Replying to Avatar CrazyMyra

nostr:npub145umrlfuf9cppkgkzf08438peevqs8lqrswsu27w3txkeh4n2yysathq7w The last step is a hangover from the Twitter algorithms, which - thanks to a litany of stupid small decisions originally designed to help all real users - gave an advantage to those who had far more followers than those they followed.

A high ratio was also seen as a status symbol because it resembled that of genuine celebrities.

The algorithmic feeds hid those changes from Toad to Schmoe. You got to see Schmoe's tweets because you were following them, but you thought it was because they were popular.

Yes, there are several marketplaces for such accounts. The more public-facing side is for big ones - 25k followers and up - but there are plenty that are used as sock-puppets for misinformation that have a few thousand followers.

Avatar
My camera shoots fascists 2y ago

nostr:npub1cne6gvqcju47v4uw80ps2ksctxncrw8mq8t07ksmjf4pqmsh7uaqxlmuve

Oh, now this makes complete sense. With an algorithmic timeline that puts random people in your feed, you may not even realize that you are following the JoeSchmoe account.

I think this also explains the obvious bot followers I've been getting tons of lately on Twitter and Instagram, despite not posting there. E.g. "40567Claire" (usually with a cute Asian woman pfp) who has 756 followers, but only 8 posts and follows only 17 people (i.e. the ones who haven't been unfollowed yet).

Sometimes they also send a personal message like "hi, can we be friends?" I've wanted to see what their grift was so I've tried writing back with "hello, let's be friends. What do you like to do for fun?" expecting to be told about how much fun they're having investing in NFT's or Dogecoin. They never responded, probably because the point was just to use a personal message to increase the likelihood that I would follow them back.

Next time I'll write to @ 04557Claire and ask how much to buy the account. 😂

Reply to this note

Please Login to reply.

Discussion