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That 'viral' charity video was actually paid promotion and I fell for it hard
I saw this tearjerker video on TikTok about a guy buying groceries for a homeless veteran. It got 15 million views in 2 days. Then I found out from a creator forum that the whole thing was staged by a marketing agency trying to sell a documentary. The algorithm pushed it because engagement was high, not because it was real. Has anyone else seen these fake viral moments and wondered how many we miss?
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anthony76318d ago
That "paid promotion" bit really opened my eyes. I used to defend those videos.
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quinn16118d ago
Same here, just started checking the disclosures first.
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spencer_gonzalez118d ago
The account that posted it @quinn161 was probably a bot farm from the same agency. I dug into the profile after I saw your post and it had 50,000 followers but only 12 actual comments on any video. That ratio alone tells you something fishy is going on. The whole system rewards fake content because sadness makes people share without thinking. It feels like platforms want us to stay angry or emotional so they can sell more ads. Has anyone ever looked into how many of these feel-good videos are actually just marketing experiments?
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