I found a large black-hat content marketing org. they're paid by startups, then they pay bloggers to write about clients' products for @ITNEXT_io, @ThePracticalDev, @freeCodeCamp - and pretend to be regular users/fans. they then submit to Reddit & HN from many disguised accounts. I didn't know that black-hat content marketing existed, but it does and these folks have at least a dozen clients. you'd recognize some of the names.

as you'd guess, I'm doing things to make their approach… less effective.