Paid to Post: is it acceptable?

[tmfp]

I've been thinking about this for a while now.
I'm not talking about paid for posting, as in signature campaigns.
I'm referring to posting in or starting a topic in a certain way, because a third party pays you, to promote a particular POV or subject in the way they dictate, whilst you pretend to be posting voluntarily.
Paid for proxy posting, I guess.
I've come across it a fair bit on BCT. Invariably the third party paying for the posts has a scammy reason, basically because no one would say what they want to have said of their own free will.
It was quite common during the Cloudthink saga and I left negative trust for the mouthpieces and the script writer, on the basis that anyone who will put their name to anything simply for money is potentially highly untrustworthy to deal with and impossible to believe.
The mods deleted one or two of those posts iirc, but the paid-to-post aspect was obvious and exploited mainly off BCT, although organized on it.

Then again more recently, the MMM Global scam has been making it a condition of qualifying for 100% per month interest (!) that members perform certain internet tasks, one of which is to post favorably in social media etc.
These tend to be mainly poor english one liners "Mavrodi is Marvellous" but there are some with 'content': I report them as paid-to-post spam and the mods delete them.

Two recent examples made me open this thread:
Whilst rifling thru the trash a.k.a. browsing "Investor Based Games", I was reading about Ore-Mine's collapse and came across this post

It's a shame that ore-mine shut down, so many people trusted them and yet so many people got scammed.

Luckily there are some honest ponzis out there. For example, for over a month I've been using Flexybit.com and have doubled a significant amount of bitcoin. The website is super easy to use and they don't tell you that they will double any amount, but that it is a gamble. Also, if you read one of the questions in their FAQ, it states "Honestly, will you run with the pot?" and the answer is "Honestly, though that is not our plan, but you should always assume that we will!"

Really flexybit is one of the only transparent ponzis out there. Of course you should only gamble what you can afford to lose on ANY ponzi website, but for some of you who are looking to receive a recompensation from your ore-mine losses, perhaps you should try flexybit. I know I have!

and just marked it down as an ambulance chaser, but then had a look at Flexybit's giveaway thread. JavaLove is there, claiming his payment for posting

Here's my entry for round 14:

Posted the friendly and positive message of Flexybit here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1330510.msg13599866#msg13599866

(just wanted to clarify, this link does take you directly to the post however because I was at the bottom of the page it looks as if I am linking the post above mine. I am not. I am linking the post at the bottom made by "JavaLove")

Here's my deposit address: https://flexybit.com/user/3NtmNuZThPDKLJfCN3XwB9dVBcrgdPbD7y

Thanks again Flexybit!

a 'friendly and positive' post, which Flexybit confirm they pay to be posted on BitcoinTalk

actually I was thinking about some boards beyond bitcointalk . org. Posts on bitcointalk are worth only 0.001 btc   since we are represented here already.

The second recent one is the MakeBelieve/suchmoon drama referred to here in Meta
I have no view on this and if I did, various knife sharpeners would be climbing all over me as a shill etc. because of the bit of + trust I have, so I'm not going there and it isn't the point of this thread.
The aspect of it that is relevant here is where pay-per-post is being offered to post something which would not normally be posted by that person, as in this related topic

So, a two part question really
1) Is a post made solely for payment to specifically push a POV or service acceptable, or is it reportable for deletion?
2) As some have already been deleted and some not, where is the dividing line between acceptable and unacceptable?

Thanks.
 

[subSTRATA]

so essentially, youre asking if shilling is acceptable. ethically, i would say its sketchy; if youre paying people to post and take a certain side on an issue, theres clearly a reason for that, one that is most likely intended to cover something up or derail opposition. however, it doesnt really go against the forum rules, people are just posting after all. to be marked for deletion, the posts would have to explicitly break the forum rules (off topic, insubstantial, pointless / redundant, etc), and knowing how tolerant theymos is, they wont be deleted on the basis of shilling alone.

[Quickseller]

From strictly a forum rules point of view (this thread is in meta, so I would assume you are asking about this point of view), yes this is allowed. What you are describing is essentially the person paying for the threads to be created is engaging in paid speech, which is a constitutionally protected form of speech (in the US).

I would say that if a thread is not something in which any kind of conversation can be had (ex, it is a pure advertisement) in such thread, then it should be deleted. The same is true if it is essentially a duplicate of another thread/post.

From a "what does the community think of this practice" point of view, I think it is much less clear cut. This is something that I would probably not engage in personally, although can understand why others would want to engage in this practice.

Another example of this activity is likely the block size debate. Although I do acknowledge that some people do have genuine opinions and feelings on this debate, there is no doubt in my mind that there are people on both sides that are engaging in this kind of activity.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I came across the suchmoon/makebelieve drama just recently in that thread where makebelieve is offering people to basically be paid trolls.  I posted my opinion there that it is in fact paid trollwork and I can't see it being anything but that.  He's paying people to express an opinion that they most likely don't have.  I think he called it "diluting her bullshit" or some such phrase, but it is going to have the effect of multiple people trolling everything she posts and that is against the rules I think.

[capcher]

I don't think shilling is okay.

But it is hard to prove that shilling has taken place unless it's like the one you posted where the poster said "I posted what you want. Now pay me bitcoins".

[ABitNut]

Paying for posts in itself is fine.

Paying for posts to do any of the below is not fine:
Spamming is not fine.
Trolling is not fine.
Shilling is not fine.
Using sock puppets is not fine.

Being paid for a post doesn't mean the post will be spam/trolling/shilling (though it usually is). If person A offers to pay person B to write a post on the block size debate and let's person B free to write what they want, that's fine with me. I'd consider it tipping. If person A dictates the content though Person B is a shill and should give full disclosure (which would change it from shilling to advertising). Otherwise it's not fine.

[SFR10]

For me, the acceptable one would be if someone pays few people to engage in a topic he created, as long as whatever they put into each post, is true and valid but  it's not acceptable if participants get paid for posting fake result that would trick others into trusting that certain service as a whole.

[MyBTT]

It is definitely not acceptable. But people these days will do anything to get paid. Even if it means advertising a scam website.

[Undermood]

It is definitely not acceptable. But people these days will do anything to get paid. Even if it means advertising a scam website.

It is not acceptable if it is troll, spam, backmail, ponzi  etc. I am fine with the genuine advertisement which is for real business.

[mexxer-2]

Posts are more or less fine, its better(bad for the shills) if the (ad-spam)post was made by a newbie as patrollers are strict about it. I've reported many MMM spammers and all of their posts get deleted.
As for higher ranked members, the posts themselves should be fine(not according to the community however, shilling for a ponzi makes me feel obligated to neg) , however threads more than ~3 about the same service about how it is "Paying" etc, should be deleted(and from what my report accuracy is, I'd say it is being deleted)

[Joebrann]

It's definitely not a clear cut issue. People might get paid for certain posts that they engage in but it might be a coin let's say. If I was paid to post about XMR all the time I would. (I Do Anyway) because I believe in that coin and it's anonymous chain. So in sense people could be doing it for something they believe in that they are getting compensation for. Big companies pay people who believe in there philosophy and such. Google, Apple, Samsung and many others.


So I say it is excepted in my eyes but only for certain things people get paid to spam but where can you draw the line without affecting other people.

[twister]

I don't think it is acceptable but its hard to differentiate if the person posting on a subject is actually paid to do so or just saying things they really mean. It's definitely wrong to vouch for things you don't know anything about and which could potentially harm others financially.

[dogie]

I think there are two separate things being discussed in here. Paid to Post (PtP), and Paid to Opinion (PtO). I see no problem with PtP as long as they conform to the forum's rules and are constructive and useful, while PtO should be considered as alt'ing.

The extreme advantage is if someone posts something controversial (ie an attack), and then uses 5 of their PtP accounts to join in. It wouldn't be allowed if it was one guy with 6 accounts so it shouldn't be allowed if its 1 guy paying for 5+1 accounts. In either scenario, enforcement is near enough impossible though, so I'm not sure where that leaves this discussion.

[RodeoX]

I assume the FUD-spam posts here are paid for. The sheer volume of posts is so great that it is illogical to think they are just for fun.

[shorena]

I think there are two separate things being discussed in here. Paid to Post (PtP), and Paid to Opinion (PtO). I see no problem with PtP as long as they conform to the forum's rules and are constructive and useful, while PtO should be considered as alt'ing.

The extreme advantage is if someone posts something controversial (ie an attack), and then uses 5 of their PtP accounts to join in. It wouldn't be allowed if it was one guy with 6 accounts so it shouldn't be allowed if its 1 guy paying for 5+1 accounts. In either scenario, enforcement is near enough impossible though, so I'm not sure where that leaves this discussion.

Nicely distinguished. I think PtO is more common than most think though. That lengthy review on amazon, the article in your favorite magazine, the youtube review you liked so much, the blog article about that awesome product? Most likely bought. 'SEO-experts' and 'digital influencers' are all over the place. Why should this place be any different? How could you even distinguish between PtO and PtP or Paid to Review (e.g. by giving you the product for free) without bias?

Recently a few hardware reviews poped up and I am not entirely sure the person actually bought them. I suspect at the very least they got them for free to write a lengthy post about them here. As long as the opinion was not dictated I hardly see a problem with it, even though I wish it was clearly labeled as such. That would probably reduce the marketing value though.

[kingaltcoins]

The topic title would be better if you state "Paid to review" because what you stated in op clearly signifies that as a whole.

I think paid to review is great for legit services which are more beneficial for people as a whole. But it is more harmful to newbies if you review a ponzi for being paid. This will result in a bad reputation to you when they dig out the actual truth. For example Yahoo was somehow promoting Ore-Mine always by saying that it was online for more than 2 years and will never fail. But his reputation got lowered, now nobody will believe him in at a first glance.

One thing is most important here and that is money cannot buy your reputation.

[1Referee]

I don't mind people who do this as long as it isn't for cloud mining, ponzi, or any other scam related thing. If it is to review an hardware wallet for example, then I don't mind it. If you simply use your common sense and do some actual research about the product, then you can easily avoid buying something which isn't being the product as it was advertised. People are doing this as well on youtube and these videos mostly get a lot thumbs down because they are too obvious.

[BitHodler]

I find it to be NOT acceptable, however the forum administrator will not do anything against these people as long as they are not breaking any rules.

The answer to your question is: It is not against the forum rules and thus there is nothing wrong with doing this when the person has not the intention to scam or steal.

[Astargath]

I remember some guy who came to the gambling section claiming that he won like 13 btc or something like that in a roulette game, don't remember the site. People found out he was lying and that he was only promoting the site and as far as I remember the thread got deleted by a mod. I guess it depends on how big the offense is but I would consider promoting a ponzi because you are paid for it to be a baneable offense.

[Dahhi]

It is not entirely wrong to be paid to post provided you are not trying to scam people. At least I don't think it is against the rules of this forum.