"This whole who-is-the-paid-shill witch hunt is disruptive nonsense." - Skinner

[backscatter712]

14. All you have to do is look at the posting patterns.

First, there's the sheer volume of posts - I'm pretty prolific, but I've got nothing on some of the smear-meisters who are throwing out dozens of posts a day - that suggests to me that they do this for a living.

Then, there are the patterns - sudden swarming of threads, the choice of topics they swarm, the repetitiveness of the posts, the deliberately circular argument style, filled with ad-hominems and baiting, designed to make threads go diagonal. There's the reinforcing back-slapping between the socks as an attempt to build false credibility. Then at times, they almost disappear completely, suggesting to me that either they're waiting for the new batch of talking points to come back from focus group testing, or they went home from work.

I'm sorry. I'm past writing this off as simple political disagreement, or even the amateur trolling of the Beavis-and-Buttheads from sites like the Cave. This is a professional operation, designed to disrupt discourse here on DU.

Sorry. I can't agree with Skinner on this. I think after watching forums like DU for a few years, I can spot astroturfing and deliberate disruption.

Skinner needs to throw the shills out.