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Ask HN: How do you keep track of astroturfers on HN?

10 points by mr_spothawk ↗ HN
I've noticed a lot of astroturfing in the past couple years. It's led me to visit HN less and less often, which probably isn't such a bad deal. The problem is that i sometimes feel like I am the problem, but i'm a peace-loving hippy... so maybe that's not a reasonable assumption.

I wonder if anybody would identify the same in this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19251589

There's a style of commenting which (to me) sounds like it's written by a Mandarin speaker with great, non-native English skills. And it seems to me like astroturfing...

Is anybody keeping track these folks? Does YC care? Is YC in on the gig?

Any thoughts would be appreciated... even if you want to just say i'm crazy, it'd be interesting to have some discussion in the community about this.

18 comments

[ 3.8 ms ] story [ 53.2 ms ] thread
mr_spothawk
My personal solution is to keep a spreadsheet of names, occurrences, and then review the comments over time. It's a pretty new effort though.
luckylion
Wait, you're manually datamining comments with a spreadsheet? That sounds really dedicated.
mr_spothawk
it's not really datamining, it's more like subjective opinion recording.
siruncledrew
It would be interesting to see what patterns emerge, and what algorithm could be used to detect astroturfing. HN currently uses some kind of opaque detection software.
ocdtrekkie
If you think you have identified some sort of astroturfing effort, the best solution is to contact the moderators using the link at the bottom of the page.

HN mods do regularly act against users who post solely in support or opposition to a single company (or for example, always promote one company and simultaneously attack it's competitors), or people who use HN to "wage ideological battle" by arguing for one position to the detriment of any other discussion on the matter.

There's not a lot of discussion in the community on it because HN would much rather not be bogged down by people complaining about other users, and would rather deal with it privately.

Dahoon
There's a style of commenting which (to me) sounds like it's written by American speakers with great, native English skills. And it seems to me like astroturfing...
ocdtrekkie
I can spot Googlers (and relatively recent Xooglers) by their commenting style usually, with no other obvious disclosure. The funny thing about this, is they can be from wholly unrelated divisions from what they're commenting on, and not marketing people. Which is to say this isn't an accusation of wrongdoing here. They just have... a certain style that's distinctly Google, and it's kind of audible when reading.

I think it'd be really interesting to do some sort of data analysis on HN comment text, sorted by employer or country of origin, maybe known CEOs versus marketers versus engineers who comment, or whatever else, and see what patterns could be found. Are there certain sentence styles that correlate to different groups, or a noticeable difference in vocabulary?

rchaud
I feel like most sites have a kind of commenting monocolture that's specific to the community on that site. For example, Reddit comments on popular threads can be indistinguishable from each other due to the use of "inside jokes" based around quoting a meme or something from pop culture. Everybody seems to comment in the same way in order to get upvotes from other users who "get it".

Twitter and Tumblr are similar in that users are often trying to write witty one-liners, which too end up leaning on pop culture references.

That said, what you are proposing could absolutely be used to suss out not astroturfers exactly, but fanboys of certain things. Jordan Peterson, Elon Musk, etc., they all comment in the same way when a critical article about them is posted on a message board.

jf22
I've been accused of being an astroturfing shill on multiple platforms...

I wonder if the reason is simply my poor grammar.

NeedMoreTea
There's some topics that rapidly attract a certain pattern of posting. Where the first comments are something blatantly wrong, or just wildly provocative. Often only tenuously, if at all, related to TFA. They then proceed to answer every. single. comment. with more provocation.

See it enough times and it looks like these low karma and activity, often recently created accounts, show a real pattern. Call it astro turfing, call it gaming the algo to trigger a spam flag for burying the thread on HN, or call it an incredibly unlikely coincidence, I do wish it were not so.

Oftentimes it's not even a great article or study they're attacking, just that the topic exists at all. If it were left alone to sink or swim with real comments, half the time they'd sink intellectually due to it being poor reporting, or reporting a flawed study etc.

I find it one of the more frustrating things about current HN, but I know of nowhere else free of it.

luckylion
If nobody is downvoting their comments, I suppose they are good comments? Otherwise, HN blocks low karma accounts for hours after writing two or more comments within XX minutes and receiving a downvote on any of them (I know because it regularly happens to me and I can't reply to anything).
danbolt
Is there a litmus test for testing if someone is a "Mandarin speaker with great, non-native English skills"?
AnimalMuppet
I've seen... I don't know that I'd call it astroturfing, but at least people pushing an ideology. I mean, we all have our view of the world, and we all think ours is right. But some people will argue every post opposing their view. And they Just. Won't. Stop. I mean, they may talk about other things on other threads, but when a thread talks about their position, they will never stop arguing. They will never give any acknowledgement that people on the other side had any valid points. It's like talking to a brick wall.

I'm tempted, when I see this behavior, to just say "With those who will not listen, it is useless to have a conversation", and walk away. But I'm pretty sure they'd reply something like "I will listen, but everything you say is wrong".

Other than flagging it or otherwise contacting the moderators, I don't have a good solution. It sure doesn't help the atmosphere of the board to have that kind of "conversation", though.

rchaud
That's what makes it hard to discuss politics on the Internet. Not saying that in-person conversations can't be difficult too, but in person people start off with a level of basic human respect that can move a conversation along.

Plus there isn't the possbility of cutting your conversation short so you can correct all the other people who commented in a similarly wrong manner.

krapp
At the risk of winding up on someone's enemies list here, let me make a suggestion: "keeping track of astroturfers" is the last thing you want to do.

Trolls, shills, false flaggers, etc. are a problem in just about any online forum. But they don't win by posting. They win by convincing you to look at a thread with suspicion and assume malice, by encouraging an atmosphere of paranoia that has a chilling effect on discourse, and by leading you away from honest discussion with fruitless tangential arguments that poison the well and get threads flagged.

The site guidelines already provide what I think is a decent strategy. Assume good faith on the part of a commenter, and respond to the strongest possible interpretation of their argument (steelman, don't strawman.) If after a response or two, it seems like someone isn't arguing in good faith... then just ignore them. Fold the thread and move on with life. If they're being uncivil or outright malicious, flag them.