Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun One who engages in astroturfing—the disguising of an orchestrated campaign as a "grass-roots" event.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • I doubt the accused poster on the Brokaw thread is an "astroturfer".

    "You are also a paid astrotroller." Ann Althouse 2008

  • I look forward to ZDnet's damaging breakdown of the whole Microsoft "astroturfer" campaign, in which untold hundreds of people are paid from Microsoft coffers to masquerade as genuine Microsoft users, while they stream a constant flow of lies and deliberate pro-Microsoft, anti-Microsoft-competitor distortions to magazines and tech News web sites like ZDnet.

    Daring Fireball John Gruber 2010

  • Are you for real or just another "astroturfer" spinning for Fairpoint.

    UnionLeader.com -- RSS feeds -- New Hampshire news, business and sports 2009

  • He blogged at the climate denialist Cooler Heads Coalition, an industry astroturfer closely tied to the think tank and astroturfer Competitive Enterprise Institute CEI.

    Shawn Lawrence Otto: Climate Scientist Wins A Round for America Shawn Lawrence Otto 2011

  • Mark Block, fresh from the Wisconson branch of the Koch-family-funded Americans for Prosperity Tea Party astroturfer, makes smoking into an anti-government act of defiance.

    Shawn Lawrence Otto: Blowback: The Failure of Cain Cool Shawn Lawrence Otto 2011

  • Mark Block, fresh from the Wisconson branch of the Koch-family-funded Americans for Prosperity Tea Party astroturfer, makes smoking into an anti-government act of defiance.

    Shawn Lawrence Otto: Blowback: The Failure of Cain Cool Shawn Lawrence Otto 2011

  • Mark Block, fresh from the Wisconson branch of the Koch-family-funded Americans for Prosperity Tea Party astroturfer, makes smoking into an anti-government act of defiance.

    Shawn Lawrence Otto: Blowback: The Failure of Cain Cool Shawn Lawrence Otto 2011

  • He blogged at the climate denialist Cooler Heads Coalition, an industry astroturfer closely tied to the think tank and astroturfer Competitive Enterprise Institute CEI.

    Shawn Lawrence Otto: Climate Scientist Wins A Round for America Shawn Lawrence Otto 2011

  • Mark Block, fresh from the Wisconson branch of the Koch-family-funded Americans for Prosperity Tea Party astroturfer, makes smoking into an anti-government act of defiance.

    Shawn Lawrence Otto: Blowback: The Failure of Cain Cool Shawn Lawrence Otto 2011

  • Mark Block, fresh from the Wisconson branch of the Koch-family-funded Americans for Prosperity Tea Party astroturfer, makes smoking into an anti-government act of defiance.

    Shawn Lawrence Otto: Blowback: The Failure of Cain Cool Shawn Lawrence Otto 2011

  • Easily identifiable by their English-sounding names, odd posting times that coincide with the working hours of Muscovites and slightly broken English, these “astroturfers” (or state-sponsored trolls) aren’t just a Russian invention: China has its “50-cent army” of commenters ready to leap to the defence of the motherland.

    How to handle a troll … and neuter a sea lion Chris Stokel-Walker 2018

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