"Astroturfing?" No, wait, let me guess... artificial grass... does it mean faking "grassroots" support for a project?
OT: I wish Pocket would do something like this
- Thread starter ryan123450
- Start date
^ Yep, astroturfing is the name for the PR activity of e.g. posting fake positive consumer reviews, fake forum posts and other social media publications and so on, to fabricate the appearance that a product is well-received or garnering attention by some consumer demographic and in turn making it seem desirable to others. This strikes me as almost the same - doing it above boards certainly, but still having people spread the word in exchange for goods instead of the product standing on its own feet. It's just lousy somehow.
Well the major way I am participating in the program is by posting reviews on Amazon of books I've already read. I'm not giving false opinions just to support DelRay, I'm being honest. The only thing the rewards are doing is encouraging me to take the time to do the reviews. Otherwise I wouldnt be doing that.
Yes, but consider the dynamic this causes: The people who get motivated to post reviews based on these rewards are most likely going to write positive reviews, because they're unlikely to have heard of the campaign if they're not fans, or unlikely to have much of an appetite for the rewards if they're not generally fans of the franchise. That means it hypothetically could have an effect on the positive-to-negative review ratio and computed average scores - with the goodwill mobilized essentially through bribes (well, "incentives"), not the quality of the original product. I think that makes the average score less useful than if the system worked free of that stimuli.
Of course, the counter-argument is that in the face of things like astroturfing happening anyway, someone who really wants to get a picture of the quality of a book has to actually dig deeper and read some reviews and purposefully expose themselves to differing viewpoints anyway.
Of course, the counter-argument is that in the face of things like astroturfing happening anyway, someone who really wants to get a picture of the quality of a book has to actually dig deeper and read some reviews and purposefully expose themselves to differing viewpoints anyway.
Same here. I'd been meaning to start doing reviews of my SW books for a while (to possibly qualify for Amazon Vine), but this program was the final push I needed to do it.
I'm with ya there. There's that Star Trek offical Starships collection starting soon, $40 a month is a bit steep & would land me in deep poodoo.
Maybe. We have the reward here of interacting w/ some of the Trek writers. Doesn't seem to stop us from telling their book rocked or sucked. I know winning something (potentially winning) can lead some to construct their opinions one way or another - so could knowing that if you write that Christopher's latest was dull or fantastic that he will read that could also influence an opinion.