7 ms·

Am starting to feel this trolling is an industry (like troll farm) of its own - there are people or bots dedicated to trolling and reporting people who raise vo

Am starting to feel this trolling is an industry (like troll farm) of its own - there are people or bots dedicated to trolling and reporting people who raise voice against the discrimination.. I recently had to report an unfair service by virgin atlantic staff after an emergency landing - I tweeted the pictures and video of the incident.. I was immediately trolled by twitter accounts about how i should be happy that I am alive - I was complaining about how the staff handled the issues after the emergency landing .. wish the social media companies could raise voice against companies or countries that use their platform to discredit real concern - guess people do not matter anymore

windsurfer 7y ago
For those looking for context: https://twitter.com/machbio/status/1146954308086317056 https://twitter.com/machbio/status/1146954308086317056
noja 7y ago
I'm not so sure... looking at your twitter thread it seems like the usual twitter responses from people who ignore context and detail.
- danso 7y ago
  I'll have to second this. None of the accounts who belligerently responded look to be obvious bots or otherwise committed trolls. It looks like your account caught the attention of several news organizations, which means their tweets to you would have been seen by their followers. Or anyone checking out the "vs138" hashtag.
naringas 7y ago
> guess people do not matter anymore I agree with this sentiment. only groups of people seem relevant nowadays. makes me really wonder about the philosophy and history of individualism.
foldr 7y ago
What's the point in complaining on twitter about it? The situation sucks, but the airline was most likely doing its best to resolve it. It's probably not possible to plan ahead much for unexpected diversions.
AFascistWorld 7y ago
You may not believe it, the vast majority of Chinese actually love the CCP and the system, they only just hate that a few corrupt low-level officials who are the bad apples fucking up leaders' glorious visions. These "bots" are mostly spontaneous people, they are not even government-sponsored Wumao, they genuinely love China and defend it, their reason being it may have some flaws but any other country has too and is worse than China, and them being either students or comfortable middle-class help.
- zachguo 7y ago
  Whoever has been living in China knows this is true, too bad you are downvoted. I always laugh at report like this, because in reality probably such 'coordinated effort' is simply done by people from a random forum online.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- walshemj 7y ago
  That's pretty common in dictatorships, if you read Alex Kershaw's two volume Bio of Hitler he gives some examples. The response to corruption by local Nazi party members, was along the line of "if only the Fuhrer knew"
  - UnFleshedOne 7y ago
    This goes much further back, Russian peasants often expressed similar sentiments towards their tsars. Even Robin Hood stories feature benevolent king who would come in and fix everything, if only he knew.
- jknz 7y ago
  The examples given in the article are hardly "genuine, spontaneous citizens". Of course, the important question is to quantify bots vs. genuine--though the following examples are pretty clear-cut. Quotes from the article: > The accounts posted in Indonesian, Arabic, Portuguese and other languages. They promoted hookup services, posted about Korean boy bands and retweeted messages about pop-punk music. > “As a Hong Kong person who loves Hong Kong, I really miss the Hong Kong of before, which was developed and ruled by law,” @derrickmcnabbx wrote in Chinese on June 15. The account’s location was described as “Georgia, USA.” Before this year, nearly all of its tweets were links to pornography.
shmerl 7y ago
It is industrialized in case of dictatorships pushing propaganda. Normal people don't do it on such scale.
ben_jones 7y ago
It is an industry that goes way beyond Twitter and PR companies. It's incredibly popular for US businesses to pay firms in Asia, Africa, etc. to trawl social media and collect data using various automaton tools for BI and other purposes. That said I also believe a lot of trolls and political posters are just normal people voicing their malignant opinions to the point where it is nearly impossible to identify astroturfing as long as the accounts are "tenured" enough (real pictures, some age, etc.).
TearsInTheRain 7y ago
I feel like those responses to your tweets were pretty organic. Are you suggesting they were paid to discredit you?
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
swiley 7y ago
Last summer I remember a coworker telling me he was writting bots to counteract what he belived to be bots employed by republican polititions. I already felt like the signal to noise ratio on twitter had gotten pretty bad but at that point I realised there isn't enough left to ever justify exposing myself to it again.

windsurfer 7y ago

For those looking for context: https://twitter.com/machbio/status/1146954308086317056 https://twitter.com/machbio/status/1146954308086317056

noja 7y ago

I'm not so sure... looking at your twitter thread it seems like the usual twitter responses from people who ignore context and detail.

danso 7y ago
I'll have to second this. None of the accounts who belligerently responded look to be obvious bots or otherwise committed trolls. It looks like your account caught the attention of several news organizations, which means their tweets to you would have been seen by their followers. Or anyone checking out the "vs138" hashtag.

naringas 7y ago

> guess people do not matter anymore I agree with this sentiment. only groups of people seem relevant nowadays. makes me really wonder about the philosophy and history of individualism.

foldr 7y ago

What's the point in complaining on twitter about it? The situation sucks, but the airline was most likely doing its best to resolve it. It's probably not possible to plan ahead much for unexpected diversions.

AFascistWorld 7y ago

You may not believe it, the vast majority of Chinese actually love the CCP and the system, they only just hate that a few corrupt low-level officials who are the bad apples fucking up leaders' glorious visions. These "bots" are mostly spontaneous people, they are not even government-sponsored Wumao, they genuinely love China and defend it, their reason being it may have some flaws but any other country has too and is worse than China, and them being either students or comfortable middle-class help.

zachguo 7y ago
Whoever has been living in China knows this is true, too bad you are downvoted. I always laugh at report like this, because in reality probably such 'coordinated effort' is simply done by people from a random forum online.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
walshemj 7y ago
That's pretty common in dictatorships, if you read Alex Kershaw's two volume Bio of Hitler he gives some examples. The response to corruption by local Nazi party members, was along the line of "if only the Fuhrer knew"
- UnFleshedOne 7y ago
  This goes much further back, Russian peasants often expressed similar sentiments towards their tsars. Even Robin Hood stories feature benevolent king who would come in and fix everything, if only he knew.
jknz 7y ago
The examples given in the article are hardly "genuine, spontaneous citizens". Of course, the important question is to quantify bots vs. genuine--though the following examples are pretty clear-cut. Quotes from the article: > The accounts posted in Indonesian, Arabic, Portuguese and other languages. They promoted hookup services, posted about Korean boy bands and retweeted messages about pop-punk music. > “As a Hong Kong person who loves Hong Kong, I really miss the Hong Kong of before, which was developed and ruled by law,” @derrickmcnabbx wrote in Chinese on June 15. The account’s location was described as “Georgia, USA.” Before this year, nearly all of its tweets were links to pornography.

shmerl 7y ago

It is industrialized in case of dictatorships pushing propaganda. Normal people don't do it on such scale.

ben_jones 7y ago

It is an industry that goes way beyond Twitter and PR companies. It's incredibly popular for US businesses to pay firms in Asia, Africa, etc. to trawl social media and collect data using various automaton tools for BI and other purposes. That said I also believe a lot of trolls and political posters are just normal people voicing their malignant opinions to the point where it is nearly impossible to identify astroturfing as long as the accounts are "tenured" enough (real pictures, some age, etc.).

TearsInTheRain 7y ago

I feel like those responses to your tweets were pretty organic. Are you suggesting they were paid to discredit you?

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

swiley 7y ago

Last summer I remember a coworker telling me he was writting bots to counteract what he belived to be bots employed by republican polititions. I already felt like the signal to noise ratio on twitter had gotten pretty bad but at that point I realised there isn't enough left to ever justify exposing myself to it again.