over 200,000 Facebook posts per day by Russian trolls, says whistleblower

[uhnope]

Amazing article where a former troll for the Russian government explains what it was like.

For Facebook trolling, the whistleblower said there are 40 rooms filled each with 20 people with a quota of 135 posts per day, in two twelve-hour shifts per day. He compared it to an Orwellian Ministry of Truth.

I got curious because the first rabid Trump for President ad I saw on FB linked to a website that had a whole tab on explaining Putin. WTH is the Russian gov paying for ads on Facebook in support of Trump?

http://www.rferl.org/content/how-to-guide-russian-trolling-trolls/26919999.html

[KG]

1. I lulz'd

[Scientific]

2. OMG. Trump and Repulicans in league with The Dark Side?

Typical.

[joshcryer]

3. Trump would be seen as slowing Russia's decline.

If not bolstering Russia's influence in Eurasia. Particularly, they want NATO to go bye bye.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

4. Putin's agenda is to fuckup the West, create disarray, and divert attention from economics at home

His bet on Trump is stupid and foolish, because not only would Trump fuckup the USA, but he would fuckup the rest of the world too and destabilize it, leading to more problems for Putin, not less. Putin is a child at democracy and is reaching for the boiling point on the stove of the US election. Putin is clever, but not wise.

(note: I don't often use the f-word, but this seemed fitting since it was not as an expletive but as a descriptive verb.)

[Bernardo de La Paz]

5. Web Brigades, Troll Army

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_brigades

[DetlefK]

6. "Russia Today" uses a similar technique for orchestrating propaganda:

RT follows a different pattern than these professional trolls, but it's still a pattern: RT simply tells you half the story.

1. First they define the topic and headline.

2. Then they include those facts that support the story, and only those facts. (When russian and english hooligans clashed in Marseille, RT went out of its way to avoid connecting russian hooligans with violence. When english hooligans had attacked, the bad guys were "english hooligans". When russian hooligans had attacked, the bad guys were "hooligans" in general.)

3. And then they embellish the article by going on tangents and refering to other topics that have little to nothing to do with the actual sensationalist headline. (There was an article about the Olympics in Rio. The headline was that Washington is sabotaging Brazil. But the part of the article that actually dealt with that was a brazilian politician who thought that Washington was responsible for the bad press the Olympics in Brazil are getting. Only 40% of the article was about the topic of the sensationalist and accusatory headline. The rest was filler.)



The technique is: Bombard the readers with bullshit until they can't tell fact from fiction and then tell the half of the story that you like.

Almost like what those professional russian trolls are doing: Set up a fake discussion so you have a pretext to mention talking-points.

[awoke_in_2003]

7. How many do they post here? nt

[allan01]

8. @ awake in_2003

i was thinking that too. hmmm

[greiner3]

9. Well

That one group only had $1,000,000 to spend on Internet trolling.

Not sure if that budget is spent or not

[awoke_in_2003]

14. I could use

some extra cash

[Mendocino]

10. Putin is fellagood dah.

I like, understood much not. Strong like bear. Make Russia again powerful. Trump only the hope for people US.



Ok I guess they wouldn't be this obvious.

[awoke_in_2003]

15. Nyet, comrade

I mean fellow Merkin

[lame54]

11. "WTH is the Russian gov paying for ads on Facebook in support of Trump?"...

can you think of a better way to nuke the U.S.?

[edhopper]

12. we had one or two of them here.

Constant RT and SputnikNews posts.

[AgadorSparticus]

13. He is in bed with the Russian mafia. Why else would they try to hack into the DNC? & not the gop?

Here'sa couple interesting reads on it....

"There have been multiple media reports about Donald's business dealings with the mob, with the mafia," Cruz said Feb. 28. "Maybe his taxes show those business dealings are a lot more extensive than has been reported."

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/mar/02/ted-cruz/yes-donald-trump-has-been-linked-mob/

Former Mafia-linked figure describes association with Trump

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/former-mafia-linked-figure-describes-association-with-trump/2016/05/17/cec6c2c6-16d3-11e6-aa55-670cabef46e0_story.html