Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China • Hacker News Board

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#21

Post by est » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 4:49 AM UTC

princeb wrote: post #6

i wonder if there will be a possibility in the future where the OS runs app telemetry, looks at things like how long a user spends on an app, parts of the app that the user clicks on, looks at, the text and non-text elements of the app, and then applies a statistical model to determine quality and hence rating of the app. that could obviate the need for "human rating" which is inherently gamable.

We run hundreds of pipelines like this to fight against click-farms and spam bots....

.... and censorship for the government.

The secret weapon is Heap Analytics, which allows define data points collection on the fly without recompile the app and republish with hard-coded predefined event hooks.

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#22

Post by bctnry » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 4:53 AM UTC

It's not "booming", not in the sense of "it just got big all of a sudden"; it is big, and it has been there (and big) for a very, very long time.

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#23

Post by beachy » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 4:54 AM UTC

kingkawn wrote: post #18

nradov wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of those people are just lying about their circumstances to elicit sympathy. They're no different than any other con artist.

Most people are suffering needlessly and asking for help. What comes if we critique the artfulness of their ask and do not help?

What comes if we help those who ask (artfully or not) rather than those most in need?

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#24

Post by drevil-v2 » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 4:55 AM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #7

There was a reply here, now dead, that I wanted to discuss: "Hey man, I'm just trying to feed my family. I have kids so that means I can behave however I want so long as it benefits my kids. And rather than trust some reviews on a platform anyone can sign up for, how about you do some reading on the app developer and their ToS and Privacy Policy." I'm adamantly opposed to spam, and back in the early days of the web (…

I could not disagree with you more. You have extrapolated a lack of morality in well off human beings in such black and white totality. What a fking trite and naive generalization you have made.

There are bad shitty people and bad intentions across all populations. Rich or poor. Men or Women. Old or Young.

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#25

Post by nitwit005 » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 4:55 AM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #7

There was a reply here, now dead, that I wanted to discuss: "Hey man, I'm just trying to feed my family. I have kids so that means I can behave however I want so long as it benefits my kids. And rather than trust some reviews on a platform anyone can sign up for, how about you do some reading on the app developer and their ToS and Privacy Policy." I'm adamantly opposed to spam, and back in the early days of the web (…

If you can afford buying a thousand used iPhones to start such a business, you aren't exactly living in poverty. Spam operations back in the day probably cost even more given what hardware and bandwidth used to cost.

Even if they weren't trying to BS you, people committing crimes often come up with some sort of story to justify the whole thing. People like to be the hero of their story.

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#26

Post by nitwit005 » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 4:59 AM UTC

princeb wrote: post #6

i wonder if there will be a possibility in the future where the OS runs app telemetry, looks at things like how long a user spends on an app, parts of the app that the user clicks on, looks at, the text and non-text elements of the app, and then applies a statistical model to determine quality and hence rating of the app. that could obviate the need for "human rating" which is inherently gamable.

It might up the costs, but you can always record the behavior of real humans and replay it with randomization elements. You'd can fairly easily fake a bunch of engaged people.

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#27

Post by chaosite » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 5:06 AM UTC

beachy wrote: post #23

kingkawn wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people are suffering needlessly and asking for help. What comes if we critique the artfulness of their ask and do not help?

What comes if we help those who ask (artfully or not) rather than those most in need?

How do we find out who is most in need, by subjecting them to invasive tests and forcing them to jump through increasingly complicated hoops just to prove they are truly in need?

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#28

Post by cbzbc » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 5:07 AM UTC

dmix wrote: post #16

wpietri wrote: post #7

There was a reply here, now dead, that I wanted to discuss: "Hey man, I'm just trying to feed my family. I have kids so that means I can behave however I want so long as it benefits my kids. And rather than trust some reviews on a platform anyone can sign up for, how about you do some reading on the app developer and their ToS and Privacy Policy." I'm adamantly opposed to spam, and back in the early days of the web (…

You had me until the part you suggested there was some subset of the upper class conspiring to keep an underclass of poor people... in order to make/keep themselves rich?Wouldn't rich people get much richer if there was more economically healthy middle class people buying their products and real estate or w/e they are making money off of? What could they possibly gain from ruining the economy and keeping others poor.…

I think this is true in agggregate and over the longer term - but can run into collective action problems where the narrow interest of some is to get richer quick or who can perversely help themselves in the short term by ruining others.

Equally there’s the possibility of some of the rich not really understanding this or not buying into this philosophy- look at some of the countries with increasing inequality and a disappearing middle class and you’ll always find some lobbying against spending money on services - including things like education which serve as an economic common good and which drive the economy over the long term.

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#29

Post by vpears87 » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 5:10 AM UTC

dmix wrote: post #16

wpietri wrote: post #7

There was a reply here, now dead, that I wanted to discuss: "Hey man, I'm just trying to feed my family. I have kids so that means I can behave however I want so long as it benefits my kids. And rather than trust some reviews on a platform anyone can sign up for, how about you do some reading on the app developer and their ToS and Privacy Policy." I'm adamantly opposed to spam, and back in the early days of the web (…

You had me until the part you suggested there was some subset of the upper class conspiring to keep an underclass of poor people... in order to make/keep themselves rich?Wouldn't rich people get much richer if there was more economically healthy middle class people buying their products and real estate or w/e they are making money off of? What could they possibly gain from ruining the economy and keeping others poor.…

Wealth is relative to others in society. If the pie grows, I maybe better off in absolute dollars. But if the percentage of the pie I control decreases, I am relatively poorer. Comparing how much wealthier/happier/successful/beautiful I am to my previous self is niether as satisfying nor as real as comparing to those immediately around me.

I also wouldn't think a conspiracy is necessary. Just lobby to write tax, tariff, and property laws out in the open that benefit one class of people/industry more than another.

Re: Click farms: a shadowy internet industry is booming in China

#30

Post by EnFinlay » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 5:16 AM UTC

dmix wrote: post #16

wpietri wrote: post #7

There was a reply here, now dead, that I wanted to discuss: "Hey man, I'm just trying to feed my family. I have kids so that means I can behave however I want so long as it benefits my kids. And rather than trust some reviews on a platform anyone can sign up for, how about you do some reading on the app developer and their ToS and Privacy Policy." I'm adamantly opposed to spam, and back in the early days of the web (…

You had me until the part you suggested there was some subset of the upper class conspiring to keep an underclass of poor people... in order to make/keep themselves rich?Wouldn't rich people get much richer if there was more economically healthy middle class people buying their products and real estate or w/e they are making money off of? What could they possibly gain from ruining the economy and keeping others poor.…

I don't think you need a conspiracy to get to a place where in aggregate the decisions of people in control create or perpetuate a poor underclass.

Just like some companies make decisions for the benefit of the next quarter, rather than the next 5 years. If you are able to make a decision that increases near term metrics, at the expense of some other metric you aren't even paying attention to (like making poor people poorer) I can see that happening independently thousands of times a day.

Take payday loans, more commonly used by people with a lower socio-economic standing. They aren't there to create an underclass, they are there to provide a service (loans) at a cost that matches the risk (ignoring the conversation about the cost not matching the risk due to predatory loans). But if decisions are made to increase profit from payday loans, a natural consequence is that the underclass is going to be made more of an underclass.

This is just one example, and it's clearly got some issues. I have no problem imagining many other decisions that will help create an underclass. Maybe the impact is 2 or 5 steps removed, but each one makes a difference, and leads to in aggregate "the rich work to keep the poor, poor".

But what do I know. I'm a developer who took one econ course.