/r/HailCorporate
/r/HailCorporate is to document times when people act as unwitting advertisers for a product or a brand with an aim towards raising awareness of the pervasive nature of commercialism in our society and culture.
We have strict "Don't be a jerk" rules that are enforced with immediate banning for violating the rules.
/r/HailCorporate is to document times when people act as unwitting advertisers for a product as well as to document what appear to be legitimate adverts via native advertising.
What acts as an ad, is an ad, no matter if it was put there sneakily or because someone has become inured to a brand so far that they don't even know they are a walking ad.
We have strict "Don't be a jerk" rules that are enforced with immediate banning. The guidelines are more likely to result in a post removal or warning, but breaking them could result in a ban.
RULES
Don't use a brand name in title
Be civil
- No name calling or being insulting. Historically people have had a very hard time with that and so we have had to also add as a rule:
- No Swearing/cursing/cussing. Automod will remove your comment and no one will ever see it.
- We don't need to explain 'be civil' to you, but if you can't obey this simple rule then you're out.
No personal information
- Doxing, witch-hunting, etc. is a violation of Reddit wide rules and will result in a ban
- Use the "[/new](r/hailcorporate/new)" function to see if it's already come up before posting.
Wash your hands regularly
You may be banned for the first offence
TIPS
- Replace any brand names (company, product, celebrity, etc.) with something less descriptive, like [COMPANY], [PRODUCT], [CELEBRITY], and so on.
- Flair your post after making it or it may be removed
THINGS TO KEEP IN MIND
- If you don't report a rule violation, we probably won't see it.
- If you make a post or comment that violates the rules Automod will remove it and no one will ever see it
- posts about r/gaming, r/movies, r/ama, etc links are not encouraged as we all know that it is filled with advert type posts in their own specific subject. However when a different topic comes up it may qualify. E.g. posts about a soda brand in a television subreddit
'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice anywhere,' and because of that /r/hailcorporate condemns the r\bitcoin moderators for engaging in heavy censorship
The reddit.com of today is different than the reddit.com of the past. Potential for censorship across the website has been realized.
* More
/r/HailCorporate
212,605 Subscribers
Just randomly brought a box of donuts to wait for a shop to open, and guess what, this random person I gave one to says it was the best food they've had in years! [insert photo of box with full logo]
07:58 UTC
Advertisement of processed food, 27K upvotes
19:19 UTC
This chocolate bar design is so amazing! Also all the top commenters of this niche sub somehow have intimate knowledge of their supply chain and corporate practices and are just dying to tell you about it.
15:37 UTC
"Brat Summer" is HailCorporate af
Brilliant marketing. I love CharliXCX and her new album is dope but all this "brat summer" shit and obsessing over her color and branding is nausea inducing... https://www.instagram.com/reel/C-WIW30yD69/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
19:07 UTC
Never have I seen such beautiful advertising.
18:38 UTC
A “me” post? Read the comments and you decide.
04:26 UTC
What's your consumer pet peave? [With an image focusing on the brand logo and its slogan]
14:42 UTC
Is this American fast-casual restaurant chain doing an astroturfing campaign on the /r/burgers subreddit? I think so, here's why
/r/burgers has been getting hammered with DAE LE CULVERS GOOD!?!?!!? in the past weeks / month. Every other post in the hot feed seems to be praising Culver's. Keep in mind that the big majority of upvoted posts do not mention a restaurant or chain.
These posts are from the past 7 days and all receive a suspicious amount of upvotes within the first 1-2 hours, around 200, despite being mediocre looking burgers.
21:10 UTC
Who Wants To Eat (fast food chain) With Me?
13:28 UTC
My floor mat is so quirky and unique; it's not like other mats
11:55 UTC
Ignore their bigotry. Just pay attention to this chicken restaurant's fancy conveyance tech.
20:39 UTC
Check out this "interesting as fuck" video of a GPS-tracked cat and dog brought to you by [GPS TRACKER BRAND]
16:43 UTC
AITAH post masquerading as circumcision ragebait actually trying to sell an IQ test... and it's not the only one.
The Aptilink "IQ test" site (which makes you pay to see results btw) is astroturfing Reddit.
This AITAH post combines two things Reddit loves to give attention to, circumcision debate + relationship drama, and inserts a link to a paid IQ test right in the middle of it. And bam, they got 11k upvotes and 9000 comments.
Somehow, none of the top comments are calling it out. The comments that are calling it out, are downvoted to oblivion. It's my suspicion that the same website that posts them, are also running bot rings downvoting anyone calling them out. e.g. this comment which was heavily downvoted before real users came to see
And... it's not the only one. Here was a similar such post/comment
Here's yet another + image link for when it's deleted
Despite people reporting them constantly it doesn't seem to put a pause on what they do. Honestly, I'm just against the scammy methods used (I can't help enjoying the drama and when I realize it's actually an ad, it's very annoying!) and I want to get the word out.
They follow a trend of posting something "high engagement", leaning into political or interpersonal/relationship drama that we all know Redditors love to engage with. Reports to mods are doing nothing (it appears they pick subs with low moderation/high engagement ratios). It seems like there's not really anything users can do about it unless someone can bring this to admin attention or start banning subs for being unmoderated.
In fact, even four months ago this was happening: this post on a psychology sub questioning someone's claim their company was making them take this IQ test - context here
This has also been noticed 7 months ago and discussed in the scams subreddit here.
Anyone else seen these?
Admin permabanned Unidan for less, back in the day.
edit: Holy shit, the same OP from that AITAH post is STILL actively promoting the site in comments imgur link if deleted and vote manipulating to make sure people see it and don't see those pointing out that it's an ad.
edit: the active account in question doing this continually is thepatriotclubhouse, there are some one-offs too but this one seems opposed to just ditching the account when called out and making a new one, maybe because it's some intern working there's actual account too. So I'm putting the name here :) - he has historically posted about them repeatedly and then deletes their posts later so it isn't obvious, but you can kind of see around the edges of deleted content... i.e. this comment calling it out by name, then this one where the mod comment happens to include the name and same here - all three the same account.
23:40 UTC
[Fast food place] has the best food!
https://www.reddit.com/r/unpopularopinion/s/eTUnmHOoRB
Good gods, another one in r/UnpopularOpinon. That subreddit is very quickly become a haven for corporate shills and unwitting stooges.
03:21 UTC
Roast me if you will, but [Brand's] [label] sauce is friggin' delicious! I just bought six bottles from [other brand].
21:02 UTC
[candidate] is so down to earth, i promise. just look at my story and all these definitely totally real comments from others. i'm voting for him and citing [campaign messaging] as my reason.
02:39 UTC
[Sandwich restaurant] is the best restaurant!
https://www.reddit.com/r/unpopularopinion/s/WkjSb85BUL
I swear, some days r/UnpopularOpinion is just r/FeebleAttemptsAtGuerillaMarketing
13:04 UTC
All these people are taking [POPULAR GLP-1 ANTAGONIST]! Why aren't you?
Top comments are all basically hailing the benefits, with similar stories of how it stop cravings. And any comments questioning it seem to have a lot of answers insisting there's no side effects found so far and insisting people are just bitter (what?). A lot of the critical top-level comments ended up as controversial, funnily enough.
21:20 UTC
Wow! Isn't it mildly interesting how a consumable product gets consumed as you use it? Unbelievable!
18:34 UTC
The difference between the square and the round egg at [fast food chain], damn that's interesting right? 10k upvotes.
03:18 UTC
Oh joy, inclusive bug spray.
I'm definitely sold, since they say "We Care"® about fellows who need to use a prosthetic. What timing, too, to hear about... bug spray, of all things, in the middle of summer.
But, in all seriousness - bug spray?? Why even bother?
20:07 UTC
IgnoranceInFinance top mod posts ad for AI company - bans user calling it out
23:58 UTC
Nothing and Nothing but An Advertisement
You WILL get excited for a union of condiments mediocre at best from a brand known as cheap, just in time for the fourth of July. Why, how convenient.
21:11 UTC
Clearly an ad. Nice product placement as well!
Who needs to pay Reddit directly to promote their content anymore?
https://www.reddit.com/r/BeAmazed/comments/1dorja7/wait_what/
09:49 UTC
Top of r/all video ad from 20 years ago with a click bait headline (was banned/pulled/whatever)
What do you know? Click bait works. I watched the crap. It wasn't even good. It was funny back in the day, IIRC.
14:49 UTC