Weeding out fake reviews online takes care, incentive

October 27, 2013

Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission this week fined Korean conglomerate Samsung $340,000 for "astroturfing." Specifically, the Taiwanese FTC said Samsung paid two "marketing firms" more than $100,000 to hire people to "highlight the shortcomings of competing products," engage in the "disinfection of negative news about Samsung products," positively review Samsung products and, (in a bizarre turn of phrase), do "palindromic Samsung product marketing," whatever that means. Wait, what's 'astroturfing'? Samsung was fined for paying a "large number of hired writers and designated employees" to post comments in online forums praising Samsung and criticizing competitors. Astroturf is a brand of fake grass; "astroturfing" is a reference to a fake "grass-roots" movement. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Link: http://www.pcworld.com/article/2057939/weeding-out-fake-reviews-online-takes-care-incentive.html#tk.rss_all