Having to see people who disagree with you is violating your freedom of speech? Coming from the crowd that calls their opponents "snowflakes" this is the pinnacle of irony.

You must have missed the point entirely.

The value of reddit is that it's an open discussion forum and its supposedly reflective of public opinion.

If everything from the posts, to the comments, to the upvote/downvotes are being manipulated then its really just become a propaganda tool more than an open forum. Everything you're seeing is being manipulated. So therefore those who are unaware of this are getting a false perspective of fellow humans' thoughts and opinions, and those that are aware of it can no longer trust the legitimacy of anything they read on the forum.

I dont care, i got off reddit as soon as I realize how manipulated it was.

But this kind of thing is in the same category as fake protests, paid provocateurs, dishonest partisan media etc....... It fucks democracy up when you can't even trust that you're getting an organic public discourse. Hence the violation of freedom of speech

And that applies across all political spectrums. Its not left vs right (even if thats what OP was on)

If you think that Reddit isn't already overrun with fake corporate accounts fake corporate spammers basically everyone and anyone promoting their garbage to make money, then you're pretty naive. Reddit is simply a marketing Brown, nothing more

Why was that contentious? I'm in agreement. But I think the fervency of the manipulation of the political discussion (as opposed to corporate marketing) really began late 2016. Before that I remember much more honest and organic discussion

You got off reddit, you tell us from your reddit account.

Anyone can look at the voting pattern and comments on this thread alone and see it for themselves. Yet they expect us to think it's totally organic for THIS sub. What a joke.

Anyone can look at voting patterns overall in the sub to see how it gets brigaded and/or botted. When people like peyote have three simultaneous front page posts with hundreds of upvotes, all from extremely dubious sources about information that's just torn apart in the comments, it's pretty clear those post upvotes aren't organic.

Same way anything remotely anti Trump can't make it out of new without being instantly mass downvoted, unless it's a story so big that people from all come here to join in the discussion and overvote the bots/brigaders.

Tell us more 2 month account.

Im sure a lot of people will disagree, but truth be told the bigger problem is the people who brought the "shill" dismissal into our lives. Scrolling past some propaganda with a billion upvotes isn't hard, whats hard is writing something to try and show someone new information and they just have the blinders on, "shill"

Is this not just passing the blame onto regular users for the damage shills have done?

https://i.imgur.com/FrNrrEe.png

No -- and by no, I mean that is not something you could logically derive from my post .... its a completely different idea, its unrelated. My post has nothing to do with attempting to assign blame. If you really care, I stilll blame the the literal bots and hired shills for the problem. What Im saying is that we should make the problem worse than it already is. The shill talk is a worse problem then just having vote spam, in my view.

mmm, I don't man, before the shills you were just called a retard or idiot. What has been destroyed hasn't been the way people react to their beliefs being challenged.

The only people who care about shill accusations are shills. If someone accused me of being a shill I wouldn't care because I'm not a shill. It's up to the audience to decide if a shill accusation is warranted

But when you're downvoted into oblivion and as a result of constant negative karma cannot frequently post in places like this anymore you are effectively silenced.

I am fairly certain there are quite a few people who have gotten stuff figured out but I cannot easily land on their blogs by searching within my filter bubble which Google built so conveniently for me.

If you have something to say and you take the time and try to share that with someone else, and they just "you're a shill" thats not just like "whatever". It completely defeats the purpose of communication.

Shills completely defeat the purpose of communication* fixed that for you. Not to mention, it's against the rules to accuse someone of being a shill so really this whole argument is moot

She's not the sitting President, and has pretty much retired from public life. Why are we talking about this? Who cares, "her time" never came. She was a shitty candidate, and has no real power anymore except in the fees she commands for speaking.

I bet you think the Queen of England is just a figurehead, and that the Royal family doesn't even have any real power anymore...

Look, I hate Hillary Clinton too, but comparing her to the Queen of England? Come on man...

Strictly in terms of not believing that powerful people still have power.

You have no idea how much power she still has... behind the scenes to much more is going on

By all accounts, it seems that the Deep State has started to move valuable assets from beneath the Clinton umbrella, so I firmly stand by the fact that her power is being vastly overestimated and simply used as a deflection against the various pro-Deep State actions the Trump administration has taken, including filling his entire staff with one of the largest international bank's in the world.

Brainwashed. You hate trump. stop the tunnel vision

Tunnel vision? I supported neither candidate in the election, as the entire thing was a shit-show. It was proven early on that Trump was not what his supporters had hoped for.

There is no swamp being drained, just more water being dumped into the swamp. I'm sorry he didn't do what he said he was going to do, a lot of people were hopeful, even myself included. It's over, nothing is going to happen to Clinton. And while Trump's chances of being impeached are very low, imagine President Pence yikes, he's not going to do any of what he said he was going to do. The sooner you come to terms with it, the sooner you can move on.

Dude i fucking hate trump and the entire establishment. Just saying you instantly started speaking of trump again like a lot of delusional people here. Clintons still have very much power. Very much connections to almost every powerful person in this world, plus probably billions of disposal money

Good work r/conspiracy as a non American it good to see that this sub can sniff out this political BS.

“Reminder” = look over here not where you should be looking.

u/spez sold r/politics subreddit for $2.8 million dollars.

https://archive.4plebs.org/pol/thread/152440960/

What I want to know is how someone finds out about a job? How they find you? How you communicate? How they send you the talking points? How much they pay you? How they pay you? What exactly is the job? Who recruits? Who sign the checks? What address is in the checks? If they provide you the accounts?

I mean, someone has to have evidence about working for CTR or Shareblue. It can't be so hard to prove it.

"talentless losers to combat your freedom of speech online"

"Media Matters, Correct the Record, Shareblue, Priorities USA, American Bridge, onward together..."

So basically you mean TMoR, I think you forgot to add them to your list.

A reminder as well that Brock started his career by attacking the Clinton's

In fact much of the dirt you see to this day about the Clinton's Arkansas years was first made widely public by Brock's article in The American Spectator.

I have no idea if it's true, but the story I heard was he switched camps because some people on the right who did not like him outed him for being gay.

Back in the old days, the method was for political groups to urge ordinary citizens to send letters to the editors at their local newspapers to be published. Of course, there were "suggested templates" for these letters. I'm sure this is probably still in play but it's nothing compared to the size and speed of messaging the internet offers.

I've had friends who have worked in communications capacities for political parties (not PACs like Brock) so I'm familiar with crafted political messaging. I probably can't differentiate an employed shill from a rube but lurking in the political sub, I can definitely tell which remarks are borne from manipulative political messaging.

And they are all in this sub. As a regular, I've noticed there are times were traffic is exceptionally high. There's a glitch in their algorithm and the trained eye can see right through it.

Something something Cambridge Analytica... something something Hillary is innocent... something something pizzagate is fake news... fuck Donald Trump.

Now bring on the upvotes!

I'm sorry the answer we were looking for was russians. No points and we continue to the next round.

At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. I award you no points... And may God have mercy on your soul.

-That dude from Billy Madison

Something something David Brock.

Something something Donald is innocent

Something something Russia is fake news... fuck Obama

Now bring on the upvoted!

See how partisan politics work and how stupid your post is? Go circle jerk elsewhere

It was clearly a joke.

Clearly it wasn’t judging by your history.

Oh really? Please point me to the parts of my history that show you how clearly serious I was being?

Look through it yourself.

jeez you got some butthurt and rustled jimmies all over you man...
they splashed it all over here. gross.

Get over it, already... she lost!

But it was her turn!

Not my president!

How soon? I NEED TO KNOW

Do you have any evidence that accounts are run by paid posters or is this guessing?

....and this has nothing to do with freedom of speech.

May get some flac for doing this but every time i see a comment like yours this starts playing in my head.

https://youtu.be/m2-gDQDYcTA?t=5

May get some flac for doing this but every time i see a comment like yours this starts playing in my head.

https://youtu.be/m2-gDQDYcTA?t=5

And in the off chance that you are new to the internet yes there is evidence in the form of folks coming forward and ratting them out with pay stubs. The whole "nerd virgins" comment though I can't remember where it originated from, twitter? One of the chans recently managed to get a bunch of info off brocks server which allowed them to doxx a few of the nerd virgins..

Obviously PACs and similar organisations have employees.

I'm wondering if anyone has come forward with any direct evidence of paid posting.

Why don't you just go look at what HRC paid CTR to do? It is public record. I'm surprised that anyone could be here and not know that, but everyone can't know everything. No one disputes that there are groups paid to shape political narratives on the internet.

I presume it is just a new subject for you.

Why don't you just go look at what HRC paid CTR to do? It is public record. I'm surprised that anyone could be here and not know that, but everyone can't know everything.

From what I understand it was to prepare materials and content for supporters. And I don't recall HRC paying for anything.

Again, has anyone come forward and talked about their time as a paid poster?

No one disputes that there are groups paid to shape political narratives on the internet.

I certainly don't dispute that.

I presume it is just a new subject for you.

No. Plenty of people accuse others of being shills and cannot seem to show that any US political group pays people to post.

The leaked crap from 4Chan is almost laughably suspicious.

Seriously don't try to bring logic or facts in here. Look at the post history of the guy you are responding to, you think he cares at all what the truth is?

This is a Shill, folks. Nothing to see here move along.

Nice

When I see the itemized quote replies these days it immediately raises an eyebrow. I think they are trained and instructed to do this. I feel bad for all the reg users who do it.

It's been around for a while, back in the early political internet days when people mostly had blogs rather than social media. Look up "fisking".

Again, has anyone come forward and talked about their time as a paid poster?

There were paid posters, but all the evidence I've seen points to them being upfront about who they were.

Here's a quote directly from them, as well as (most of) the accounts they are referring to:

The task force currently combats online political harassment, having already addressed more than 5,000 individuals who have personally attacked Secretary Clinton on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/CTR_DZ

https://twitter.com/ctr_sm

https://twitter.com/ctr_mm

https://twitter.com/ctr_jn

https://twitter.com/ctr_se

https://twitter.com/ctr_ak

As you can see, their operation wasn't exactly "sophisticated". I have yet to find any actual evidence of CTR related organizations posting covertly (pretending to be regular users). No where near the type/amount of evidence found of Putin's "troll army":

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-agency.html

There are other articles, as well as interviews with former trolls, leaked documents, etc. You can search for "Putin troll army" if you want to learn more about online paid shills.

David Brock used Russia's troll farm as a template to create his own troll farm. Russia's troll farm has nothing on what Brock created in size and scope.

Nope, was literally to go on forums and "correct the record".

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-clinton-digital-trolling-20160506-snap-htmlstory.html

There are even leaked handbooks along with paystubs plus Craigslist posting.

Shill or willfully ignorant.

I seem to remember the leaked handbook said nothing about shilling on internet forums, and that's why we don't hear about it often. Can you show me where it said that?

Dude, the name of the org was initially “Correct The Record”.

What did you think that represents other than shilling online comment forums?

Brock was even later blamed by Clinton for creating an echo chamber and making it seem like she was doing better than she was.

Do some research.

Here is the link to CTR Wikipedia page. CTR => ShareBlue (same $$, same employees).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correct_the_Record

Any direct evidence that people were paid to post?

Not replying anymore, You people are lazy. Search for the paystubs and ex-employee testimonials yourself.

Lol getting down voted? Been a member of this sub for many years. This place is toast. I’m totally correct and there is no evidence that suggests CTR was anything BUT this. You can say it ended when CTR disbanded and I can’t prove it didn’t. But they did this and it’s embarrassing public.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correct_the_Record

Non-Mobile link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correct_the_Record

^{HelperBot v1.1 /r/HelperBot_ I am a bot. Please message /u/swim1929 with any feedback and/or hate. Counter: 136113}

Lol getting down voted?

You're just calling people shills and pulling the "educate yourself, shitlord" move. Are you expecting a positive reaction?

My understanding is that it was called that because the idea was to counter blatantly false posts in the internet with fact-based responses. They also didn't hide that they were posting as "Correct the Record."

I find it funny that a lot of the same users now referencing wikipedia think it's complete bullshit when it comes to the pizzagate article calling it debunked.

Anyway, seeing as nobody is providing any evidence ("Do your own research!", usually means, "I've got nothing!"), I'll address your question:

There were paid posters, but all the evidence I've seen points to them being upfront about who they were.

Here's a quote directly from them, as well as (most of) the accounts they are referring to:

The task force currently combats online political harassment, having already addressed more than 5,000 individuals who have personally attacked Secretary Clinton on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/CTR_DZ

https://twitter.com/ctr_sm

https://twitter.com/ctr_mm

https://twitter.com/ctr_jn

https://twitter.com/ctr_se

https://twitter.com/ctr_ak

As you can see, their operation wasn't exactly "sophisticated". I have yet to find any actual evidence of CTR related organizations posting covertly (pretending to be regular users). No where near the type/amount of evidence found of Putin's "troll army":

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-agency.html

There are other articles, as well as interviews with former trolls, leaked documents, etc. You can search for "Putin troll army" if you want to learn more about online paid shills.

Thanks for putting the effort into this comment. I just get bothered with the CTR obsession because it's clearly an attempt to discredit people with views they dislike.

It’s very arrogant of people that can’t conceive of anyone disagreeing with them unless they’re getting paid.

I think a lot of it is a semi-organized campaign to discredit Trump criticism.

They say the election was rigged, but only to the extent that Trump lost the popular vote - the election being rigged never seems to bring into question his electoral college win.

The polls showing his low approval rate are fake, because how could he have won if he was unpopular? When you point out that the popular vote aligned with the polls they revert to the saying the popular vote count is wrong.

They constantly spam "inorganic" or ""organic"" (with the scare quotes) to discredit the popularity of Trump criticism on Reddit. At this point they don't even make an argument for why there wouldn't naturally be few Trump supporters on this site, they just spam the "inorganic" buzzword to drive it into your head by repetition.

And then basically the multitude ways they call people shills. I love how this post goes out of it's way to only target liberal or anti-Trump groups, and then you get comments saying "these posts are always shill magnets". So, basically they're trying to create a situation where they call everyone that dislikes Trump a shill, and then if you push back against that it makes you a shill.

It's a pretty obvious conspiracy to create an echo chamber, but for some people the only criteria for being "woke" is that you defend Trump and endlessly fixate on Clinton in the year 2018.

They’re still claiming there were millions of illegal voters and that all polls are fake. I don’t understand how anyone thinks Trump is popular. Hell, I don’t even understand how he’s even rated at 30 percent.

I recall pay stubs but nobody ever pointed at what was being paid for.

Anyone can make a Craigslist post.

Thanks for being part of the problem though.

This is a Shill, folks. Nothing to see here move along.

Are you OK?

More than pay stubs and the server? One of the guys with a stub said he was paid to deal with pizzagate. Though he said he felt it was more about laundering money through art at the Pegasus museum than pimping kids to pedophiles. I think it is both. He had names and paperwork. Someone may be able to dig it up for you.

The pizzagate shills are plain to see. It's fairly easy deduction. You either have an army of hundreds and hundreds of users who are really concerned about the image of one of the most powerful men in Washington. Or that very powerful man thinks he can throw money at his image problem. Pedo apologists aren't really a thing outside of the catholic church and that is just a netowrk of pedosadists covering each others ass.

Sounds very made up to me. Do you happen to have a link still to this guy?

This is a Shill, folks. Nothing to see here move along.

Friendly

God damnit now that's all I'm gunna be able to sing in the kitchen bork bork bork

No, it doesn't have anything to do with the actual regulation of free speech.

But when people are continually harassed, blasted with downvotes, and ridiculed for having an opinion these paid weasels consider wrong think, a lot of people will either stop expressing those opinions, or start posting opinions that agree with the narrative just to get their fake internet points.

So it is an interference with free speech, because they know the psychology of how it works.

Where's your evidence they are paid to do this?

I feel this step is missing...

A user here actually did an excellent write up with plenty of links.

https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/7o4euw/yes_paid_shills_exist_and_here_is_what_you_can_do/

Here's the one about "Correct the Record."

Citing “lessons learned from online engagement with ‘Bernie Bros,’” a pro-Hillary Clinton Super PAC is pledging to spend $1 million to “push back against” users on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and Instagram.

Correct the Record’s “Barrier Breakers” project boasts in a press release that it has already “addressed more than 5,000 people that have personally attacked Hillary Clinton on Twitter.” The PAC released this on Thursday.

The PAC was created in May of last year when it was spun off from the American Bridge SuperPAC, which is run by longtime Hillary and Bill Clinton supporter David Brock. Brock also founded the left-wing media watchdog website Media Matters for America.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/hillary-pac-spends-dollar1-million-to-correct-commenters-on-reddit-and-facebook

Cheers, reading now.

There's one thing missing from that write-up: Evidence that CTR (or any related organization) was actually posting covertly. That is, pretending to be regular users, or "shills". There's nothing wrong with a media outreach organization posting online. In fact, that's pretty much their job. The issue is if they were pretending to be users not related to the organization. This is the crucial evidence that's missing.

There were paid posters, but all the evidence I've seen points to them being upfront about who they were.

Here's a quote directly from them, as well as (most of) the accounts they are referring to:

The task force currently combats online political harassment, having already addressed more than 5,000 individuals who have personally attacked Secretary Clinton on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/CTR_DZ

https://twitter.com/ctr_sm

https://twitter.com/ctr_mm

https://twitter.com/ctr_jn

https://twitter.com/ctr_se

https://twitter.com/ctr_ak

As you can see, their operation wasn't exactly a "sophisticated". I have yet to find any actual evidence of CTR related organizations posting covertly (pretending to be regular users). No where near the type/amount of evidence found of Putin's "troll army":

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-agency.html

There are other articles, as well as interviews with former trolls, leaked documents, etc. You can search for "Putin troll army" if you want to learn more about online paid shills.

Sure. They don't show up here and pretend to be regular users. I believe you. Hahahaha.

You know no one is going to believe that, right?

I assume you also believe the RNC has paid shills as well and are even more insidious since they’re the party in charge of two branches of the government, no?

Obviously. Everyone has paid shills nowadays. Monsanto, pharmaceutical companies, there are shills for movies, shills for products, they're everywhere.

Believe what? I didn't exclude the possibility. I'm merely letting people know that no evidence of it has been presented. I'm completely open to it, however. In fact, I encourage you to post any evidence you have. Would make it a bit easier for readers to research the subject for themselves.

"It is meant to appear to be coming organically from people and their social media networks in a groundswell of activism, when in fact it is highly paid and highly tactical,” said Brian Donahue, chief executive of the consulting firm Craft Media/Digital." http://beta.latimes.com/politics/la-na-clinton-digital-trolling-20160506-snap-htmlstory.html

This is the opinion of someone unrelated to the organization. I presented the actual accounts used (that is, direct primary evidence instead of opinion). You can see for yourself how they operate.

Regardless, thanks for the link. Readers can compare the evidence presented for themselves.

See front page sticky post.

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-clinton-digital-trolling-20160506-snap-htmlstory.html

I do recall one of the podesta emails containing a plan about creating a "robust echo chamber". One of the bullet points was literally "control the political discourse".

https://www.scribd.com/document/329671653/NYC-Meeting-2007-Final-Draft-4#from_embed

“Control the political discourse. So much effort over the past few years has been focused on better coordinating, strengthening, and developing progressive institutions and leaders. Now that this enhanced infrastructure is in place — grassroots organizing; multi-issue advocacy groups; think tanks; youth outreach; faith communities; micro-targeting outfits; the netroots and blogosphere — we need to better utilize these networks to drive the content of politics through a strong “echo chamber” and message delivery system”

And an earlier draft said this:

“Create a robust echo chamber with progressive messaging that spans from the opposition campaigns to outside groups, academic experts, and bloggers.”

But in general though, it is pretty much standard for every major government/corporation to have shills with at least a modest-sized botnet to do damage control/promotion.

Aaaaaand instantly downvoted within seconds with no reply. Standard.

This is the shit the sticky post on front page of the sub is for. Let’s just transcend the irritation and don’t give them the pleasure of rewards.

Edit : great response to the issue by the way

But in general though, it is pretty much standard for every major government/corporation to have shills with at least a modest-sized botnet to do damage control/promotion.

I’d assume so. I’d assume all political parties capable of doing this probably are to some extent, along with the various companies and special interests that want to push stuff.

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-clinton-digital-trolling-20160506-snap-htmlstory.html

Says the guy with a 9-day old account.

Your point being...

If I have to explain that to you then you truly aren't someone who thinks things through.

When they insult you or your beliefs take screenshots to use later as evidence of targeted harassment.

Are you perhaps being a little oversensitive to criticism?

Users here and in other conspiracy subs are being actively stalked.

Edit: take screen shots and report them to admin.

“Please don’t screencap my anti-Semitic public post!”

proceeds to screenshot another user in the hopes of getting them banned from a discussion hub

Lol y’all hilarious

Sorry? Did I ever say anything antisemitic, or are you just full of horse shit?

Anyway, I'm talking about active stalking- as in following people around to unrelated subs and harassing them, posting their usernames on unrelated drama subs linking them to false accusations and encouraging gang stalking. That shit needs to stop.

Take screen shots and report to admins.

Why are you even getting downvotes? You didn’t even mention Jews lol. The shills here are so obvious anyway

My guess is that they think if they downvote enough they will discourage people from discussing their tactics. They got caught red handed this week and they are on the rebound.

Caught red handed you say? What did I miss??

It's a long story but here's a primer. Be certain to read the PM that OP added in the edit.

Who got caught redhanded?

Stalkers.

People disagreeing with your political narrative are not all paid, nor is it censorship. The "freedom of speech" is that the government can't censor speech, like um, perhaps trying to limit the publishing of an unflattering book...

And how this sub has gotten so obsessed with party radicalism is troubling. We should all be pushing for ranked choice voting and dismantling of PACs. Arguing every media story is a waste of time and their happy diversion.

It is difficult to tell the difference between useful idiots and shills. I just assume shill and treat them like useful idiot. That way I don't break any rules and since you can't prove it one way or another you just keep speaking to them. Shills rinse and repeat the same tactics. The topics are always the same. Clinton, Pizzagate, Trump.

https://cryptome.org/2012/07/gent-forum-spies.htm

edit: Also the itemized quote replies instantly raises my suspicions. Seems to be standard practice.

Well there's also the possibility that the person is not a shill OR a "useful idiot" and just sees things differently from you.

It's more than just seeing things differently. Shills use specific tactics like ad hominems and being intentionally divisive.

It's not so much the individual shills that are the problem though. It's the forum sliding, brigading, and vote manipulation that distract from useful conversations.

Honestly I feel like there a lot of people on the internet that just have poor debating skills. Are there shills? Sure. There are groups for every organization that I'm certain are trying to sway opinions. However, I feel like on Reddit as a whole the mentality of "They disagree with me/us, they must be a shill" runs rampant and is rather unhealthy when it comes to honest debate.

No that's not it. A lot of times I agree with shills. But nobody likes astroturfing

Ad hominems are just poor debating skills. The majority of people are going to attack the person and not the argument especially when you disagree with them or they don't like what they are reading

It is a useful shilling tactic though. If they can't win the argument, they'll use overwhelming ridicule to force you out of the community. It's rules for radicals #5.

I look through a persons post history to determine if they are a shill. That tactic alone is used so commonly I could not use that as an identifier for shills. If I go through a persons account and they only post in certain subs like the Donald or politics and they do it all day then I assume they are a shill

Thats very unusual around here 

And how this sub has gotten so obsessed with party radicalism is troubling.

Honestly, though, dude... find me some comments from a radical right winger on this sub. I feel like that would be pretty hard to do, but feel free to prove me wrong. Meanwhile the anarchists and socialists are easily found.

You can't critically read the contents of this thread alone?

There are no radical right wingers in this thread, or in this comments section.

There's a guy with "red pill" in his name, but a) he doesn't really appear to be advocating radical right wing positions, and b) he's getting piles of downvotes.

Again, can you find me someone actually advocating for radical right wing ideas that isn't buried? Do you want me to find you advocacy for socialism and anarchy? I mean, I've literally had conversations within the last few days about it.

You obviously have an agenda, a bias and refuse to acknowledge the hivemind. It's like you guys brigade the same tactic, while screaming about shills and sadly, I think you guys do it for free, often with alts. But if I point that out, I'm violating a rule, put in place by the questionable shift in moderation, that simultaneously happened when y'all overtook this ship anyways...

You obviously have an agenda,

Whats my agenda?

refuse to acknowledge the hivemind.

Hivemind... like how your comments are all upvoted while mine are downvoted?

you guys brigade

Brigade, which is why I'm constantly downvoted and you're upvoted. "You guys" because your argument is so weak and your hyperpartisanship so strong that you have to insist I'm a Trump supporter.

y'all overtook this ship anyways

Y'all overtook the ship, he says, to the tune of upvotes, while I get shit on with downvotes (except when I'm critical of Trump or the GOP, then it's upvote city). You're literally LARPing right now.

My upvotes likely had to do with my comment on the mods and rules, I don't have a penis and I only LARP with nerds, IRL, yo.

What comments on the mods and rules?

You got +19 for telling me I have an agenda but won't say what it is.

You got +19 for calling me a Trump supporter when I'm not.

You got +19 for telling some one that they took the sub over.

If you actually believe that you are some kind of oppressed underclass in this sub, and aren't part of a hive mind, Democrat circle jerk... then I guess you're right, you aren't LARPing. At that point, the fantasy has become reality and you've actually had a break from the real world.

Sorry to hear about that.

Stop counting votes like they fucking mean anything. The numbers have been skewed on reddit for over a year. Jesusfuck, no wonder you like Trump, y'all both love pissing contests and the sound of your own voice.

I literally only ever get downvoted when I say anything critical of democrats or the Don 2.0 LARP.

I get upvoted everytime I'm critical of Trump or the GOP.

Why? Because this sub is a hyperpartisan Democrat, hive mind echo chamber.

no wonder you like Trump

I hate trump and have for decades, I've never voted Republican in my entire life, and I talk about how he and stone fucked third parties in the 2000 election all the time, they are some of my most upvoted comments.

But don't worry, I'm used to being called a Trump supporter by the hyperpartisan democrats who control discussion on this sub. Its a favortie tactic of yours. It works better for your LARP that you pretend everyone is against you even though all your opinions get showered in upvotes.

I'm a registered Independent.

Which independent did you vote for in the general?

I misspoke, I'm registered as "unenrolled", which means I get to pick which ballot at primaries. I voted 3rd party in the general election, and more importantly, local issues and candidates.

Which 3rd party candidate did you vote for?

Jill Stein. Johnson is too capitalist for my tastes and the green party was looking for 5% to get access to federal election funds. I knew my state was going full-blue, but there's no way I was voting for HRC or Trump. Bernie write-ins were not an option in my state, would have invalidated my vote on local issues and state reps

So as a third-party supporter, can you provide me with a comment you've made in this sub promoting third parties?

Can you provide me with any evidence that you've ever been critical of democrats on this sub? Can you provide any evidence that this sub has been anything but friendly to your opinions?

I regularly get voted into the -20s and -30s for criticism of democrats, or promotion of third parties. You got anything like that?

I'd like to believe you, since I'm a die hard supporter of third parties and voted Stein myself, but I'm not seeing it. I'm seeing a lot of "Trump sucks" and a lot of upvotes... plus a lot of "I get downvoted by Trump supporters all the time"

Not seeing this supposedly oppressed neutral third party supporter you want to present as.

You're free to scan my profile, but I did notice a lot of comments that were doubledigit downvotes on the day I submitted them are now neutral. The most downvoted comment of mine in the past few days was about drag and 19 downvotes doesn't read as liberal love.

I'm not still avidly following Jill since her election recount debacle, but I get my fair share of abuse for arguing against the GOP, Trump and Pizzagate. Oh, and the Christians and the alien believers. And I'm pro-choice on weed, but don't use it myself or feel it's necessary for enlightenment, so people "punish" me for that opinion, too.

I think you should look at your profile. You're not as persecuted as you proclaim.

was about drag

You also called everyone who disagreed with you homophobes and you also told Reddit, video game capital, that kids dressing in drag is a better hobby than a video game.

That's why you got downvoted. Other than that, you haven't gone under -1 in the two weeks I looked at.

doesn't read as liberal love

Because identity politics aren't actually mainstream with liberals? It's more of a deviant, vocal fringe.

Also, remember when you told me votes haven't mattered in a year for whatever reason? That's funny. That means those downvotes aren't accurate, right? Or were you full of it earlier?

I saw plenty of highly upvoted comments. Some highly upvoted anti-trump comments. You get a lot of upvotes from this sub, in fact your most highly upvoted comments from this were from telling me I'm a Trump supporter who took over the sub! That makes perfect, logical sense, doesn't it?

for arguing against the GOP, Trump and Pizzagate. Oh, and the Christians

Not from what I can tell. Getting voted to -1 on a dead thread is abuse, now? Lol.

the alien believers

Oh, so many of the die-hard, good-faith users of the sub who have been here for years. Good to know.

people "punish" me for that opinion, too.

Reddit is insanely pro-weed. See the note about video games.

I think you should look at your profile

Sure:

https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/7mkriw/lena_dunham_molested_her_6_year_old_sister/drvnnr7/

I made that comment 12 days ago with a bunch of the recent instances in which I had been downvoted into double digits for goin against the narrative.

Where are yours? They don't exist.

This week is no different for me... mostly downvoted into the negatives but here's my best comment this week:

https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/7nnpsb/roger_stone_just_retroactively_registered_as_a/ds3dakr/

Lol... don 2.0, amirite? Im just another random encounter in your LARP

Also, are you intentionally being obtuse, or is that in y'alls directives?

Obtuse, like insisting someone is a Trump supporter when there is evidence that they aren't and they flat out tell you they arent? That kind of obtuse?

I'm not sure how I've been obtuse in that way. It was a pretty stupid thing for you to do, though.

K, man. You think people can't decipher which alts you use? Who's LARPing now?

You "deciphered" that I'm using alts?

So is this like a concrete thing that you can actually make a compelling case for... or are you still a LARPer who is literally making up fantasies as we speak?

1) the use of the word Larp is being misued by you, which actually shows what tribe you're from

2) nope. No more "alt"ercations with you. You may use different handles, but the themes overlap. You should analyze your tells, if you're gonna sit at this table.

No, I'm using it perfectly well. You are role playing. You are playing pretend, like a little kid. Fantasy. I couldn't tell you what the reason is, but youre definitely lost in a fantasy. So lost, in fact, that when evidence is presented to you that contradicts your role play, you just sink into denial about it and create new fantasies in order to preserve the old one.

It's actually one of the lamest things I've ever seen.

If anything, your obsession with alts tells me youre probably projecting and use alts.

Tell me what you consider a radical right winger, and I'll list you a bunch of user names. Do obsessed Trump fans that post and push obvious propaganda to further daddy's interests count?

Sure, if you'd like to list them.

I'd consider anyone who espouses extreme conservative ideals to be a radical right winger.

Feels like bots in this thread. Weird conspiracy postings once again in a Hillary alefantis thread. Hmmm not suspicious at all lol

Notice how no one can actually show me "radical right wing" comments like I asked. They just insist it's real, downvote and deflect

Sounds like a karma conspiracy. Soros is after your updoots.

doot doot

Oh boy, marching orders came early today!

The fusion GPS transcripts were released.

"Engage whataboutism. Огонь!"

If that was true the top comments wouldn't be denying the gravity of shilling and astroturfing.

These sorts of threads are always shill magnets. Just watch the comments.

Genius. "If you claim everyone who disagrees with you are shills and then people disagree with you then that's proof they're shills."

Holy shit I've literally never heard that line before! Its not like I didn't call it. Again, just look at the comments.

Seriously though, does that line come from a handbook or something?

They are probably instructed to write it on a post-it and stick it to their bathroom mirrors.

lmao

I swear that in literally any thread where the topic is shills, you will see some variation of the line "Anyone who disagrees with me is a shill!" Its not even an argument, its just deflection.

Says the month-old account that almost exclusively posts in t_d and conspiracy.

Yea, because that totally makes me a shill, right?

No, just makes it weird when you complain about shills this much when you've only been here for a month.

I've been here longer. Like, a really long time actually. I burn accounts often because I'd rather not be stalked by said shills and other crazies.

The top voted comments are always the biggest giveaway

Shhhh. Those people are being paid to post here.

Were you gonna mention Cambridge analytica too? Or the Russian trolls at work?

I think the point is we need to be concerned about all of them (instead of the comments upthread defending this practice since it's not actually a 1st Amendment violation). If you're against those you should be against what these guys are doing.

Otherwise you're engaging in whataboutism too.

That's clearly not the point of this post. It's just a circle jerk about democrats being lame.

Sure but he's also right. Don't avoid my point or excuse the one-sided behavior upthread if you also oppose OP's own circlejerk.

Cambridge Analytica got 5 million from Trump campaign and I'm pretty sure had an operating budget of 25 million at one point, which is more than CTR ever had.

The problem is on both sides, though I'll admit there's clearly a vocal Democrat majority on this sub.

However, we're fairly confident what the Democratic money was spent on as it was publicized as MediaMatters, CorrectTheRecord, and Shareblue from all the rooftops. We pretty much know the game there and the players.

What did Cambridge Analytica provide, specifically?

What did Cambridge Analytica provide, specifically?

Read up Project Alamo. What the Trump campaign Project Alamo is far beyond any amount Clinton paid to Brock.

https://www.sacurrent.com/the-daily/archives/2016/10/27/project-alamo-lessons-from-inside-trumps-sa-based-digital-nerve-center

"Trump's digital team is spending some $70 million to cultivate a universe of millions of fervent Trump supporters, many of them reached through Facebook."

However, we're fairly confident what the Democratic money was spent on

I disagree. This whole astroturfing story about CTR originated from a Daily Beast writer who misread their press release. Now anytime a democratic funded group comes out, it's assumed to be a shill factory based on literally no evidence whatsoever.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/06/us/politics/cambridge-analytica.html

Some kind of secret, proprietary profiling system for targeted ads, from what I can tell. If you think that translates to a massive Reddit astroturfing effort, I don't know what tyo tell you. I don't see it, though.

There's no evidence for either of them doing astroturfing on Reddit, btw

There's no evidence for either of them doing astroturfing on Reddit, btw

Unless I'm mistaken (in which case I would welcome being corrected, with proper sources and evidence) - there is just as much evidence that CTR was astroturfing Reddit as there is proof Cambridge Analytica. I think this is what you're saying, right? Because this is not a sentiment most people here seem to agree with.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Shilling is basically impossible to prove, and neither organisation has been linked to activity on Reddit.

Because this is not a sentiment most people here seem to agree with.

I think it probably is happening, but not in the way most people think.

Thanks for clarifying. I agree completely, along with the idea that there might be some sort of shilling/targeted posting happening but it's not the pure "CTR pays people to talk about how great Clinton is on /r/conspiracy" so many posters seem to think it is.

This is the most likely sentiment all along. You can go into the smallest of the Trump satellite subs, with subscribers below 10,000, and people are complaining that Correct the Record is targeting their posts for downvotes.

I would be SHOCKED if CTR or Cambridge Analytica cared that much about Reddit, and especially the smaller subs like r/conspiracy or really anything other than defaults. If they were smart they would focus on Facebook and Twitter, where you can reach a real audience.

I would be SHOCKED

The thing is, Reddit gets millions of unique page views per month. Millions of uniques. That's huge marketing opportunity, right there. No competent business would ignore that. I remember before they started hiding metrics on this sub, I checked and this sub got 40,000+ uniques per month. That's almost half a million per year.

Now, where it differs from the popular sentiment is that while Reddit is, from a business efficiency standpoint, being astroturfed... it's most likely a very small group of maybe 3 or 4 people all managing hundreds of accounts. It would be easy to compartmentalize and cheap.

I have friends who work professionally in SEO and online branding and that's how everyone is doing it.

OK I should clarify. I would be shocked if they exist in the way people here seem to think they do --- with giant teams of people patrolling every r/conspiracy thread to downvote right wingers. I agree that it's probably in post manipulation.

I work in SEO myself and I've seen campaigns where their target is to get to the front page of Reddit, and they do it. Pretty easily.

with giant teams of people patrolling every r/conspiracy thread

Like I said, it's probably 3 people in a room. They don't need to patrol, programs can be written to parse keywords.

If you work in SEO then surely you know how easy it is to write or have written programs that allow you to automate nearly everything, including keyword targeting.

Theres a democrat majority now due to obvious shilling bud

When you see a thread get 1,500 upvotes in two hours, know where the upvotes are coming from. When they insult you or your beliefs take screenshots to use later as evidence of targeted harassment.

What test have you devised to differentiate between legitimately popular posts that get 1,500 upvotes in two hours vs. astroturfed ones?

No offense, but if you can't honestly answer this question, then you haven't thought this post through well enough for it to be convincing.

https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/7cqh4t/leaked_emails_show_wikileaks_and_trump_jr/dptoydm/

Lol

You realize that post was a joke, right? I was obviously wrong about it gaining traction.

Don 2.0, amirite?

The irony of your top-rated conspiracy comment of all time being one that insinuates this sub is somehow hostile to your opinions... is gold. Straight up gold.

evil, filthy

This is why some try to cover up Pizzagate.

Not sure how these people can take money to cover up for paedofiles, but they are already in the comments here.

To all you people who don't believe in David brocks shills

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-clinton-digital-trolling-20160506-snap-htmlstory.html

The "whataboutism" fags?

Yeah, they love using that word ...

Removed. Rule 1.

Corporate media still silent regarding Clinton's manipulations upending the Democratic party.

I sense many of those "talentless losers" are flocking to this post now.

It's getting mighty "shilly" in here.

Going to have to start sorting this sub's comments by Most Controversial and posts by New. It's been absurd the past few days. I've noticed many times in this sub when there is some "spicy Drumpf story" they are pushing in the MSM, suddenly the Reddit subs (not just this one) have an insane frequency of active users who just happen to be going along with that narrative. That's how I know it's coordinated. I've seen similar situations like this happen like when Bernie lost to Hillary in the r/sandersforpresident sub and this sub (and all of Reddit for that matter) when this stupid dossier came out in the first place. I gotta say, whoever is really pulling the strings in the media, whether it is Soros/Brock/whoever is really scared of the President and wants him gone. I've never seen such an effort to impeach a President.

The same David Brock who now also controls Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

David Brock is one weird looking dude.

Sure. They don't show up here and pretend to be regular users. I believe you. Hahahaha.

You know no one is going to believe that, right?

It was clearly a joke.

Obviously. Everyone has paid shills nowadays. Monsanto, pharmaceutical companies, there are shills for movies, shills for products, they're everywhere.

I think a lot of it is a semi-organized campaign to discredit Trump criticism.

They say the election was rigged, but only to the extent that Trump lost the popular vote - the election being rigged never seems to bring into question his electoral college win.

The polls showing his low approval rate are fake, because how could he have won if he was unpopular? When you point out that the popular vote aligned with the polls they revert to the saying the popular vote count is wrong.

They constantly spam "inorganic" or ""organic"" (with the scare quotes) to discredit the popularity of Trump criticism on Reddit. At this point they don't even make an argument for why there wouldn't naturally be few Trump supporters on this site, they just spam the "inorganic" buzzword to drive it into your head by repetition.

And then basically the multitude ways they call people shills. I love how this post goes out of it's way to only target liberal or anti-Trump groups, and then you get comments saying "these posts are always shill magnets". So, basically they're trying to create a situation where they call everyone that dislikes Trump a shill, and then if you push back against that it makes you a shill.

It's a pretty obvious conspiracy to create an echo chamber, but for some people the only criteria for being "woke" is that you defend Trump and endlessly fixate on Clinton in the year 2018.

Look through it yourself.

It's a long story but here's a primer. Be certain to read the PM that OP added in the edit.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/06/us/politics/cambridge-analytica.html

Some kind of secret, proprietary profiling system for targeted ads, from what I can tell. If you think that translates to a massive Reddit astroturfing effort, I don't know what tyo tell you. I don't see it, though.

There's no evidence for either of them doing astroturfing on Reddit, btw

No that's not it. A lot of times I agree with shills. But nobody likes astroturfing

However, we're fairly confident what the Democratic money was spent on

I disagree. This whole astroturfing story about CTR originated from a Daily Beast writer who misread their press release. Now anytime a democratic funded group comes out, it's assumed to be a shill factory based on literally no evidence whatsoever.

What did Cambridge Analytica provide, specifically?

Read up Project Alamo. What the Trump campaign Project Alamo is far beyond any amount Clinton paid to Brock.

https://www.sacurrent.com/the-daily/archives/2016/10/27/project-alamo-lessons-from-inside-trumps-sa-based-digital-nerve-center

"Trump's digital team is spending some $70 million to cultivate a universe of millions of fervent Trump supporters, many of them reached through Facebook."

My upvotes likely had to do with my comment on the mods and rules, I don't have a penis and I only LARP with nerds, IRL, yo.

Which independent did you vote for in the general?

Which 3rd party candidate did you vote for?