the most interesting piece of software since Bitcoin...

[Jaime Frontero]

i'm not really sure which forum this belongs on - if there were a "Bitcoin & Politics" forum, that would probably be perfect.

my point in posting this is to offer something to think about as to where the latest crop of trolls could be coming from.  you know the ones i mean - well-rehearsed and well-informed, with the tools of the professional blogger in place.  they sow doubt and reap anger.  every incremental step is like the tiniest tap of a dwarven hammer on the walls of the Bitcoin mine...

i wear no tinfoil hat - yet it is clear that blog warfare is becoming a major part of the government's arsenal.  just because there has been no announcement of their engagement with their economic 'enemies', as there has been (see my link) with their military enemies, it doesn't mean that they are not now engaging.  and possibly, i am prepared to believe, here.

here is a starting point for those with interest, who may not already have heard of the US government "online persona management" software:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks

and for a more in-depth analysis, try the DailyKos (like them or not, they're good at this...):

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/02/16/945768/-UPDATED:-The-HB-Gary-Email-That-Should-Concern-Us-All

*************

i just kind of get the feel of this, lately...

[Jaime Frontero]

I sure hope I'm getting OT for this week

i hope you are too, brother.

it's my dime, but the value of that dime is something i can afford.

[Anonymous]

I am astonished but not entirely surprised. Haha.

[Longmarch]

Why isn't there an open source version of this software?  I wanna psyops too.

[niemivh]

"since" bitcoin?

Honey, these bots have been around for years now.

Ever wonder why there are so many stupid comments on all major news sites?  And you ask yourself: "people can't be this stupid".  Well the good news is that they are not, but the main stream media and the people they work for make it seem like the 15% of the population that is hopelessly stupid is something like 80%.  Wonder why the cover Sarah Palin when her own state of Alaska hates her?  Why the intense coverage of Anthony Weiner?  Same garbage.  The media magnifies the bad, downplays the good, obfuscates anything with nuance and complexity, and keeps those white people afraid.

The bots that do this are in the same boat, cynical manipulating of public opinion.

[Scientician!]

Fox

"since" bitcoin?

Honey, these bots have been around for years now.

Ever wonder why there are so many stupid comments on all major news sites?  And you ask yourself: "people can't be this stupid".  Well the good news is that they are not, but the main stream media and the people they work for make it seem like the 15% of the population that is hopelessly stupid is something like 80%.  Wonder why the cover Sarah Palin when her own state of Alaska hates her?  Why the intense coverage of Anthony Weiner?  Same garbage.  The media magnifies the bad, downplays the good, obfuscates anything with nuance and complexity, and keeps those white people afraid.

The bots that do this are in the same boat, cynical manipulating of public opinion.

This bears serious examination. I can easily imagine that CIA/NSA/SS would deploy semi-automated HUMINT agents to troll for exactly these types of scenarios. Hell, BTC offers seem almost tailor made for a manipulation at these vectors.

OTOH,

FoxNews.com comment threads:

http://images.media.nscdn.com/index.php?src=http://images1.memegenerator.net/ImageMacro/4630476/Cant-tell-if-trolling-or-just-very-stupid.jpg?imageSize=Medium&generatorName=Futurama-Fry&size=400x1000

[niemivh]

Fox

"since" bitcoin?

Honey, these bots have been around for years now.

Ever wonder why there are so many stupid comments on all major news sites?  And you ask yourself: "people can't be this stupid".  Well the good news is that they are not, but the main stream media and the people they work for make it seem like the 15% of the population that is hopelessly stupid is something like 80%.  Wonder why the cover Sarah Palin when her own state of Alaska hates her?  Why the intense coverage of Anthony Weiner?  Same garbage.  The media magnifies the bad, downplays the good, obfuscates anything with nuance and complexity, and keeps those white people afraid.

The bots that do this are in the same boat, cynical manipulating of public opinion.

This bears serious examination. I can easily imagine that CIA/NSA/SS would deploy semi-automated HUMINT agents to troll for exactly these types of scenarios. Hell, BTC offers seem almost tailor made for a manipulation at these vectors.

OTOH,

FoxNews.com comment threads:

Here you go:

If you google automated forum posting you get 3.8 million results, some of these companies have been in business for a while.

www.winningcampaigns.com (a lobbying firm) advertised that they'll 'go to war for you' in the blogosphere.  You can find the flyer online.

Here are some more:
http://www.news1130.com/news/national/article/58287--harper-government-monitoring-online-chats-about-politics
http://unitedhollywood.blogspot.com/2007/11/astroturfers-sock-puppets-conglomerate.html
http://ezinearticles.com/?Introduction-to-Automated-Forum-Posting&id=2793909

Read this:
http://www.amazon.com/Manufacturing-Consent-Political-Economy-Media/dp/0375714499/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1307565741&sr=8-1

[Jaime Frontero]

Here you go:

If you google automated forum posting you get 3.8 million results, some of these companies have been in business for a while.

www.winningcampaigns.com (a lobbying firm) advertised that they'll 'go to war for you' in the blogosphere.  You can find the flyer online.

Here are some more:
http://www.news1130.com/news/national/article/58287--harper-government-monitoring-online-chats-about-politics
http://unitedhollywood.blogspot.com/2007/11/astroturfers-sock-puppets-conglomerate.html
http://ezinearticles.com/?Introduction-to-Automated-Forum-Posting&id=2793909

Read this:
http://www.amazon.com/Manufacturing-Consent-Political-Economy-Media/dp/0375714499/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1307565741&sr=8-1

uh huh.

but now the alphabet soup guys have their own.  why would they use the others?

[MemoryDealers]

Any ideas on what we can do to keep the bots from spreading their FUD?

[Jaime Frontero]

Any ideas on what we can do to keep the bots from spreading their FUD?

third post...

http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=14796.0

[Nescio]

Meta moderation sytems open up a new can of worms though. Slashdot comes to mind: since they changed the site a couple of years ago they have almost made it impossible to read lower rated posts (you literally have to click through a dozen times on large threads) and it's basically impossible to get rated if you're not logged in, which means both manufacturing consent and hiding the often most interesting content of dissenting voices (valuable e.g. in whistleblower type situations, people posting anonymously due to employer etc.).

Also, some TLA with a large staff and sophistaced bots will overwhelm such systems by numbers. They could build up lots of personas to the level this is possible, then use them while building the next batch to replace any fallen ones.

I don't think this is going on here yet, the noise isn't very sophisticated

[Oldminer]

Many nazis migrated to the US after WWII. They were the masters of propaganda.

[royalecraig]

Couldn't the Bitcoin Community hire the Botnet community to do the same, or pay for 300 million Botnet Ads.

[FreddyFender]

Information unfiltered has a strange attractor among many groups that would otherwise be oblivious or unperturbed by a little known open source software derided as nerdcoin. The threat is not in the Bitcoin protocol or it's wide adoption, but in the meme change of knowledge. If allowed to prosper, Bitcoin and future iterations will undermine the misconceptions of present society and create a domino effect towards all bottlenecks or containment of free flowing information. We have brought hard attention to the commons and by using the same concepts as bitcoins (merkle tree et. al.) hopefully some kid has envisioned that phase-shift application for forums and documents.
FF

[lettucebee]

Good job, Jaime. There are a lot of naive folk here in this bitcoin community who haven't seen an enemy of the kind arrayed against us.  This will probably be new to many of them.  There will still be those who will call you "conspiracy theorist" or someone who wears "a tinfoil hat".  Damien Black, time for you to snort and scoff!

[Anonymous]

Is it a conspiracy theory to think a company would create a controlled version of the bitcoin software then trademark it so that only their centrally managed version can be known as bitcoin ?

Co-opting the entire project so it comes under the control of a corporation and has backdoors allowing inflation and tracking/registration of users ?

oh wait...

[MrCrabs]

I don't  see any problems here. We know its happening already. I have no doubt there will be Counter Social Media bad asses pointing out suspect accounts and Blogs .

[TheGer]

For awhile now Government has had departments of people whos job it is to manage propaganda online in forums, Youtube comments,  Blogs, even online MMORPG's have teams of people monitoring chatlogs. 

Yes, even this forum here has people on it sowing the seeds of propaganda.  Some of you who are awake to whats going on in the world today could even pick them out.  They know who they are, and have sold themselves out for a paycheck not knowing they will be stepped on just like the rest.

[Sannyasi]

i've never seen an article like this about it but i've had no doubt for some time about this sort of b/s

[kloinko1n]

I'm sure a lot of volunteers can be found willing to do exactly the same, but then spreading non-government opinions in a multitude of 'persona'.
I mean, how naïve can 'they' be, thinking that such a disgusting contamination of the social media would ignite no response at all...