As Twitter, Facebook, and other popular sites across the web continue to figure out how to fight trolling in the Age Of Trump, Google has taken its big step forward with the release of its Perspective API.。

Created by Jigsaw (an Alphabet incubator) and Google’s Counter Abuse Technology, Perspective is for publishers that are constantly dealing with the onslaught of horrible trolls. The tool monitors conversations happening in a forum in real time and assigns the comments a score relating to how "toxic" it considers the comment. 
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The program's definition of "toxic" was created by asking internet users to rate comments on a scale from "very toxic" to "very healthy." For reference, the definition of "toxic" in this context was, "a rude, disrespectful, or unreasonable comment that is likely to make you leave a discussion."
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In a chat with the。 In a chat with the。Washington Post。 , Jigsaw president Jared Cohen noted that the team putting the API together collected millions of comments from the。New York Times。

and additional comments from Wikipedia and online harassment victims to help them develop that toxicity scale.。

It continues to be a work in progress, he notes, and as the API is now released into the wilds of the internet, more feedback would help the team improve it. 。

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One tool displays dozens on comments on three topics: Climate change, Brexit, and the 2016 U.S. election. Using a slider tool, you can see how certain comments were filtered by toxicity. Slide all the way to the left and you get only the least "toxic" comments. Slide to the right, and you get everything, including the most "toxic" comments.。

My comment got an 11 percent toxicity rating.Credit:。 A Donald Trump tweet about "fake news" only ranked 36 percent. May need a tweak.Credit: 。And a love letter from a Twitter troll to me scored 86 percent "toxic." Not bad.Credit: 。 Though it's in its early stages, sites can now request access to the Perspective API. Some of the publications already using it are the
。New York Times
。 ,The Guardian。

, and 。

The Economist 。

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Ultimately, what the publisher decides to do with the API is entirely up to them, according to Jigsaw and Google. They can use the API to flag comments for moderators or even set up their forum in a way that allows each user to select the toxicity threshold. Or, they can even use the other tool and allow users to see how "toxic" their comments are as they type them.。