MyDD :: Fishy Commenters and Net Neutrality

Fishy Commenters and Net Neutrality

by Matt Stoller, Tue May 30, 2006 at 04:59:27 PM EST

I have a presentation I give to political campaigns about effectively using the internet. My one rule of thumb is that you shouldn't be dishonest about who you are online. Now, when doing cutting edge 'buzz' marketing of the type sold by firms such as New Media Strategies (to pick one of new marketing firm at random), it can be very tempting to play around in comment threads to generate discussion without disclosing that the commentary comes from paid operatives. It's also probably a bad idea.

I bring this up now because it appears that there is something fishy going on with commenters in the internet freedom fight. These five commenters (paulaner01, oldhats, John Rice, AJ Carey and lessgov) tend to show up on blogs and praise each others' comments promoting the anti-freedom side of the debate, and they have a bizarre focus on this one specific issue. Several bloggers have noticed the use of common talking points among these five.

Now I'm not sure that there's proof here of anything unseemly, and even if there were it's just unethical and stupid rather than genuinely dangerous or illegal. And I doubt that a reputable firm like New Media Strategies would do something like that, or that someone like Mike McCurry would condone it if he knew it was happening. But I want to draw attention to this in case this is a tactic being employed in this fight.

There's nothing wrong with commercial speech, and it's even questionable that financial disclosures are terribly important. But hanging around in comment threads pretending to be a gang of ordinary citizens commenting on an issue while actually operating as a paid lobbying or marketing operation is probably over some unstated ethical line.

Anyway, it's not really worth getting into a lather since even this tactic has been used it hasn't been very effective.

Tags: net neutrality (all tags)

Permalink :: 8 Comments :: Post a Comment

Re: Fishy Commenters and Net Neutrality (none / 0)

It seems to me that the best indicator of viral opinion marketing may be what you pointed out: the common set of talking points. I tend to look out for that, irrespective of topic at hand.

by dblhelix on Tue May 30, 2006 at 05:51:07 PM EST

An interesting set of hypotheticals (none / 0)

to ponder.

Before you win, you have to fight. Come fight along with us at TexasKaos.

by boadicea on Tue May 30, 2006 at 07:55:56 PM EST

Re: Fishy Commenters and Net Neutrality (none / 0)

It's definitely happening. I got several comments from people shilling for the pharmaceutical industry during the special election in California last year, where there interests were at stake. Same geography / ISP, same talking points. Several other Cali bloggers got the same thing.

by jsw on Tue May 30, 2006 at 08:47:26 PM EST

Re: Fishy Commenters and Net Neutrality (none / 0)

M$ been doing this for years in every tech board I have ever seen so I the jump from one illegal monopolist to another shouldn't surprise us.

by Rational on Tue May 30, 2006 at 10:26:09 PM EST

Re: Fishy Commenters and Net Neutrality (none / 0)

Is there some software you use to sift for patterns such as whether certain commenters are interested only in one issue, whether they reference only each other, whether they post on a reliable schedule or in a reliable order. It seems to me that such software would be a valuable tool.

Anybody know?

by drlimerick on Tue May 30, 2006 at 11:04:54 PM EST

A more general observation (none / 0)

We often talk about the Internet, blogs, etc. as a medium uniquely impervious to standard corporate marketing tricks (e.g. "you can't buy authenticity") but I'm not so sure.

Scrappy-looking DIY-style flash ads (produced by corporate PR firms), astroturfed comments of an increasingly sophisticated variety, etc., may be expensive, but they can be developed and purchased. I'd expect to see more of this as time goes on.

Still better than ads on broadcast media, of course, because at least this kind of faux-populism is easier to detect...or is that really better?

Here's a darker vision for you:

1. People get sick of broadcast media as a news source and go to blogs, etc. (yay!)

2. Campaigns stop spending their PR dollars on broadcast ads (yay!) ...

3. ...and start spending those dollars on astroturfing online... (uhm)

4. ...and since authenticity is difficult and time-intensive to reproduce, these efforts become very, very, very expensive... (hrm)

5. ...Making the money race even more important for those who want to market on line than it was for those who market now in the broadcast setting. (uh-oh)

I don't have any particular reason to be confident that things play out as I've described above. But I do think we should hesitate before we crow about our beloved medium's victories over corporate tactics.

Want Blue States? ActBlue.

by brahn on Tue May 30, 2006 at 11:23:57 PM EST

Re: Fishy Commenters and Net Neutrality (none / 0)

an interesting post. and thread.

by Marisacat on Wed May 31, 2006 at 03:53:51 AM EST

Interesting Post Matt (none / 0)

Full disclosure: I work with New Media Strategies and agree with your points. While I appreciate the shout out, I appreciate the benefit of the doubt even more. Agreed, this garbage isn't effective and more importantly for us, isn't our handiwork. Full disclosure - we DO work with the Hands Off coalition and employ full disclosure in any out reach i.e. http://mydd.com/story/2006/5/24/184832/5 34#4 These are important points that Matt brings up. We can have differences of opinions, but either side spamming the blogosphere isn't going to advance the debate at all. Emily West

by Emily West on Wed May 31, 2006 at 12:07:50 PM EST

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