The need to protect the internet from 'astroturfing' grows ever more urgent

[coin]

Thought this article was interesting ... apologies if it's already been discussed - couldn't find anything about astroturfing on the web/forums

'astroturfing' blog post @ Guardian

The tobacco industry does it, the US Air Force clearly wants to ... astroturfing – the use of sophisticated software to drown out real people on web forums – is on the rise. How do we stop it?

Every month more evidence piles up, suggesting that online comment threads and forums are being hijacked by people who aren't what they seem.

Anyone have any experience of this or how real/prominent it is?

Wikipedia Astroturfing entry

oh...and I hope this doesn't cause any major flare-ups in those prone to paranoia or conspiratorialism (is that a word?)

Edited February 28, 2011 by coin

[Yeti101]

You don't know the half of it. I'll post some more info tomorrow as it's all on my other machine. There are many many examples and resources out there. The short story is that much of what you see in the papers, the evening news and especially on the web is there because a PR firm (hired by a corporation and/or a govt dept) has made it so.

[synchromesh]

http://www.shaman-australis.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=26544&st=0

[coin]

yeah, i have family who've been in PR/journalism for a long time, but they are very ethical and never go too far with spin...that's just business.

but this suggestion of a sort of infiltration of social media is next-gen, and beyond the spin of the past, i believe, due to stealth/anonymity, sophisticated systems for creating personas that have 'web history' to give a sense of legitimacy, etc.

to be totally honest - if I was still into IT/coding, etc. - I could possibly find these persona management systems/software very interesting

I was hoping there could be some discussion about how these tactics are/can be detected, are known to be employed already, and the type of sites that qualify as targets, beginning with *what is known as fact*

no offence synchromesh, but i didn't see much actual or factual in that thread or any constructive discussion past the first post you made ?

Edited February 28, 2011 by coin

[dundee]

Interesting......was reading a post earlier today about this, can see why it would be a powerfull tool to possibly help sway public opinion on many matters

[ThunderIdeal]

protip: don't start listening to twits just because their numbers swell.

[synchromesh]

no offence synchromesh, but i didn't see much actual or factual in that thread or any constructive discussion past the first post you made ?

Continued Sunstein: "We suggest a distinctive tactic for breaking up the hard core of extremists who supply conspiracy theories: cognitive infiltration of extremist groups, whereby government agents or their allies (acting either virtually or in real space, and either openly or anonymously) will undermine the crippled epistemology of believers by planting doubts about the theories and stylized facts that circulate within such groups, thereby introducing beneficial cognitive diversity."

Sunstein said government agents "might enter chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups and attempt to undermine percolating conspiracy theories by raising doubts about their factual premises, causal logic or implications for political action."

[coin]

oh, it was off the link -- thanks...there were a lot of links in that thread

[Yeti101]

Thanks for reminding me of that article synchromesh, I'd been thinking about it a lot of late. There were other PR things I wanted to mention but I'll do that in a separate post. Regarding Sunstein, let me make this suggestion:

 

1. For the sake of argument lets agree that the US government does engage in conspiracies to manipulate our perception of the truth of certain matters and to manipulate our political, commercial and social behaviour.
   
2. This fact should cause us to question the motivation and real effect of anything that occurs which is in any way linked with them.
   
3. It is implausible to suggest that Cass Sunstein's article made it into circulation on the Web without the approval and knowledge of the administration.
   
4. Therefore we should treat this article with suspicion as it itself could be a tool of manipulation.
   

 

Some conspiracy theorists see this as validating their world-view, but that's why I see it as so insidious.

It might have strengthened the resolve of some people, but I see that it causes division and distrust where people are really only having a disagreement of ideology or science. In circles where people are already paranoid, some-times for good reason, giving more reason for them to accuse each other of being government shills every time they disagree is pretty destructive.

That said, many such people do exist on the web. Even though I've disagreed with people on this forum over AGW in the past I would hope that no-one thinks that I'm one of 'them'.

[Yeti101]

Other astro-turfing resources:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Astroturf

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Astroturfing_in_Australia

http://astroturfwars.org/ ( I haven't seen this yet, so can't say if it's un-biased or not - looks interesting though)

http://www.spinwatch.org.uk/component/content/article/50-dirty-tricks/264-grassroots-versus-astroturf-discrediting-democracy

There are many, many examples of this, such as:

http://bothkindsofpolitics.org/?p=3900 (I thought this was very interesting - but I am a bit of a politcs geek )

http://techcrunch.com/2009/08/22/one-pr-firms-lack-of-ethics-reverb-caught-astroturfing-the-app-store/

The classic non-web astroturf campaign was the National Smokers Alliance http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=National_Smokers_Alliance . It's a strange coincidence that the same tobacco company involved in that is also involved in the The Alliance of Australian Retailers: http://www.australianretailers.com.au/

Even though I've not cited examples from all sides of politics and various debates, it is worth noting that everyone is accusing almost everyone else of doing this.

I agree that what is described in the guardian article is very bad. But it only seems worse than the current situation if you are not aware of the steaming pile of spin we are currently occupying.

A large percentage of what we read in the paper is based on PR managed press releases. http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/03/15/the-spin-cycle-how-your-newspaper-fared/

How much of our evening TV news is the same is unknown in Australia, though it does happen: http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/03/25/spinning-the-media-pre-packaged-journalism-just-download/

It seems to have been a significant issue in the US: http://www.prwatch.org/fakenews/execsummary

What I do know is that there are companies who guarantee that they can get your story on the news. The news people usually put their own voice-over on it, but the resulting story is so similar to the original VNR, that they may as well have done nothing to it. These are benign examples, but worth watching to see the comparison between the

This new development is the application of the same existing attitude to the Web. So there are paid shills on the web. If you watch the news or read the paper, you've had a similar thing done to you for years. This doesn't mean you should accept it. It does mean that this problem is a whole lot bigger than people commenting on blogs or trolling on forums and in chat rooms.

[synchromesh]

Pretending to be people you aren't, in order to make other people believe that conspiracies don't exist, is a conspiracy unto itself. Fucking idiots...

Ah, Video News Releases... that's right! I had forgotten the name of them. Thanks, Yeti!

 

 

Edited March 1, 2011 by synchromesh

[Yeti101]

I actually meant to post this link about VNR's previously but left it out.

Medialink Productions

Note similarity between the VNR that is sent to the News (this first part of the clip) and the eventual story that goes to air.

The company has deliberately chose benign examples, but their client list includes some pretty heavy customers e.g.: BHP, the ATO, Pfizer, Macca's etc.

[synchromesh]

Craziness maximus.