Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 99 posts

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#81

Post by ehnto »

mapmeld wrote: post #63
weird-eye-issue wrote: post #8

Astroturfing on reddit has been a thing for over a decade and has really accelerated over the last few years. There's several companies where literally that is their business model to promote your product or service on reddit. I saw one for sale on acquire.com a while back for 7 figures

I'm seeing a much less sophisticated campaign for this on my city's subreddits recently... Someone will ask a weird or generic question, and either poster or the top comment is a throwaway account with a spiel about checking $site_name. It's exhausting, especially since people will write out real advice and corrections about how to deal with rats, bedbugs, neighborhoods, etc. and it all goes into the ether in hopes s…

Youtube has been spammed with these multi-account back and fourth discussion advertisements for a while. They're frequently for small local attorneys or financial advisors, and I have to wonder if those individuals realise how they're being marketed in bad faith.

I used to co-work next to a SEO specialist back in my freelance days and he would offer rankings, but the client would not be told that they were getting said rankings by blackhat SEO tactics (that mostly no longer work).

It's all so obvious and standardised that I have to imagine it is part of a toolkit or framework marketers are using without much thought.

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#82

Post by freehorse »

uoaei wrote: post #76
freehorse wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, a moderator has stated this many times https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

I don't see how that's "fair". Moderators are not impartial and since they are paid now they also have a vested interest in lying.

You are free to present examples where they are lying in this. From what I have noticed, I have not seen any censorship in this matter, especially in contrast to other topics that reach flagged status very easily.

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#83

Post by uoaei »

freehorse wrote: post #82
uoaei wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how that's "fair". Moderators are not impartial and since they are paid now they also have a vested interest in lying.

You are free to present examples where they are lying in this. From what I have noticed, I have not seen any censorship in this matter, especially in contrast to other topics that reach flagged status very easily.

Occam's razor is more nuanced than blind naivete. It is the nature of suppression that there is no evidence of it. I do not understand how you stand by your words.

Healthy skepticism plus the maturing industry of online propaganda and persuasion campaigns is where I would put Occam's razor a la "minimal assumptions". Every social media site has been manipulated at all levels, moderation notwithstanding, I see no reason to believe HN is immune to this.

It is not just a question of economics for YC to allow and even administrate this kind of manipulation, but of second- and third-order goals like consent/consensus manufacturing, reputation-building, shoring up investments by building "viral" interest, etc. These are immediate logical deductions from the patterns of behavior by humans and the bots that imitate them that are present everywhere on the internet these days.

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#84

Post by freehorse »

uoaei wrote: post #83
freehorse wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are free to present examples where they are lying in this. From what I have noticed, I have not seen any censorship in this matter, especially in contrast to other topics that reach flagged status very easily.

Occam's razor is more nuanced than blind naivete. It is the nature of suppression that there is no evidence of it. I do not understand how you stand by your words. Healthy skepticism plus the maturing industry of online propaganda and persuasion campaigns is where I would put Occam's razor a la "minimal assumptions". Every social media site has been manipulated at all levels, moderation notwithstanding, I see no reas…

I do not disagree that tactics like "building viral interest" may happen here (not necessarily by mods or with their help though), as they happen also in reddit, as OP shows, and in general obviously all around the internet, and it is safe to assume that it does happen from time to time. For me the most disturbing part of the post is that the manipulating tactics target teenagers.

But talking about repressive behaviour by mods against YC-related criticism specifically, I do not see that. I understand the prior would be that a popular forum run by YC would want to protect and censor in order to protect interests of the companies they back. I also had that prior. However, this is not "occam's razor", it is a prior. The time I have been around here I have not noticed this kind of behaviour happening though, while I have definitely noticed other kinds of stuff getting repressed, meaning that it is less likely that such repression would go unnoticed all the time. Thus I adjusted my understanding accordingly by shifting the prior according the data. If you find different examples I am willing to take them into account.

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#85

Post by DrScientist »

Teever wrote: post #12
weird-eye-issue wrote: post #8

Astroturfing on reddit has been a thing for over a decade and has really accelerated over the last few years. There's several companies where literally that is their business model to promote your product or service on reddit. I saw one for sale on acquire.com a while back for 7 figures

I’m shocked when I come across people who think that sockpuppeting doesn’t happen on social media including HN. I wish there were laws that required large social media sites to publish data to their end users that indicate the severity of the problem.

Spam, astroturfing, sockpuppetry are just some of the costs of anonymity, as it removes accountability.

It's also the flip side of people feeling free to say what they want under the cover of (pseudo) anonymity.

I wonder if one solution is to partition the web into places where anonymity isn't possible, and places where it is.

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#86

Post by vintermann »

DrScientist wrote: post #85
Teever wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m shocked when I come across people who think that sockpuppeting doesn’t happen on social media including HN. I wish there were laws that required large social media sites to publish data to their end users that indicate the severity of the problem.

Spam, astroturfing, sockpuppetry are just some of the costs of anonymity, as it removes accountability. It's also the flip side of people feeling free to say what they want under the cover of (pseudo) anonymity. I wonder if one solution is to partition the web into places where anonymity isn't possible, and places where it is.

It should be possible to use plain old cryptography to prove

1. I am one of the named, publicly accountable people registered as participating in this thing, and the same as posted under this pseudonym yesterday

2. Provided I'm reasonably careful, you can't tell which one is me unless n of m participants agree to unmask me.

3. I can only post under one name at a time. I can change pseudonym, but then my old one is marked as abandoned, so I can't trivially fake conversations with myself.

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#87

Post by jascha_eng »

dang wrote: post #70
jascha_eng wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do however often ask friends and family to upvote and leave comments. Like "we have been very happy using XYZ" which is against HN rules but not that strictly enforced. I feel like it is extra-lax towards YC companies but maybe I'm imagining things.

On the contrary, we particularly tell YC founders not to do this—mostly privately, but there's a public version of it at https://news.ycombinator.com/yli.html (scroll down to "Comments" and see the part in bold. That's me trying to scare them.) We do tend to be more lenient when there's no evidence of organized manipulation, just friends/fans/users trying to be helpful and not realizing that it's actually unhelpful.…

Okay I have heard different things from some friends that are YC founders and saw them do it in practice (e.g. posting about their HN post on LinkedIn).

I'm not going to out people here but maybe it helps you to know that not everyone plays by the rules. Tbf I also understand that this is just really hard to enforce.

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#88

Post by snicky »

Semi-related opinion, but it really boggles me how people can be such a*holes to leave spam all over the internet and keep turning it into a cesspit. If a company does it in such an obvious way it has to be systematic, meaning that someone somewhere comes up with an idea, his manager gives an okay to proceed and then they chop it into tasks and other employees pick them up. There are multiple people involved. All of them know about what's happening and that it's unethical. And for what? I doubt most people running/working for the YC companies need money that badly. Are they going to buy a boat? A higher Tesla model? Invite their friends to Michelin-starred restaurants to show how successful they are?

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#89

Post by cinntaile »

1718627440 wrote: post #50
cinntaile wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A cheat sheet could be a piece of paper you're allowed to bring to an exam. To make a proper cheat sheet you have to understand the material you're working with anyway so it usually doesn't help you.

I usually does help you by having written it.

That's true, I meant it doesn't help much as a cheat sheet if you didn't put in the work to make it yourself.

Re: RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

#90

Post by bicepjai »

What is Astroturfing ? It’s a deceptive, organized effort to make a message, campaign, or movement look like it’s genuine grassroots public support (or opposition) when it is actually planned, funded, and often controlled by a hidden sponsor (such as a corporation, political group, or other organization).
Post reply on HN