Link could be changed to https://web.archive.org/web/20230611210834/https://old.reddi...

Well, time to r/RedditRequest to remove spez as moderator per spez's own new policies

The link has pretty convincing evidence of astroturfing.

What I don't understand is why take the sub private instead of deleting the post? That's crazy. Were they concerned deleting a post would create more backlash than taking the sub private? Basically the same calculus as a tyrant declaring martial law and expecting the backlash from that to be less than from allowing protests?

Is the archive link of the actual post working? Just a broken white page for me.

Edit: works by clicking the comments button. Utterly pathetic move, so stupid. You'd think reddit of all services would know how to astroturf

Most of the content/comments we see are either paid-promotion or bot-voted.

That sort of thing has been present on reddit since the start... it was how they started the site.

I'd bet they've turned it up lately to try to nullify the effects of the blackout.

Predictable and sad, really.

Are you claiming that Reddit staff rather than r/programming mods did this? Why?

It's modded by reddit staff. Hence post two predicting the sub would not join the protest.

Yeah, it was essentially the first subreddit.

> Hence post two predicting the sub would not join the protest.

Sorry I don't understand. "post two"?

Yes, the no.2 post in the link.

I hope we can keep this in the headlines. r/programming was the subreddit I mostly posted stuff from my reading list (one of the top submitters) to get feedback from comments and now I can't get in. Has the community from r/programming moved somewhere else? I'm posting here if anyone is interested: https://www.reddit.com/r/softwarecrafters/

I've started contributing to programming.dev

Knew this was going to be happening. Insane honestly.

This is an archive from four days ago? What's the news?

It appears someone is using a LLM to make pro-Reddit (ie anti-subreddit-blackout) posts on r/programming. The accounts are all under 30 days old and the posts have that classic milquetoast ChatGPT vibe to them - utterly bland, inoffensive, “safe” posts. If you’ve used ChatGPT you’ll immediately recognize the style.

> Sorry, I am not capable of generating inappropriate or offensive content.

That’s a bit more red handed than just milk toast language.

https://web.archive.org/web/20230612080526/https://i.imgur.c...

Tinfoil hat on: spez himself, right into the backend again. v2 will be rolled out to all subreddits then :D

What's "astroturfing"?

You can prob find a better explanation online, but basically faking a “grass roots” movement using bots or a brigade of users. It’s called such since astroturf is fake grass.

So organising a group of bots to influence a decision?

Less about the technique and more about the optics. Astroturfing is about building the perception of popular support. Bots pretending to be people can be astroturfing, but so can people putting up signs, people writing legislators, writing to newspaper, etc.

The idea is to make it look like support for/aversion to something is organic and popular (grassroots) when it's entirely artificial (astroturf)

In other words, its malign influence and deceit intended for some outcome or goal.

More specific than that. You could describe blackmail like that.

The key characteristic of astroturfing is that it attempts to influence public opinion by presenting a false picture of the current public opinion. It's both of those things together that make something astroturfing.

Pretty much, it doesn't have to be bots it can also be real people astroturfing something to manipulate public opinion.

The term astroturfing predates bots/brigades. It’s used to describe any fake grassroots movement

astroturfing

> the deceptive practice of presenting an orchestrated marketing or public relations campaign in the guise of unsolicited comments from members of the public.

As in what happened with Ajit Pai, Corporate Sponsors, and the FCC/Net Neutrality?