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Me in 2090 BC, “Seems like people keep retelling this Gilgamesh tale and embellishing it each time! I’m really smart so it must people trying to convince me to
by paulcole 7mo ago
Me in 2090 BC, “Seems like people keep retelling this Gilgamesh tale and embellishing it each time! I’m really smart so it must people trying to convince me to buy something.”
- satvikpendem 7mo agoWhy would the Epic of Gilgamesh want to sell you something? In contrast this Sriracha story clearly does want to sell you something. If you want to use an analogy at least use one that makes sense.
- paulcole 7mo agoYou think this Sriracha story wants to sell you something.
- satvikpendem 7mo agoYes, the fact that I can even think so makes a case that it's possible to astroturf it. The same cannot be said of a folk tale, unless somehow it had its own interstitial ads between every chapter.
- paulcole 7mo agoPeople sell things by telling stories. Sometimes those stories are interstitial ads and sometimes they are not.
- satvikpendem 7mo agoIf you can't tell the difference between an ancient poem and an astroturfing reddit post then I'm not sure how to convince you there is one.
- nathan_douglas 7mo agoIt was all about Shamhat's OnlyFans clay tablet.
- le-mark 7mo agoThe point of heroic tales such as Gilgamesh was to draw tribute and sacrifices to the temple of Ishtar. The analogy makes perfect sense.
- satvikpendem 7mo agoMaybe that's a post facto rationalized reason, as I'm sure it did draw in more tributes, but that's like saying folk tales across the world's sole purpose is to have sacrifices when in reality people just like making up and telling stories. It's like saying the apostles of Christ only spread his message to raise money for the Catholic Church, no doubt that was a side effect but it wasn't the "point" by any means, especially early on where there was no church.
- paulcole 7mo ago> Maybe that's a post facto rationalized reason Isn't this what you're doing with the idea that the Sri Racha story is obviously meant to sell?
- satvikpendem 7mo agoOne is plausible as the primary reason, with documented instances of it happening, as I had linked before, while the other is mere conjecture.
- paulcole 7mo agoBecause astroturfing on reddit exists doesn't mean that this is plausibly astroturfing. Any post on reddit about any business could be plausibly astroturfing by that logic.
- satvikpendem 7mo agoCorrect, that is what plausible means in this case, especially as we have evidence of them doing so, even in this very thread.