Until now, no journalistic organization has questioned the ethics of buying fake followers. I've always felt it was unethical to inflate your follower count non-organically, but when I've written about it, I've mostly been alone. #
The story is actually bigger than the NYT reports, and Twitter's disclaimer that this is against their policy doesn't mention that they gifted followers to people they like, personal friends of the founders, journalists who wrote about them favorably. It was even shown that they removed publications and bloggers from the Suggested Users List when they reported on information about the company that was leaked to them from the company's board of directors. #
I first became aware of what Twitter was doing when I was online at the same time as Ana Marie Cox, a popular blogger, as her follower count was exploding minute by minute. We couldn't figure out what was going on. Thought it might be a bug in Twitter. #
But it was also happening on other accounts. It turned out that Twitter was promoting them to new users. But we don't really know where the followers come from. Because Twitter is a closed system, not an open web protocol, only they know. #
I don't think anything can or should be done about it at this late date. But people should know that if someone has a million followers that doesn't mean a million actual people chose to follow them. And don't assume that if someone with a million followers RTs you that will get you more attention than someone with a smaller follower count. #
Anyway, here's a search query that links back to my writing about this issue in the archive of this blog. #