Over the past few weeks I had noticed a number of new AN members - all with a number in their nickname - create their 1st forum post with topics that often elicit comments from other forum members.
The types of topic went along the lines of eg:
I just discovered my Thai GF has a penis
My Thai wife's brother is actually her husband
I had a ladyboy experience blah blah blah
and then the comments come in from this initial post and the thread grows and grows, often with the original poster making no further posts. The 'clickbait' has worked.
Now I can recognise these shills a mile off, so I've been calling them out as soon as I spot their posts. This seems to have upset the forum mods/owners, who have suspended me from posting
I (and many others) have also taken offence at the number of AI news stories. Again, it is not difficult to spot these.
Now I don't blame George et Al for these tactics - they are trying to up the page views and click-throughs. What I'm pissed off at is that they think their forum members are so dumb that we won't spot this!