fyi, i flagged it because it is boring reading and against the rules.
if you suspect astroturfing, flag the comments and contact the mods.
(complaining that your complaint got flagged is also tiresome. contact the mods. "@dang" doesnt work, use the email.)
I respect you for replying here though, and yes I get that HN forum standards would suggest flagging my previous comment. But it is just sad to see a place used to be so vibrant get manipulated because of how much weight it holds for us in the industry.
And yea sure, I could go and flag all the bots and message Dang. But probably time to stop shouting into the void. :)
Also, I don’t see that much astroturfing here? (And I tend to see it a lot on HN.)
I would agree now that the thread has recovered to a more interesting state, but how it first looked--combined with it being posted right after Opus 5.5 announcement--look questionable to me.
But do you really think people were so excited about cheaper versions of Astra that they were just waiting around to comment the instant this was posted? More than two comments per minute? All the initial comments were really similar too: brief one liners celebrating the cheap prices.
I think AI right now is a sort of Rorschach test. What it is clearly revealing to me is that I don't trust organizations with enormous financial incentives to not manipulate public opinion. So I see bots everywhere. :)
> what the fuck
yes, i think so.
because, unfortunately, complaining about bots (or astroturfing, or whatever) doesn't stop them. so we end up with threads that have both the potential bot/astroturfing/whatever activity and complaints, which further drowns out any interesting comments.
Anyway these comments were made when this thread was in an earlier state. I agree that it has gone on to be more "organic" looking. That doesn't exclude it initially being manipulated to the top, in my mind, but certainly they aren't carpet-bombing with only booster comments.
I see long massive pro apple threads. I don't get it at all. As in; literally don't understand what Apple is good for. But I have friends, family irl who love apple so I know the sentiment exists. I therefore accept that many HN users are similar.
Many people really truly are happy to see another model drop and are excited about progress etc etc. Surely you've met such ppl in real life. Well, they're here too (I'm one of them fwiw)
I wouldn't argue there aren't real humans excited for this drop. It was just all the circumstances around it--the comment speed, the upvote speed, the initial uniformity of what people were saying.
Anyway, thank you for the moral reminder.