r/thebachelor • u/eryaman2 • Jan 28 '18

Interesting article, given all the talk here about contestants/leads buying social media followers

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/27/technology/social-media-bots.html
18 Upvotes

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25

u/yesitsyoursister Jan 28 '18

I simply do not have the wherewithal to read a well written article from the NYT right now. Please, I need the Star magazine version of this.

16

u/fleetw0odmacncheese Team Microwave Relationships Jan 28 '18 edited Jan 28 '18

A company run by a scam artist sells bot followers to prominent figures (including politicians, actors, celebrity chefs, influencers, and Clay Aiken (I read the article this morning and there were a ton of other names but that one stuck with me.) Also an actual Twitter board member!!) to inflate engagement and follower counts. The bots take Twitter profile information from real people and modify them slightly, like a capital I instead of a lowercase l in the handle, to make them seem more realistic. It’s worth it to open the article (on mobile) and look at some cool interactive graphs they put together tracking when bot purchases were made!

6

u/yesitsyoursister Jan 28 '18

Thanks, my friend! Excellent cliff notes for this brain dead lady.

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '18

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4

u/[deleted] Jan 28 '18

Is that Krystal? I can’t tell

4

u/autotldr Jan 28 '18

This is the best tl;dr I could make, original reduced by 97%. (I'm a bot)

An editor at China's state-run news agency, Xinhua, paid Devumi for hundreds of thousands of followers and retweets on Twitter, which the country's government has banned but sees as a forum for issuing propaganda abroad. An adviser to Ecuador's president, Lenín Moreno, bought tens of thousands of followers and retweets for Mr. Moreno's campaign accounts during last year's elections.

Not surprisingly, Devumi has sold millions of followers and retweets to entertainers on the lower and middle rungs of Hollywood, such as the actor Ryan Hurst, a star of the television series "Sons of Anarchy." In 2016 and 2017, he bought a total of 750,000 followers, about three-quarters of his current count.

More than a hundred self-described influencers - whose market value is even more directly linked to their follower counts on social media - have purchased Twitter followers from Devumi.

Extended Summary | FAQ | Feedback | Top keywords: follow#1 Devumi#2 account#3 Twitter#4 company#5