what does "shill" mean??

Thrill

I see the word "shill" a lot, but i dont know what it means.
I would hate to be banned for doing something i dont know about.

Thank's.

Oriel

You've actually heard of google, right?

Goodshape

A shill would be someone hired by a company to give favourable reviews of the company's products/services on a web forum.

The sneaky thing is that these shills will often keep their affiliations with the company secret in the hope that they will be seen as 'just another happy customer'.

Rabies

thrill, Feedback is used for general site questions and the odd rant

You are not long joined, don't worry you are not expected to know the run of the place just yet. After Hours would have been more suited to your question.

Sometimes using google or wikipedia is faster.

Anyway, here is a link from wiki
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shill

Thrill

Thanks.
I actually did use google but i typed in shilling, which is the way i have seen it
used in sentences. I got a lot of rubbish about the old five penny coin,
which only added to my confusion.
If i have wasted your time then i offer you my most groveling apology.

Now i'm off to find After Hours.

Karoma

¬_¬
I've hidden it.



Some wonderful definitions here:
http://www.google.ie/search?hl=en&q=define%3Ashill&btnG=Google+Search&meta=

DublinWriter

Shill is Yiddish in origin. It basically originated from the '3-Card Monty' or 'Find-the-Lady' street card games set up by sharks in NYC in the 50's.

Basically the 'Shill' was the stooge employed by the shark to come up and appear to win loads of money, therefore generating interest in passers-by to come and play the game.

Thrill

Karoma wrote:

¬_¬
I've hidden it.

Not very well, my good man. Found it straight away.
Best forum on the site.
Now, my work here is done, but fear not, i may pass by this way again some day.

hi ho silver...awaaaaayyyyyyyyyy

D

On a completely unrelated topic, (well not really it does involve shills and other muppets) kudos to Beruthiel. She is streaking up the LoB, 2nd last time I checked.

Edit: Bad spelling ftl!

Hobbes

type this in google...

define:shill

Shills are also sometimes fake bidders who push up the bidding price.

There is also...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shill

Talliesin

Hobbes wrote:

Shills are also sometimes fake bidders who push up the bidding price.

That sense is the origin of how we use it here, by extension.

and how might one find a shill

what if they are just a happy customer?

\me ponder's for a while

Hmmmmm!

The Sweeper

Often times, the giveaway a newly registered account with 20 posts or less. (Very often they've only managed about three posts before "I did meh sh0ppin @ dese boyos der great www.mymatesbusiness.com" appears.)

Shills, people who are actually HIRED to promote someone elses business (and therefore won't get any benefit through a bit of self-promotion) are paid on both quantity of spam and quality of hits - so it's not worth their while building up a trustworthy user profile just to post one link that remains undeleted but disappears off the front page of the board within hours.

For instance, I doubt sinecurea is a shill for Google.

You can often tell by the nature of their contribution up to the point where the review, reference, link or bit of promotional bumpf appears.

You can also get negative shills - "My friend went to eat in Restaurant del Food and she had a horrible time, I'd never ever go there ever."

If you try and engage a shill in conversation about their promotion either they won't respond (they've moved on and their account will remain unused forevermore) or they'll answer you by repeating their original promo with no further detail.

If you PM them pointing out how their post looks suspicious, you'll rarely get a repsonse.

thats seems like a massive waste of time

and resources too! Think of all those dormant account's

John

There's actually only 14 real accounts on boards. I myself am 49 shills.

biko

coolsmileygirl wrote:

thats seems like a massive waste of time

and resources too! Think of all those dormant account's

Won't someone please think of the accounts

Cuddlesworth

Example of a shill, ignored as usual on the comp-tech forum

http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055009902

Did you report it?

Cuddlesworth

Didn't bother.

DeVore

"what if they are just a happy customer?"

Thats the problem with them. They piss in the "trust pool" we share online. Ok, I dont trust many people online but if I'm involved in a lowkey discussion of (say) games, I want to more or less take people at face value. I certainly DONT want to be talking to a group of which 2-3 are in the paid employ of a game-distributor. I could rant for hours about this topic but I wont (again).


"Massive waste of time."
Yes, another in a list of downsides of shills. They have no upsides either.

DeV.

brianthebard

Minesajackdaniels wrote:

For instance, I doubt sinecurea is a shill for Google.

We are all a shill for google, we just don't know it yet.

InFront

I can't believe that can be a common thing. Who would actually pay their employees to create accounds and log onto internet boards just to speak well of a product without getting caught? Sounds like a lot of effort for questionable gain.

Who here likes Brennan's Bread? Available in brown or white.
It's nutricious and delicious. And the change is in your pocket.

aidan_walsh

Who would actually pay their employees to create accounds and log onto internet boards just to speak well of a product without getting caught? Sounds like a lot of effort for questionable gain.

Third party companies recruit anyone who wants to make a bit of cash to do it for them, so you have bored housewives, teens, students, etc doing it. I believe there is also something of a lucrative business of it running in countries like Korea as well.

Sparky

I think a post in the dome puts it well

DeVore: Hi girlfriend, how are you today.

Girlfriend: I'm fine DeVore, got up this morning and had some delicious Crunchy Nut Cornflakes. Then I settled back and watched Oprah on my fantastic 42 inch Sony Bravia Plasma Television and later on I'm gonna drive my top of the range Mercedes S- Class into town.

DeVore Get the fcuk out of my house you fcuking SHILL. You fcuking disgust me.

Talliesin

InFront wrote:

I can't believe that can be a common thing.

It's common enough that we get plenty of the little pricks.

InFront wrote:

Who would actually pay their employees to create accounds and log onto internet boards just to speak well of a product without getting caught?

Some do it themselves, some hire students or people who want to be able to work a couple hours a week. In some cases bands, radio stations (or one particular DJ, who is hence banned) encourage fans to do it for free.

InFront wrote:

Sounds like a lot of effort for questionable gain.

We do our best to make the gain zero or negative.

cast_iron

thrill wrote:

Thanks.
I actually did use google but i typed in shilling, which is the way i have seen it
used in sentences. I got a lot of rubbish about the old five penny coin,
which only added to my confusion.
If i have wasted your time then i offer you my most groveling apology.

I love the logic.
You want to find out what "shill" means, so you type "shilling" into google. It doesn't work so you come here and ask what "shill" means!

Apology accepted.

Karl Hungus

aidan_walsh wrote:

Third party companies recruit anyone who wants to make a bit of cash to do it for them, so you have bored housewives, teens, students, etc doing it. I believe there is also something of a lucrative business of it running in countries like Korea as well.

Where do I sign up?

Thrill

cast_iron wrote:

I love the logic.
You want to find out what "shill" means, so you type "shilling" into google. It doesn't work so you come here and ask what "shill" means!

Apology accepted.

Read the post.

i typed in shilling, which is the way i have seen it
used in sentences.

cast_iron

Yea, I did. I also read this:

thrill wrote:

I see the word "shill" a lot, but i dont know what it means.
I would hate to be banned for doing something i dont know about.

Thank's.

Forgive me for thinking what you wanted to know the meaning of "shill" was .

Cuddlesworth

Remember the website devoted to the Psp, which attracted the attention of something awful who tracked it down to a marketing company. Thats a shill, a paid advertiser who pretends they are un-biased. Like most internet review sites.

DeVore

Honest to God if any girlfriend of mine said that to me in the morning as a response to "how are you" I'd dump the vaccous materialistic cow! LOL

So I guess its relatively accurate and also probably explains why I'm single...

DeV.

Terry

what does "girlfriend" mean?

Sparky

DeVore wrote:

Honest to God if any girlfriend of mine said that to me in the morning as a response to "how are you" I'd dump the vaccous materialistic cow! LOL

So I guess its relatively accurate and also probably explains why I'm single...

DeV.

Dev is at his best when no wimmen are around. He can relax and take it easy!

DeVore

In the immortal word of Worm from Rounders: "In the poker game of life, women are the rake".

(I'm sowwy Ruthie, Thead, tSubh et al.... um, Asok made me do it. yeah.)

DeV.

Time Magazine

First you get the money, then you get the powa, then you get to deal with the idiot on HelpDesk who can't read the sticky, then you get.... the women.

Sleepy

Talliesin wrote:

We do our best to make the gain zero or negative.

Just throwing this out there, how about a hall of shame page?

List all the companies the mods have caught shilling on boards.ie. Knowing a company was at this would certainly discourage me from giving them any business.

Fight the [strike]powah[/strike] shills.

Gordon

Sleepy wrote:

Just throwing this out there, how about a hall of shame page?

List all the companies the mods have caught shilling on boards.ie. Knowing a company was at this would certainly discourage me from giving them any business.

Fight the [strike]powah[/strike] shills.

The biggest shills that I have seen have been Universal Music. DeV has a blog post about it iirc.

They had a heapload of shills working away in the music fora acclaiming newand old bands. Univershill Music.

Sleepy

Yeah, I remember that. Just thought a section dedicated to shaming shills / helping boycot the companies they work for might make a (small) difference in terms of the practice or perhaps a larger one in terms of putting off shills that post here?

DeVore

I love the idea but its fraught with danger. We put up such an "allegation" and list the company... its then up to us to prove it if they challenge it. Personally, I'd be happy to do so (and have done with Univershill) but it requires careful level headed consideration. (Probably not my strong suit!)

I'm not saying no, I'm saying there is a flip-side that needs considering...

DeV.

Nevyn

Uh huh blame poor Asok...
Really there is only one way to respond to that

Worm: She's really got him by the balls.
Petra: That's not so bad, is it?
Worm: It depends on the grip!

:P

google work from home with broadband and you will see the ammount of companies that will pay you to sit and corrupt online communities.
This is also happening with blogs.

I mean really even my kids think advertising is dum and have wondered what a world with out it would be like and could not all the ad posters be replaced with pretty pictures or at least something intresting to look at.

As boards.ie get bigger this will become more of a problem as it wil be harder to get to know the many posters that start to make up the regulars of a forum.