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[Diddy X]

To enforce it they can do a little investigation after suspicious activity and fine the one responsible, not hard to do I think.

 

[kruis]

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/08/14/ftc-bans-fake-reviews-social-media-influence-markers.html

Wonder if this will mean the end of fake astroturfed hype like Star Wars Outlaws is using:

There are bot farms that try to ride on asttroturfed hypes in order to generate money through X.com's ad revenue sharing program. It's no coincidence that so many of these obvious bots have blue check marks. The point is not to create hype for a products, the point is to scam X.com out of money.

 

[Neon Xenon]

Good news. But like others, I'm real curious to see how these bans are actually going to be enforced.
Might even get to watch people and companies getting exposed for using fake reviews or social media bots. That'll be fun.

 

[peek]

Thatll stop them! Great work ty.

 

[Timberwolf25]

There needs to be some hefty fines for companies that are found guilty of such practices. It might be hard to prove, but the first ones that are proven to be doing them should have the hammer dropped on them.
It would send a message to all of the other companies to cut that crap out.

Edit: They need to push this to congress as a bill/law as well. Fake reviews are essentially false advertising. Tons of people, myself included, use reviews to decide on whether to buy 1 product over a similar product (at least on Amazon). I don't ever just go on the rating and will read a few of the commentary for the reviews at least.

 

[VolticArchangel]

Yeah, sure. That's gonna work flawlessly.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

Sorry Microsoft

 

[Shake Your Rump]

I'm real curious to see how these bans are actually going to be enforced

The same way it is in other countries that have implemented or plan to implement a similar ban: the onus is on the company hosting the reviews. They have to ensure the reviews are legit. I could suggest some ideas, but I'm not getting paid to type it out.

We have plenty of regulations that are not visibly enforced, yet are largely successful. The key is having the penalties be painful enough to make it not worth the risk. Think of cigarette and alcohol sales. These are almost completely self-enforced by the retailer. Video game release dates, review embargoes, MSRPs...

 

[dorkimoe]

Paid social media bots? Twitter might as well shut down now cuz thats 90% of it

 

[EDMIX]

To enforce it they can do a little investigation after suspicious activity and fine the one responsible, not hard to do I think.

The lolz

I don't think some of you realize just how difficult this actually is to legitimately prove.

 

[HoodWinked]

you don't have to necessarily go after the bots. you just have to follow the money.

Disney/Ubisoft pays for it, they will have some line item for expenses to online advertising and if they're not transparent would be subject to discovery. So to keep in regulation, when Disney propositions an advertising firm they will have in their contracts that they must follow all regulations including disallowing of paid social media bots and if they do not would be sued, made liable or void the contract.

 

[Griffon]

You seem awfully nervous EDMIX

 

[diffusionx]

This isn’t going to stop anything and is just an election year stunt

 

[EDMIX]

You seem awfully nervous EDMIX

nah, you guys seem awfully naive lol

you just have to follow the money.

Disney/Ubisoft pays for it, they will have some line item

You just need to watch a few seasons of American Greed or something lol

I mean, my god, sir that might be the fucking easiest thing for them to hide btw. Any company doing this, isn't going to be tracking their fucking criminal activity.

Hood be like "ok, lets check their bank statements to see if they paid for the hitman" lol

With how they are paying for it, I don't even know if you'd ever be able to legitimately tell who is paying for what

So...I'm sorry man, nothing you are saying points to some magical thing that Disney would be stopped by or something.

they will have in their contracts that they must follow all regulations including disallowing of paid social media bots and if they do not would be sued, made liable or void the contract.

Sir.... they couldn't even stop Disney from buying Marvel, Star Wars, Fox etc, but hey, this will stop em?

So even if Disney the company says they will follow all of this, that would never really stop them from having some 3rd party do this for them in some untraceable way.

So, strong doubt on all of this.

To help people understand how hard this actually is to track, Bernie Madoff was caught in 2008, for the last 16 years they have been unable to track all of the BILLIONS stolen by him.

He is not Disney, he is not this massive entity....

 

[HoodWinked]

bigger company actually makes it harder because it has to be ingrained in the bureaucracy and documented. The Madoff situation is vastly different they willing knew what they were doing was criminal, so inner folks intentionally did things to conceal and hide it and they directly benefited from breaking the laws. Some mid manager at Disney isn't going to care enough to break laws so that they can hit some engagement milestones.

and if they are cooking the books they'd get into much, much worse trouble, they have internal and third party auditors so that they don't get into deep shit. a company that's lasted for decades isn't going to risk that much for such little benefit.

 

[EDMIX]

bigger company actually makes it harder because it has to be ingrained in the bureaucracy and documented. The Madoff situation is vastly different they willing knew what they were doing was criminal, so inner folks intentionally did things to conceal and hide it and they directly benefited from breaking the laws. Some mid manager at Disney isn't going to care enough to break laws so that they can hit some engagement milestones.

and if they are cooking the books they'd get into much, much worse trouble, they have internal and third party auditors so that they don't get into deep shit. a company that's lasted for decades isn't going to risk that much for such little benefit.

I mean sure, if you think this will stop Disney from doing any of this, more power to you.

 

[Krathoon]

Wow. I did not know review bots were a thing.

I have seen places flat out lie. The BBC just did that with the viewing figures for Doctor Who.

 

[Nickolaidas]

 

[Nickolaidas]

Figured what out? I don't see anything in that post that actually shows any proof of anything directly tying any company to this.

So sorry man, but this whole "you can easily tell" doesn't work in a court of law.

We'd need some way to actually, LEGALLY prove the company did this, was behind this, paid for this etc.

So the question remains, how would they enforce this?

So this whole "if you find a company doing shady stuff" lets get to proving that first and go from there.

Thats like saying if EA wants Activision / MS to take a hit, they should fucking make a series of Ai bots praising Call Of Duty, oh their proof "you can easily tell" lol

I agree. I mean, you can't accuse the party benefitting from the bots because that way other companies or individuals would use bots to frame companies by having the bots act on their behalf. If third parties are involved in the use of those accounts, I doubt it can be linked back to the companies.

So it's like saying that murder is illegal, and constantly finding scenes of crime with no fingerprints or evidence linking to the murderer.

 

[Krathoon]

It does make you wonder how much hype around entertainment is made up.

 

[Nickolaidas]

It does make you wonder how much hype around entertainment is made up.

You only need to see how a V.P. that nobody cared about was suddenly heralded by the media as the Second Coming of Christ.

It's the same with pop culture, though not ALL. The hype with FROM Souls games was entirely created by the fans, it wasn't expected or manufactured by the press.

 

[EDMIX]

It does make you wonder how much hype around entertainment is made up.

I'm sure some of it is, generating hype is part of business. So the idea of saying 'made up" is odd as its kinda a moot point. Its like when a new car is coming out, is it REALLY some revolunary thing? Nah, but why the fuck would they market it lessor? Their job is to hype it up in the first place lol

Can someone "hype" something up that isn't a company, that is paid or influenced by a company? Sure, but that has always been something that could be done in gaming, that isn't really some new concept.

You only need to see how a V.P. that nobody cared about was suddenly heralded by the media as the Second Coming of Christ.

It's the same with pop culture, though not ALL. The hype with FROM Souls games was entirely created by the fans, it wasn't expected or manufactured by the press.

Even with From Soft games, I'm not saying you are wrong, but if someone within FromSoft wanted to generate hype, they can have their own secret campaign online spreading memes and paying instagram and Twitch streamers to randomly play or talk about the game or something lol

Thus, from your perspective it would have been "created by the fans"

How would we know who is on the take? lol

Always remember, how marketing is, is not always 100% going to look like it has come from "the press", campaigns exist where their whole goal is to even avoid any of that and only on the ground type guerilla marketing

 

[Krathoon]

I wonder if the Borderlands movie had fake hype. It should stick out like a sore thumb.

 

[Nickolaidas]

I wonder if the Borderlands movie had fake hype. It should stick out like a sore thumb.

Haven't seen a single positive thing about that movie. Critics and audience hated it.

The Gaymer doesn't count.

 

[EDMIX]

I wonder if the Borderlands movie had fake hype. It should stick out like a sore thumb.

Haven't seen a single positive thing about that movie. Critics and audience hated it.

The Gaymer doesn't count.

I mean, consider how much that movie cost to make, if they could buy that hype, you'd already have someone signing its praises or something lol

Maybe they did have fake hype, but all the negative shit about the film was too much lol

 

[MAX PAYMENT]

The FTC is basically useless. They penalize large companies for making illegal trades with fine amounts drastically smaller than what the companies earn on those trades. So they companies just keep doing it and the FTC skims off the top every time. That isn't regulation, it's contributing to the problem.

Not only that, but they're basically asleep until a lawsuit happens within their jurisdiction. Then they wake up, take some notes, change some laws, and go back to sleep. "Regulation" via litigation.