Reminds me of something I experienced on HN and Reddit, though my case was a far less significant level.
I posted a comment on HN in response to some article about Emacs. Later that day I saw someone had copied my comment word for word in reply to the same article on Reddit.
I still have no idea why someone would do that. I thought at first it was some kind of karma farming operation but the post history of the Reddit user didn't really fit that profile. Plus,it seems like r/emacs would be a really poor choice for that.
I've always been curious to know why someone would do something like this. It's interesting to read about it happening on a way larger scale.
I tracked down my impostor
21–30 of 248 posts
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
It just means that Amy Sedghi interviewed him, and then wrote it from a first person pov. It's not unusual.
The claim is unusual. My guess is this article (or the alleged events it describes) is part of someone's art project or experiment.
Well, the person telling a story is a real person and it's been printed in not only the Guardian but the BBC and I assume elsewhere. These are news organizations that do at least a modicum of fact-checking.
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#23Reminds me of something I experienced on HN and Reddit, though my case was a far less significant level. I posted a comment on HN in response to some article about Emacs. Later that day I saw someone had copied my comment word for word in reply to the same article on Reddit. I still have no idea why someone would do that. I thought at first it was some kind of karma farming operation but the post history of the Reddi…
It's almost always bot accounts. Reddit is decent at catching bots so the botters copy legitimate comments, build a post history, and then switch to scamming or spamming after the account has some credibility.
>Reddit is decent at catching bots
I don't know about that so much. I'm seeing a lot more straight up spam on reddit that looks easy to spot, but I think reddit gave up or something...
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#24"We never contacted the police, because we didn’t think he’d done anything illegal. It was really an issue of academic misconduct." He should have contacted the Police immediately. What if a crime was committed nearby where the impostor was located under false identity, and he was later taken into custody instead? I don't know if it qualifies as a crime, but assuming someone else's identity can lead to very dangerous…
[deleted]
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
The claim is unusual. My guess is this article (or the alleged events it describes) is part of someone's art project or experiment.
Well, the person telling a story is a real person and it's been printed in not only the Guardian but the BBC and I assume elsewhere. These are news organizations that do at least a modicum of fact-checking.
And the guy is clearly a real scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=0g9Hm1cAAAAJ&hl=en...
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#26> Some of the work should have been spotted by plagiarism checkers
I've been in postgraduate academia and industry, and been involved in multiple conferences at different levels. I'm not aware of anyone ever running a plagiarism detector on any submitted work at all. Do other people do this? Should the people I work with have been doing it?
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#27Well they say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery (that mediocrity can pay to greatness). I wonder what this imposter thinks every time he looks down at the tattoos on his hands that will remind him of what he's done for quite a while, if not forever.
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#28Reminds me of something I experienced on HN and Reddit, though my case was a far less significant level. I posted a comment on HN in response to some article about Emacs. Later that day I saw someone had copied my comment word for word in reply to the same article on Reddit. I still have no idea why someone would do that. I thought at first it was some kind of karma farming operation but the post history of the Reddi…
Well: Reminds me of something I experienced on HN and Reddit, though my case was a far less significant level. I posted a comment on HN in response to some article about Emacs. Later that day I saw someone had copied my comment word for word in reply to the same article on Reddit. I still have no idea why someone would do that. I thought at first it was some kind of karma farming operation but the post history of the Reddit user didn't really fit that profile. Plus,it seems like r/emacs would be a really poor choice for that. I've always been curious to know why someone would do something like this. It's interesting to read about it happening on a way larger scale.
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#29"We never contacted the police, because we didn’t think he’d done anything illegal. It was really an issue of academic misconduct." He should have contacted the Police immediately. What if a crime was committed nearby where the impostor was located under false identity, and he was later taken into custody instead? I don't know if it qualifies as a crime, but assuming someone else's identity can lead to very dangerous…
The whole story probably isn't true or it has been grossly exagerated.
Why do you think that?
Re: I tracked down my impostor
#30Reminds me of something I experienced on HN and Reddit, though my case was a far less significant level. I posted a comment on HN in response to some article about Emacs. Later that day I saw someone had copied my comment word for word in reply to the same article on Reddit. I still have no idea why someone would do that. I thought at first it was some kind of karma farming operation but the post history of the Reddi…
> I still have no idea why someone would do that.
It's a fundamental way to learn.
E.g., suppose people tell me I'm a real funny person. Let me test that.
1. I remember a joke from a professional funny person widely considered to be one of the best.
2. I tell that joke to the people who told me I'm a real funny person.
3. I measure the laughter I get.
If the laughter is different-- e.g., if the people tell me this is by far the funniest thing I've ever said, then I know I've got a lot more to learn about jokes. On the other hand, if it's the same amount of laughter I usually get, perhaps I've got a real talent here.
Of course, it could be these are just close friends and they are primed to think anything I say is funny. Nevertheless, just the act of telling that joke as if it were my own gives me the experience of the timing and emphasis of that comic. It's a gain of knowledge.
That process is an order of magnitude faster on Reddit with control-v. Who know, maybe it even makes that person a bit more cynical about "karma" points. If so, they've at least become a less naive person.