4 ms·

How amazing of a false flag op would this be? Amazon can't really be this terrible at social media.

hpoe 6y ago
It is actually an interesting question, the effort is so transparent that is it likely Amazon is actually behind this, or someone else is trying to make Amazon look bad to galvanize people. The other possibility is they handed a bunch of money to a PR firm that does a bad job.
- AbrahamParangi 6y ago
  Or a PR contract somewhere with a kicker that only pays out if the union vote fails
- boringg 6y ago
  This sounds like a possibility
- tootahe45 6y ago
  Fake astroturfing can be pretty effective, IIRC a tech bro had a bunch of fake Russian twitter accounts follow a republican candidate which generated significant fake news about this candidate being helped by Russia.
uoaei 6y ago
How are you still doubting that this is anything but astroturfing? How can it possibly be true that "only people with a box emoji in their names are real Amazon employees", and that every single Amazon employee worth trusting has "@AmazonFC*" as their Twitter handle? It is laughably amateurish, it's actually less believable that Amazon management and the union-busters are stupid enough to entrust this to such a sloppy operation.
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  > How are you still doubting that this is anything but astroturfing? Because the accounts are so obviously fake. It seems like they're designed to be deliberately identifiable as astroturfing, rather than being genuine astroturfing. People are suggesting it's fake-astroturfing, in other words.
  - uoaei 6y ago
    Obvious for you: an internet-literate, tech-adjacent, analytical, skeptical type. I appreciate your generous optimism with respect to the intended audience of these messages but I have seen sloppier attempts that have been successful enough to push the needle from one side of the other.
  - tablespoon 6y ago
    > Because the accounts are so obviously fake. It seems like they're designed to be deliberately identifiable as astroturfing, rather than being genuine astroturfing. People are suggesting it's fake-astroturfing, in other words. You seem to be proceeding from an axiom that Amazon is always scary competent at everything it does, so you can infer that something that is not scary competent is not from Amazon. I don't think that axiom is true, and Amazon's perfectly capable of doing embarrassingly ham-fisted things. Especially since great success tends to breed hubris and lowered sensitivity to small failures (since your other successes mean you can fuck up and still be fine).
  - uvnq 6y ago
    That's what I was thinking too. It could be fake astroturfing. I don't want to rush to conclude anything because I don't know anything for sure, but it definitely is a possibility.
merpnderp 6y ago
I have distant family that works for Amazon and they say their warehouse in the middle of the US is full of people who love it there. That the vast majority are very happy and the rules are pretty lax as long as you do your job. Why is is shocking that there are people who work at Amazon who are happily employed?
fnord77 6y ago
yes they are that terrible https://twitter.com/amazonnews/status/1375529101931520007 https://twitter.com/amazonnews/status/1375529101931520007
devindotcom 6y ago
It's real, but I wrote this years ago. If you read the post a former warehouse worker explains how the ambassador job actually worked. Guessing it got reposted because of Amazon's other bad attempts at PR in recent weeks. Lots of fake FC accounts out there now too, parodies and so on, but the originals were real.

hpoe 6y ago

It is actually an interesting question, the effort is so transparent that is it likely Amazon is actually behind this, or someone else is trying to make Amazon look bad to galvanize people. The other possibility is they handed a bunch of money to a PR firm that does a bad job.

AbrahamParangi 6y ago
Or a PR contract somewhere with a kicker that only pays out if the union vote fails
boringg 6y ago
This sounds like a possibility
tootahe45 6y ago
Fake astroturfing can be pretty effective, IIRC a tech bro had a bunch of fake Russian twitter accounts follow a republican candidate which generated significant fake news about this candidate being helped by Russia.

uoaei 6y ago

How are you still doubting that this is anything but astroturfing? How can it possibly be true that "only people with a box emoji in their names are real Amazon employees", and that every single Amazon employee worth trusting has "@AmazonFC*" as their Twitter handle? It is laughably amateurish, it's actually less believable that Amazon management and the union-busters are stupid enough to entrust this to such a sloppy operation.

chrisseaton 6y ago
> How are you still doubting that this is anything but astroturfing? Because the accounts are so obviously fake. It seems like they're designed to be deliberately identifiable as astroturfing, rather than being genuine astroturfing. People are suggesting it's fake-astroturfing, in other words.
- uoaei 6y ago
  Obvious for you: an internet-literate, tech-adjacent, analytical, skeptical type. I appreciate your generous optimism with respect to the intended audience of these messages but I have seen sloppier attempts that have been successful enough to push the needle from one side of the other.
- tablespoon 6y ago
  > Because the accounts are so obviously fake. It seems like they're designed to be deliberately identifiable as astroturfing, rather than being genuine astroturfing. People are suggesting it's fake-astroturfing, in other words. You seem to be proceeding from an axiom that Amazon is always scary competent at everything it does, so you can infer that something that is not scary competent is not from Amazon. I don't think that axiom is true, and Amazon's perfectly capable of doing embarrassingly ham-fisted things. Especially since great success tends to breed hubris and lowered sensitivity to small failures (since your other successes mean you can fuck up and still be fine).
- uvnq 6y ago
  That's what I was thinking too. It could be fake astroturfing. I don't want to rush to conclude anything because I don't know anything for sure, but it definitely is a possibility.

merpnderp 6y ago

I have distant family that works for Amazon and they say their warehouse in the middle of the US is full of people who love it there. That the vast majority are very happy and the rules are pretty lax as long as you do your job. Why is is shocking that there are people who work at Amazon who are happily employed?

fnord77 6y ago

yes they are that terrible https://twitter.com/amazonnews/status/1375529101931520007 https://twitter.com/amazonnews/status/1375529101931520007

devindotcom 6y ago

It's real, but I wrote this years ago. If you read the post a former warehouse worker explains how the ambassador job actually worked. Guessing it got reposted because of Amazon's other bad attempts at PR in recent weeks. Lots of fake FC accounts out there now too, parodies and so on, but the originals were real.