You seem to be joking but it actually is well documented.
The 50 Cent Party, or 50 Cent Army, is the colloquial term for Internet commentators, who are hired by Chinese authorities in an attempt to manipulate public opinion to the benefit of the Chinese Communist Party. It was created during the early phases of the Internet’s rollout to the wider public in China.
The name is derived from the fact that such commentators are reportedly paid RMB¥0.50 for every post.
Thanks, I hadn’t heard of them. Thought this was interesting:
Authors of a paper published in 2017 in the American Political Science Review estimate that the Chinese government fabricates 488 million social media posts per year.
Now with increased focus on social media and LLMs I’d be surprised if it isn’t well into the billions.
I blocked Hexbear and they made accounts on lemmy.ml. if I block lemmy.ml they’ll just make accounts somewhere else. We need to collectively become aware of the problem and deal with it together.
Deal with them just like regular trolls. You shouldn’t be like the Muskrat cultists who think content moderation is useless and thus should be given up on. I understand, I suffered from activism burnout on the regular (one was right in the middle of an election campaign), but one should not give up easily.
That’s not at all what I am saying. I am saying it’s easier to do moderation on more centralised platforms like Reddit, because moderators simply have more power and more tools there. The flip side of that being that it makes it easier for moderators and admins to abuse and ban people without recourse. I am not saying moderation is pointless at all, just that it’s easier with one platform than the other. There are pros and cons to both models.
I would argue being open source and decentralised are major advantages of Lemmy and are more than sufficient to justify its existence. Just that it also isn’t perfect either. There are always trade-offs to be made when designing a platform, and that’s something you should always bear in mind.
Centralized platforms are also prone to the same kind of attacks. Kiwifarms and especially its users’ offshoot Discord and Matrix chatrooms are good example for this. Hell, even 4chan was infamous for organizing troll campaigns, first just “4 teh lulz”, then people turned the site into their personal army.
Yes, but it’s still way easier to pull off having multiple accounts and evading bans on lemmy
Comparing lemmy to 4chan is completely disingenuous. It has virtually no moderation by design. That’s what its whole reputation is staked on.
Discord is also a different kind of platform. You can’t read into servers you aren’t a part of, or participate in them. The dynamics there are very different, and most servers are invite only.
To me one of reddits main problems is their moderators and how overzealous they can be. I am relieved to see lemmy doesn’t give mods or site admins as much power over others, even if that causes problems from time to time. Someone else might see it differently though.
Enshittification also happens because of government propaganda, like the authoritarian propaganda Lemmy.ml spreads for the CCP.
Aee you suggesting people on Lemmy.ml are paid by the Chinese government to spread propaganda?
Some of them yes, absolutely.
Do you have any source for that? I would be curious to see.
Let me ask friend in the CCP to send some of their files over for you to look at, it’s all very open and well documented.
You seem to be joking but it actually is well documented.
The name is derived from the fact that such commentators are reportedly paid RMB¥0.50 for every post.
Thanks, I hadn’t heard of them. Thought this was interesting:
Now with increased focus on social media and LLMs I’d be surprised if it isn’t well into the billions.
I think, they are only paid indirectly in that the money are spent on propaganda to make them act like this
That’s a single instance, they can be blocked and avoided. The FOSS community is way more resiliant to enshittification.
I blocked Hexbear and they made accounts on lemmy.ml. if I block lemmy.ml they’ll just make accounts somewhere else. We need to collectively become aware of the problem and deal with it together.
Not really, their users make alts everywhere else too. It’s also quite easy just to keep setting up new instances too.
Deal with them just like regular trolls. You shouldn’t be like the Muskrat cultists who think content moderation is useless and thus should be given up on. I understand, I suffered from activism burnout on the regular (one was right in the middle of an election campaign), but one should not give up easily.
That’s not at all what I am saying. I am saying it’s easier to do moderation on more centralised platforms like Reddit, because moderators simply have more power and more tools there. The flip side of that being that it makes it easier for moderators and admins to abuse and ban people without recourse. I am not saying moderation is pointless at all, just that it’s easier with one platform than the other. There are pros and cons to both models.
I would argue being open source and decentralised are major advantages of Lemmy and are more than sufficient to justify its existence. Just that it also isn’t perfect either. There are always trade-offs to be made when designing a platform, and that’s something you should always bear in mind.
Reddit also has a ton of money they can dedicate to countering disinformation compared to no budget for it in the Fediverse.
Centralized platforms are also prone to the same kind of attacks. Kiwifarms and especially its users’ offshoot Discord and Matrix chatrooms are good example for this. Hell, even 4chan was infamous for organizing troll campaigns, first just “4 teh lulz”, then people turned the site into their personal army.
Yes, but it’s still way easier to pull off having multiple accounts and evading bans on lemmy
Comparing lemmy to 4chan is completely disingenuous. It has virtually no moderation by design. That’s what its whole reputation is staked on.
Discord is also a different kind of platform. You can’t read into servers you aren’t a part of, or participate in them. The dynamics there are very different, and most servers are invite only.
To me one of reddits main problems is their moderators and how overzealous they can be. I am relieved to see lemmy doesn’t give mods or site admins as much power over others, even if that causes problems from time to time. Someone else might see it differently though.