IN his latest best-seller, American crime novel writer Harlan Coben is clearly unimpressed by the ability of the internet to afford the world a soapbox.

“The great thing about the internet is that is gives everyone a voice. The bad thing about the internet is that it gives everyone a voice.”

“The great bastion for the cowardly and anonymous,” he concludes and if you look at some of the millions of websites affording people the opportunity to vent their bilious spleen incognito, it’s hard to disagree.

Yet there is a vicarious thrill attached to seeing two celebrities slugging it out 21st century-style, walloping away at their computer keyboards and phones.

In certain city centres, usually in South American countries, such feuds would be settled on the mean streets rather than in the press, but this spat pales into insignificance alongside some battles we highlight today.

Of course, the fact that the “bitter old troll” and the “over-privileged cry-baby” are unlikely to kiss and make up, so we can expect this one to run and run until we’re all tired of it (which was about two days ago).

It was that great philosopher Thumper’s mum in Bambi who said: “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all,” a quote my mum always used to drum into me.

Thankfully, my mum doesn’t have a computer and can’t see just how much the world has lost its hold on that idea.