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what does clearly automated mean

For now, it's just removing AutoModerators and things labeled as bots. Now that I'm reading this again, I realize doesn't really help, since bots pretending to be people recommending products, don't get filtered out.

That strikes me as very naive. Reddit bots are never marked as bots, that's the whole point of astroturfing. Youtubers aren't diligent about disclosing sponsorships either, regardless of what their ToS say.

Slightly outdated (2018), but they found that only 10% of Youtube videos disclosed sponsorship: https://www.engadget.com/2018-03-28-youtube-influencers-spon...

A recent report by the European Commission found that only 20% of overall "influencer" posts disclosed sponsorships: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_...

I think this is a very good point. We've focused a lot on correctly matching reviews with products / brands, but haven't taken hard enough of a look at astroturfing.

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