, amillionyears.

I think that cyberbullying is here to stay, sadly.

There is only so much you can do to prevent it, and I think that talking to kids about it, and trying to strengthen their self-esteem is better than trying to prosecute or punish the trolls.

I agree that cyberbullying is here to stay.
With the best will in the world,strenghtening kids self esteem is a huge task and could only work up to a point by school education.A lot of the undermining of kids is either by their peers,or mostly by the people they live with.
An alternative to prosecuting or punishing trolls is trying to educate them.Not sure if it would work. They must have underlying issues themselves,possible deep seated anger?
I realise I am partly musing here.I do not personally know a troll,and dont know much about the subject.My guess is that America will try to deal with the problem first and we will copy.