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How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

nytimes.com

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Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#61

Post by _iyig »

dirtyid wrote: post #41
RobertRoberts wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I watched a few videos of a western man living in China (married to a Chinese woman). Their views on propaganda, information, privacy, leadership, marketing, power structures, etc... are all so vastly different from ours that it's almost unbelievable until you hear about it first hand. China's propaganda style is unabashedly similar to "Baghdad Bob". [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Saeed_al-Sahhaf

I hope this isn't an endorsement of serpentza or laowhy86, bitter expats with middle school mandarin proficiency flunking out of China are not insightful sources. There are millions of Chinese diaspora who lived in both Chinese and western cultures with much more useful things to say. Here are recent studies on how domestic and foreign Chinese propaganda works. How the Chinese Government Fabricates Social Media Posts…

This strikes me as an unfair characterization of those YouTubers. I’ve followed them for a while and have quite a different impression.

Today’s video from Laowhy86 is a good short summation of his time in China, and how his perspective has shifted over time while living there and running a business, marrying a Chinese woman, starting a family, etc:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=ed4ryYokLzU

Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#62

Post by cwkoss »

DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #57
cwkoss wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the distinction between propaganda spread by a bot and propaganda spread by a human that was indoctrinated by propaganda important anymore? I think society should accept "bot" as a term for any human or automated entity who uncritically 'retweets' propaganda.

In truth, I find that most Westerners have a much more distorted view of China than Chinese people do. That may seem strange and obvious to say, but there are so many Westerners who know next to nothing about China, yet confidently talk about Chinese people being brainwashed. The thing is, those "brainwashed" people have a much better informed and more nuanced view of China. The people calling them "brainwashed" are…

My previous comment was mostly based on my personal experiences discussing US politics online - and seeing people on both sides retweet ideas that are not logically consistent but make them feel good about their team. I'm sure this common in most political discussions, but I'm not well versed in Chinese politics personally.

Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#63

Post by mullingitover »

bllguo wrote: post #53
SimbaOnSteroids wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but consider that they're equally productive for any discourse, that is to say a net negative. Therefore it would be pertinent to treat them similarly.

what kind of "discourse" are you aiming for after you've labeled and dismissed everyone with a pro-China sentiment? a debate where the only participants have the same opinions seems like the least productive possible form of discussion.

"everyone with a pro-China sentiment" != one sock puppet account with zero history aside from spouting rhetoric on one position.

Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#64

Post by zachguo »

AFascistWorld wrote: post #38
machbio wrote: post #5

Am starting to feel this trolling is an industry (like troll farm) of its own - there are people or bots dedicated to trolling and reporting people who raise voice against the discrimination.. I recently had to report an unfair service by virgin atlantic staff after an emergency landing - I tweeted the pictures and video of the incident.. I was immediately trolled by twitter accounts about how i should be happy that…

You may not believe it, the vast majority of Chinese actually love the CCP and the system, they only just hate that a few corrupt low-level officials who are the bad apples fucking up leaders' glorious visions. These "bots" are mostly spontaneous people, they are not even government-sponsored Wumao, they genuinely love China and defend it, their reason being it may have some flaws but any other country has too and is…

Whoever has been living in China knows this is true, too bad you are downvoted. I always laugh at report like this, because in reality probably such 'coordinated effort' is simply done by people from a random forum online.

Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#65

Post by SimbaOnSteroids »

bllguo wrote: post #53
SimbaOnSteroids wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but consider that they're equally productive for any discourse, that is to say a net negative. Therefore it would be pertinent to treat them similarly.

what kind of "discourse" are you aiming for after you've labeled and dismissed everyone with a pro-China sentiment? a debate where the only participants have the same opinions seems like the least productive possible form of discussion.

Would you debate a Scientologist on the merits of Scientology?

Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#66

Post by phil248 »

It's a good time to remember that the vast majority of people never use Twitter. The media has had a fixation with the platform for as long as I can remember, which has helped it gain an unearned reputation as being relevant.

It's not relevant. It's the trash heap of the internet. I can't understand why anyone would continue to spend time on it when it's become universally known that bots and trolls run the show.

Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#67

Post by dirtyid »

yorwba wrote: post #56
dirtyid wrote: post #28

What is stopping Twitter from releasing server logs for others to independently authenticate attribution? Facebook, Google have not declared. The ASPI analysis proceeds on assumption that Twitters attribution is correct. The startup Digital Intelligence concludes confidently "China has made its debut as a confirmed information operations actor" because the bots coordinated behavior "emulat[es] divisive disinformation…

> some independent agent/contractor with limited resources and basic scripting knowledge. Outsourcing seems likely. Last month an invitation for bids was posted for a contract to promote Chinese state media on Twitter for 1.2 million yuan, payable if the follower count increased by at least 580,000 at the end of the contract period. [1] Some people have framed it as "China openly buys followers", but it seems clear t…

The question is, is this the kind of activity China would outsource to this quality? This recklessly on a sensitive topic like HK so close to 80th anniversary. Was it that time-sensitive / desperate to allow something this amateurish to roll out. They're paying millions buying advertisement in foreign newspapers, I'd expect an social median influence operation would get more funding than 100 poorly cultivated bot accounts.

Services for hitting western social media KPIs are dime a dozen, but a private industry for foreign influence campaigns not so much. Maybe those Estonian fake news kids. Would be interesting to see what that tender would look like though, at least they're paying more than 50c.

Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#69

Post by zhhkthrow »

_iyig wrote: post #61
dirtyid wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope this isn't an endorsement of serpentza or laowhy86, bitter expats with middle school mandarin proficiency flunking out of China are not insightful sources. There are millions of Chinese diaspora who lived in both Chinese and western cultures with much more useful things to say. Here are recent studies on how domestic and foreign Chinese propaganda works. How the Chinese Government Fabricates Social Media Posts…

This strikes me as an unfair characterization of those YouTubers. I’ve followed them for a while and have quite a different impression. Today’s video from Laowhy86 is a good short summation of his time in China, and how his perspective has shifted over time while living there and running a business, marrying a Chinese woman, starting a family, etc: https://youtube.com/watch?v=ed4ryYokLzU

No, I think it's a completely fair assessment. In fact, it probably doesn't even go far enough in terms of criticism. These two expats are notorious in the non-expat world for perpetuating unsubstantiated stereotypes and myths about China for the sake of views. They know there's an audience for it and they've adjusted their content accordingly. Somehow, they've managed to convince a vast number of people that they are experts on the subject matter despite all evidence to the contrary. If you listen to what they say you'll end up with a very distorted view of reality.

As the parent commenter said, there are plenty of higher quality Youtubers and vloggers who do a much better job at describing what life is really like for expats living in China. In general, the more reliable and accurate sources are the people who don't make their living from producing clickbait videos.

Re: How China Unleashed Twitter Trolls to Discredit Hong Kong’s Protesters

#70

Post by TearsInTheRain »

machbio wrote: post #5

Am starting to feel this trolling is an industry (like troll farm) of its own - there are people or bots dedicated to trolling and reporting people who raise voice against the discrimination.. I recently had to report an unfair service by virgin atlantic staff after an emergency landing - I tweeted the pictures and video of the incident.. I was immediately trolled by twitter accounts about how i should be happy that…

I feel like those responses to your tweets were pretty organic. Are you suggesting they were paid to discredit you?
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