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RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids?

454 points by red-polygon ↗ HN
RevisionDojo is a YC-backed test prep company ($3.4M raised) that sells International Baccalaureate (IB) test prep. Over the past year, users on r/IBO sub-reddit have documented a pattern of unethical marketing practices:

*Astroturfing:* Coordinated campaigns where accounts pose as students sharing "cheatsheets" and "predicted exam leaks." Other accounts then upvote, leave supportive comments, and ask follow-up questions—creating the illusion of organic student excitement. Multiple threads have exposed this pattern [1][2][3].

*Paid fake posts:* High school students report being offered payment to write promotional Reddit posts [4].

*Pressuring critics:* Users who post negative reviews report being contacted directly by company representatives, told it's "a shame" they're posting publicly [5]. Critical comments receive coordinated mass downvotes [6].

*Soliciting copyrighted materials:* They use TikTok influencers and fake reddit posts to persuade students to sell them official IB exam papers, violating IB policies [7].

The r/IBO moderators are actively investigating [8].

These practices appear to be working great for them. Recently, they acquired OnePrep (oneprep.xyz), a free SAT prep tool that was already popular on r/sat. Since the acquisition, the same manipulation tactics have been deployed at scale: 150 Trustpilot reviews in a window of a few days [9], and widespread coordinated Reddit manipulation—multiple accounts posting "tips" that recommend Oneprep, coordinated upvoting, and fake enthusiasm in comments. The most prominent example was a 2,000+ upvote post removed by moderators for manipulation, but it's part of a sustained campaign across the subreddit.

*Sources:*

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/IBO/comments/1p55qun/ [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/IBO/comments/1jsb00a/ [3] https://www.reddit.com/r/IBO/comments/1ohcohi/ [4] https://www.reddit.com/r/IBO/comments/1p55qun/comment/nqmhal3/ [5] https://www.reddit.com/r/IBO/comments/1my1ajx/comment/na94upv/ [6] https://www.reddit.com/r/IBO/comments/1my1ajx/comment/na8zvs4/ [7] https://www.reddit.com/r/IBO/comments/1mej900/ [8] https://www.reddit.com/r/IBO/comments/1my1ajx/comment/nagdkl5/ [9] https://www.trustpilot.com/review/oneprep.xyz

35 comments

[ 4.7 ms ] story [ 64.0 ms ] thread
zx0r2
a YC company being unethical, shocking...
throw-12-16
I am shocked!

I mean I am shocked that this post didn't get flagged immediately ofc.

ipsum2
Pickle, another yc backed startup, is also acting really fishy. They claimed they developed a standalone AR device, took money from customers, and now they're saying it requires tethering to your phone. https://x.com/cixliv/status/2008129653467492631
throw-12-16
Don't forget about Honey!

YC is full of scams.

KomoD
> and now they're saying it requires tethering to your phone

Where are they saying that?

Also what is the second "conclusion" screenshot from? (Who is the "Matthew" and what analysis, mentioned in that screenshot?)

HeckFeck
"Disruption" comes to the world of junior academia. It was inevitable. Nothing's sacred.
vuggamie
It's OK. Paul Graham is one of the good billionaires.
didntknowyou
no surprise considering YC's fake it till you make it and growth hacking culture
sroussey
Like the founders telling employees to lie about compliance cuz everyone does it.

There is a line between fake it till you make it and fraud.

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weird-eye-issue
Astroturfing on reddit has been a thing for over a decade and has really accelerated over the last few years. There's several companies where literally that is their business model to promote your product or service on reddit. I saw one for sale on acquire.com a while back for 7 figures
Teever
I’m shocked when I come across people who think that sockpuppeting doesn’t happen on social media including HN.

I wish there were laws that required large social media sites to publish data to their end users that indicate the severity of the problem.

DrScientist
Spam, astroturfing, sockpuppetry are just some of the costs of anonymity, as it removes accountability.

It's also the flip side of people feeling free to say what they want under the cover of (pseudo) anonymity.

I wonder if one solution is to partition the web into places where anonymity isn't possible, and places where it is.

gosub100
It's so painfully obvious too. On my local subreddit: "what's the best ice cream shop in $CITY?" Check their post history, one "lol" on a cat pic on /r/aww 8 months ago.

4 lines of code could catch this.

baxtr
For those like me who didn’t know:

Astroturfing is the practice of creating a fake "grassroots" movement to make it look like a cause, product, or candidate has widespread public support when they actually do not.

mapmeld
I'm seeing a much less sophisticated campaign for this on my city's subreddits recently... Someone will ask a weird or generic question, and either poster or the top comment is a throwaway account with a spiel about checking $site_name.

It's exhausting, especially since people will write out real advice and corrections about how to deal with rats, bedbugs, neighborhoods, etc. and it all goes into the ether in hopes someone will get scammed. Or maybe it's an SEO thing because the site name is so generic it's un-googleable. I hope it doesn't work.

m1sta__
The conservative subreddits go from hundreds of active users to tens of thousands of active users depending on the talking points of the GOP at any moment. It's very very obvious.
arm32
This thread will be hidden soon.
onetimeusename
What is this cheatsheets and predicted exam leaks stuff? I don't mean to sound naive but is cheating a significant part of the test prep space?
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opengrass
Welcome to Reddit. That, and the code camp thing. Reddit is a terrible anyway.
bigbadfeline
> Astroturfing: Coordinated campaigns... [to post,] upvote, leave supportive comments, and ask follow-up questions—creating the illusion of organic excitement... Critical comments receive coordinated mass downvotes.

I thought that was the dictionary definition of social media? If it isn't yet, it should be, Reddit is just the tip of the iceberg.

TZubiri
Proposal to change title from "kids" to "teens"?
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fud101
Does anyone want to make the argument YC does more good than harm? I'd be surprised if that was a tenable position.
snicky
Semi-related opinion, but it really boggles me how people can be such a*holes to leave spam all over the internet and keep turning it into a cesspit. If a company does it in such an obvious way it has to be systematic, meaning that someone somewhere comes up with an idea, his manager gives an okay to proceed and then they chop it into tasks and other employees pick them up. There are multiple people involved. All of them know about what's happening and that it's unethical. And for what? I doubt most people running/working for the YC companies need money that badly. Are they going to buy a boat? A higher Tesla model? Invite their friends to Michelin-starred restaurants to show how successful they are?
bicepjai
What is Astroturfing ? It’s a deceptive, organized effort to make a message, campaign, or movement look like it’s genuine grassroots public support (or opposition) when it is actually planned, funded, and often controlled by a hidden sponsor (such as a corporation, political group, or other organization).
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