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Reddit is being manipulated by big financial services companies
- josho 10y agoWe've seen this before. Usenet was killed from spam as it didn't have a defence against those seeking to profit from the audience. This is today's equivalent of the same problem. The difference is it is now two monied interests battling for the audience. I long for a modern usenet newsgroup equivalent that has some kind of protection from monied interests, I suppose a small audience is a guard.
- unlimit 10y agoOk, its manipulated but why by financial service companies? Are they trying to trigger stock price movements?
- zython 10y agoI think it goes without saying that a social media site with millions of users and place 23 on the Alexa rankings is an interesting advertising platform, and that it happens on a regular basis and a large distributed scale across the platform. The far more important problem in my opinion in this situation is to be able to differentiate a "normal" user submitted post from an advertisiement, a skill that is missing in 80% of today's youth: http://fortune.com/2016/11/23/stanford-fake-news/ http://fortune.com/2016/11/23/stanford-fake-news/
- rhizome 10y agoIt's not fair to call it a missing skill when the other side of that equation is a $500B+ industry of university-educated advertisers with decades of experience who are working to obfuscate the difference between ads and content, if not practice outright deception. What exactly are "today's youth" supposed to know in the face of that?
- woliveirajr 10y agoAnd I wonder which discussion forum isn't... the closer any site gets to money (example: stock discussions), the more is at worth with manipulative conversations.
- tootie 10y agoI don't understand why "financial services" are called out in the headline. They're being manipulated by shady digital marketing companies who have some financial clients among many others.
- Rmilb 10y agoFinancial services account for a substantial portion of the US GDP and some may argue has big sway in the way our laws are written, and now in steering conversation about them on a popular site.
- tootie 10y agoI think that's a big assumption. Financial services firms are not usually savvy marketers and the big wall street firms everyone hates almost never try to appeal directly to consumers and would have little to gain from swaying opinion on reddit. I'd wager retail firms are far more active on social media.
- seppin 10y agocause people don't like them, and it's fun to read bad things happening to bad people.
- ffef 10y agoIIRC didn't reddit use fake users and content when they launched?
- Eupolemos 10y agoI think that is a pretty standard and often needed tactic when starting a forum or community. A community is pretty binary; it's either dead or it isn't, so a it needs to be jumpstarted.
- CM30 10y agoYep, this is most communities are started. Either through literal fake users (sometimes set up by the staff, sometimes 'imported' from other sites) or by deals and exchanges with other communities (aka you use my site for a bit and I'll do the same on yours). Not surprising at all that Reddit did the same thing.
- existencebox 10y agoPrevious discussion here. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13714159 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13714159 (I would like to give a more substantive comment, so I'll leave the somewhat jaded perspective of rephrasing the title: "<social channel> is being manipulated by <anyone who participates in social engagement/growth hacking/perception management>". The question I contemplate is where we draw the line of what social engagement is above the bar acceptability. (To answer my own question, I typically consider "disclosure" the answer to that))
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- hacker_9 10y agoIt's a shame this has happened. It used to that aggregated news was the best news because it wasn't opinionated. It also didn't need to focus on the big ticket items (murder, sex, drugs) like newspapers, as sales weren't a concern, so you have science, tech, and I kid you not, actual good news to read about! But now with the pay-to-get-upvotes scams going on, we get utterly biased and even ridiculous stories constantly on the front page. And how to even start on the comments, which just read like blurbs to the title. A great example on the front page at the moment: "Donald Trump's war on media is 'biggest threat to democracy' says Navy Seal who brought down Osama Bin Laden". I almost feel like this stuff is AI generated at this point, just throwing together keywords that get clicks. As someone across the pond looking in, the bias is laughable obvious. I just hope that more people realise that manipulation is present, and remember not to believe everything they read.
- vostok 10y ago> "Donald Trump's war on media is 'biggest threat to democracy' says Navy Seal who brought down Osama Bin Laden". What is this an example of? This sounds like exactly the kind of thing that I would expect on the front page if there was no vote manipulation.
- Drumlin 10y agoIt comes from the politics sub, which - to put it mildly - is one of the most suspect subs for manipulation on Reddit. They let that sub appear on the homepage, yet they ban a lot of other similar subs that are on the other side of the spectrum. It's one of those issues where I look at Reddit and think... something isn't right.
- edgarvaldes 10y ago>something isn't right. Is that a pun? Because obviously reddit has a leftist bias.
- accountface 10y ago
- codingdave 10y agoI'm not sure how anyone can think discussions on reddit are not manipulated at this point. If you watch carefully, you see the exact same verbiage used from multiple accounts on the same topic used to steer conversations. And as new responses come up, there will be a multi-hour delay, then new verbiage will get posted simultaneously to multiple accounts. There is clearly behind-the-scenes writing efforts going on, then being distributed to accounts. And if I see this just as a casual observer, I can only imagine what you would find if you really dug deep.
- edgarvaldes 10y agoDo you have an example?
- benologist 10y agor/worldnews is full of divisive commentary that shapes discussion in stupid and toxic ways. https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/5vwt2g/israel_denies_human_rights_watch_work_visas_due/ https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/5vwt2g/israel_de... Top thread (minus auto-summary bot's) erroneously declares the title misleading. The thread under that amplifies some seemingly very flakey accusations a different employee at that organization maintains ties to a terrorist organization renounced decades ago. Derail accomplished! Threads about Russia being bad usually lead with how the US is bad. Threads about Syria often debate whether Bashar al-Assad is not so bad. I am usually annoyed I read the comments in that subreddit. Look at this awesome 2 day old account's comments - https://www.reddit.com/user/Supercootur https://www.reddit.com/user/Supercootur
- big_youth 10y agoI saw a bunch of examples just like this: https://i.redditmedia.com/C87zcWzT3KPN0Sdo4YfMIe2Rd0oLWTwBsX55u3-_hdE.png?w=807&s=f2646cd1b72cb4beb66c9beebf0fcb6c https://i.redditmedia.com/C87zcWzT3KPN0Sdo4YfMIe2Rd0oLWTwBsX... Sometimes the fake accounts will even have identical comments and only post in each others comment chains.
- Nadya 10y agoSometimes they make no effort to hide it. http://i.imgur.com/M6wAJ1A.png http://i.imgur.com/M6wAJ1A.png
- Zaheer 10y agoTrend to watch in next few years: Phony Actors This same thing happens on all social networks - facebook, instagram, reddit, twitter, etc all have accounts on them that may have naturally grown and are now paid to post / influence content on their respective platforms. I've seen this first hand on Instagram how large of an effect it can have in promoting apps, products etc. Previously disclosing affiliations / paid promotions was limited to a much smaller set influencers. Now, these platforms give anyone from a kid with spare time to a professional marketing agency a means to build accounts and leverage the vast reach of these networks for their own gain. Facebook is _starting_ to realize this and clamp down on it for fake news. But there are many more avenues and it'll be interesting to see how this really gets solved if at all.
- sjg007 10y agoor it could be the next trend in the work from home movement! get paid to shill on reddit!
- kakarot 10y agoThis is a lot more serious than most people think. And a lot farther along technologically. Most of what has been exposed in the wild so far just falls under Level 0 Character. If you asked me how we could potentially combat this coming information implosion? I would say you fight fire with fire. http://wiki.project-pm.org/wiki/Persona_Development#Persona_and_Content_Development http://wiki.project-pm.org/wiki/Persona_Development#Persona_...
- anon2264 10y agoReddit has some pretty extreme heavy handed political censorship. All Republican posts from the main Republican subreddit (the_donald) are censored from the front page (what most read). Techdirt is censored from r/news and r/worldnews and some of the other main subs. And for pretty repulsive apparent reason... All of the posts from r/conspiracy about the DNC corruption and subversion that was proven were censored. Wikileaks is censored from the front page as well. One day a thread criticizing the $38billion Obama gave to Israel hit the front page. Guess what? Censored. That time, it was taken completely off of reddit, not just the front page. Aaron Swartz is rolling in his grave.
- tptacek 10y agoObjection! Claim that /r/the_donald is the main "Republican" subreddit assumes facts not in evidence.
- jtuente 10y agoEh, do you know of another "Republican" subreddit with ~400,000 readers? The obvious r/republican is still <100,000 and affiliated subs aren't any larger.
- r_smart 10y agoI think /r/the_donald is the largest subreddit on the site at this point. It's openly in support of the Republican president. So that seems fair grounds for the claim. On the other hand, a lot of Republicans don't like said president, and it's been observed that he's kind of a democrat from 20 - 30 years ago rather than an actual Republican. But then, a lot of Republican voters think Republicans aren't Republicans, hence the RINO thing. Seems to cut either way to me.
- tptacek 10y agoIt's clearly the largest Trump-supporter and Trump-troller subreddit on the site, but that's not what the commenter said.
- deleted 10y ago
- mrfusion 10y agoIf you were designing Reddit today what would you do to prevent this kind of stuff?
- codingdave 10y agoTiered subreddits. You would need to earn credibility in open discussions, and earn your way up into more serious discussions. So there would end up being multiple layers of credibility, with only vetted accounts participating in the highest levels.
- wcarron 10y agoThis approach is probably the most reasonable. Stackoverflow seems to have implemented it fairly well.
- fnordfnordfnord 10y agoI can't agree. Stackoverflow does some things well, but there are reasons that it hasn't caught on outside a certain cohort who were either there first, or who are very dedicated to cultivating their karma. HN user jfc said it better here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7650975 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7650975
- wcarron 10y agoI have to disagree. Those invested solely in cultivating karma are the reason to institute systems like "earned privileges". Any forum with a voting system will always be misused and abused by those who don't have the priority of the community in mind. Moreover, jfc has valid points about negativity and unhelpful responses, but it remains anecdotal. As a counter, my own anecdotal experience has largely been positive on SO, and I rarely run into those problems. I am definitely not part of the cohort that was there first, and think it's a rather fair system. For example, preventing downvotes until a certain level of reputation is reached is a small check on those looking to farm karma by blanketing out competing answers. Obviously it isn't foolproof, but it at least ensures that you have actually contributed to the community at least a few times. Perhaps his comment speaks more to the quality of the userbase than to the efficiency of the voting system?
- Fjolsvith 10y agoSo that's why all my NSFW subreddits have started looking weird!
- rm_-rf_slash 10y agoI can only see one cure to this pervasive issue that affects every website on the internet that allows for user comments: First, verified accounts, like Twitter, are visually separate from non-verified accounts. The distinction has to be visible on every place the username is displayed or when their post is displayed. Second, only verified users have upvote/downvote privileges. To me it is downright foolish to allow any jackass or botnet to make a ton of accounts and up/down vote the conversation as they please. I have seen this forum management all over the web and it's turning me off from social media more and more by the day. Newspaper comment sections used to be insightful, and now they are generally cesspools of shills and bots. Double or more for forums like Reddit. I even see it on Hacker News. We can have open discussions and we can have discussions free of paid influence, but I do not believe it is possible to have both.
- benologist 10y agoIf anyone wants to play a game of "how could HN be manipulated" ... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13718417 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13718417
- dowjones 10y agoAnd HN and other tech sites are somehow exempt from this phenomenon? With billions of dollars at stake at Uber and its various competitors, is it impossible to think, for example, that Susan Fowler had professional authoring help, or was offered compensation to publish her recent blog post? Or that paid/professional/fake commenters downvoted, attacked, and drowned out any voice who simply requested documentation, or cautioned that judgment should be reserved until both sides of the story were made public?
- kneel 10y agoNo one said HN is exempt from this, actually it happens all the time. However HN is tiny compared to reddit it doesnt fracture itself into small subreddits. Things are much more managable this way. When shill content does pop up it's pretty obvious and it's usually called out.
- techstrategist 10y agoIt seems likely that only the poorly-written shill content gets called out.
- grzm 10y agoWithout substantiation of any of these types of things occurring, it actively destroys discussion to engage in speculation of them, particularly online. People are left with no good faith upon which to have constructive discourse.
- dowjones 10y agoI agree with you. Which is why the entire Susan Fowler discussion and subsequent holier-than-thou proclamations (i.e. Mitch Kapor) are odious, since there is currently zero substantiation of any of her claims.
- grzm 10y agoby "types of things" I mean speculation of shillage/astroturfing as to discussions on HN, not the content of the articles themselves. Those are two different issues, and to conflate them means we can't discuss them at all.
- jasonkostempski 10y agoHas anyone ever tried something like a captcha for upvoting? Upvoting isn't really something that needs to be done conveniently in rapid succession.
- Aardwolf 10y agoReddit is awesome for tons of small game communities, I hope whatever happens on those apparently more important subreddits won't ever affect that
- grokas 10y agoSame can be said for sports communities, especially the racing subreddits :)
- xraystyle 10y agoNiche interest subreddits are about the only thing Reddit is good for anymore as far as I'm concerned. I don't subscribe to a single default sub and never check the front page. I subscribe to subs like sysadmin, woodworking, ruby and bicycling. The front page and defaults are just horribly toxic.
- strgrd 10y agoLink to this post in three years and ponder in its prescients... Web 3.0 will be born in the death of the heavily botted social networks. Reddit, Facebook & Instagram, Twitter... are all basically pay-to-win schemes at this point, benefiting greatly in terms of adoption from the grey market pay-for-likes botnets, where marketers and propagandists know they can make their content highly visible if they're willing to pay. People pay very little attention to the fragility that has arisen in the Web 2.0 economy. Once there is widespread understanding of the gaming, cheating, and botting, these social network institutions will crumble. There will be piecemeal attempts to reduce botting, but they will annoy end users, and annoy investors and shareholders as they come to realize XX% of their user base never existed. Web 3.0 will be the death of anonymity, with social networks and APIs that are, by design, hard to automate, and even harder to hide your true identity from. There will be CAPTCHA-like systems (possibly tied to hardware) that facilitate this. This will of course promise to fix the problem of botting, while heavily benefiting surveillance, for state, and for advertisement. There will be a new breed of social networks built around ensuring the content you are seeing is genuine or "organic", and yet the incentives will be much more perverse, and their networks, much more invasive.
- nix0n 10y agoI find it hard to believe people will complete captchas or give up anonymity in order to vote. The bot vs captcha arms race will continue, but I would be very surprised if the captchas started winning.
- ethbro 10y agoYou don't have to employ AI/human differentiation (e.g. captcha) if you statistically mine user actions. I think that's where resolution is more likely to come from. By definition, shill accounts have different patterns than normal user accounts. Step 1) Deal with new accounts (preferably in an anonymous way). Step 2) Mine the actions of older accounts to detect patterns that point back to shilling. Not insurmountable.
- strgrd 10y agoWhat will make Captchas valuable in the future is their ability to act as signatures, verifying you, the owner of the account, were physically present when you did whatever action required verification. They will not just be roadblocks, but checkpoints verifying not just that you are human, but that you are the person you claim to be.
- Animats 10y agoI'd noticed something like this on HN a few years ago. A negative comment about Apple might be voted up at first. Then, about an hour after posting, there would be many negative votes. The timing on this was consistent. After that, no more negative votes, and the rating would float up again.
- Balgair 10y agoYeah, this happens to my account. I think I must have made some off-hand comment once that someone did not like and it's their petty vengeance. The DVers will wait about 2 hours (+/- 1hour, random interval) to do so, no more after that normal distribution. The comments are stupid stuff too, like some links to wikipedia pages and just random comments. The ANOVA I did on the DVs showed just random timing and comments (p-val was super high though, as I don't have many comments). It's strange. Only way I can think to fix it is to tell people to stop talking about HN. If you want to keep HN good, keep it to your very close friends and family. We don't want this to turn into reddit or digg.
- wtbob 10y agoI'll often see a similar pattern: I'll post something which disagrees with the common wisdom here on HN, it'll get a flurry of downvotes, then over time it'll get more upvotes. I figure that it's probably just the result of a few folks who are HN addicts, and that over time more reasonable heads prevail.
- Animats 10y agoFor Apple, it's so consistent that I suspect there's a program watching for negative Apple sentiment, then sending out alerts to people likely to respond in Apple's favor.
- solnyshok 10y agoI think it is human nature. When I see a comment being downvoted, and I think it does not deserve that, I would upvote it.
- paulpauper 10y agoA much more insidious spam but very common are fly-by-night 'news' sites that copy paste content from reputable sources and then get up-voted to the top of popular subreddits, generating adsense revenue for the webmasters. Adsense is such a pox on the internet. I know companies need to make money but it also gives rise to soooo much spam.
- choward 10y agoThis is a fun subreddit to subscribe to: https://www.reddit.com/r/HailCorporate/ https://www.reddit.com/r/HailCorporate/
- pmoriarty 10y agoThis is a very old phenomenon called sockpuppetry[1]. Any online forum of sufficient size and popularity is bound to be a target of it. It's no surprise at all that Reddit would be targeted. Most reputable forums try to deal with it somehow, but it's difficult to stamp it out completely -- especially if the site administrators are ever themselves compromised. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sockpuppet_%28Internet%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sockpuppet_%28Internet%29