I do see the spam propaganda, the obvious paid trolls, &tc. We both ignore them, I'm sure, and I ignored them in my comment.
I was speaking more specifically of two types I encounter:
- The fairly well spoken internet ideologues squirreling away strange rational arguments deep in esoteric threads.
- The charismatic celebrity ideologue shouting evil, stillborn, emotional arguments out of a screen.
I think it's likely that most of the former folks are inspired by the celebrities: basically just innocent fools being fooled. I think the public personalities have vastly varying complicity, awareness, motivations.
Russian external security services have, perhaps, made long and serious study of American mass media.
> well-executed propaganda == organic
Seems to me that propaganda which appears to most of its targets as entirely native political discourse has by definition been well-executed. But I know very little about information war, semiotics, or mass psychology: maybe obvious, repetitive, & transparently foreign propaganda is more effective for some purposes.
It is wise to acknowledge that we do not know at the specific goal(s) of Russia's information operations in America. Gauging their effectiveness is difficult when one knows not the precise effects intended!
> In fact, there are several factors that make high-quality, lower-volume propaganda efforts worthwhile here
Such suspicion I've sometimes shared.
But HN does probably have some immunity. The average intelligence of the community is probably lower than any one member would suppose. But there is endemic recurrence of obstinate and well-argued refusal to believe anyone else on the internet could possibly be right. (And to forget one's interlocutors are v. likely humans.) Depending on their goals, that seems a tough place for even the cleverest propagandists. Propaganda is emotional, and HN hosts a mild rationality cult.
But: perhaps there's a difference to be elucidated between propaganda and information war. The latter - specifically the tactic of attacking the very possibility of rational dialogue by obscuring facts under incessant bullshit and so imposing a general unknowability of facts - has already riven HN here and there.
Moreover, it seems unwise to trust any analysis that conveniently grants me my own special place in world events. I'm uncomfortable concluding a website I frequent is influential enough to be specially targeted. Occam and Hanlon should be consulted first.
And - it costs me little to assume there is no malice afoot at all. Having long since disdained getting angry at stranger's stupidity on the internet as a fool's pastime, I endeavor to react to all obstinately disagreeable opinions with the same equanimity - I imagine you do, too. I do not harbor any illusions about my ability to generate counter-propaganda. I'm just a guy typing (mostly to himself, as with all para-sociality) on the internet.
All this considered, I'm left wondering: for both myself, you, and the Russian propagandists, what profit is there in posting on HN? What likelihood that any of us will convince any other over even the most inoffensive difference of opinion?