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  3. If you think money can’t buy you friends, think again. In the online world, it’s possible to purchase a crowd of fans. One thous

If you think money can’t buy you friends, think again. In the online world, it’s possible to purchase a crowd of fans. One thous

admin2014-03-21  37
问题     If you think money can’t buy you friends, think again. In the online world, it’s possible to purchase a crowd of fans. One thousand cost only $18 on average, according to estimates by Barracuda Networks, a network security company. Yet these friends won’t meet you for drinks after work. In fact, they don’t even exist. They are pixels on a screen.
    A large share of social-media followers of the biggest companies are not human, believes Marco Camisani Calzolari, an entrepreneur and professor at Milan’s ILUM University. In a recent study he quantified the proportion of computer-generated fans or inactive users following big brands on Twitter. To decide whether a follower is human, Mr. Camisani Calzolari used various criteria, including the number of posts from a fan’s Twitter account and the use of correct punctuation in tweets. According to this research, by June 2011 nearly half of Twitter followers of computer maker Dell—about 700, 000—were bots.
    Some politicians also seem to have many fake followers. Mitt Romney, the former Republican presidential candidate, became the focus of media attention when his Twitter following swelled by 17% in a single day in July. On close inspection, a significant proportion of Mr. Romney’s followers appeared to be fake profiles. In Italy Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement lost the driving force when Mr. Camisani Calzolari made a similar claim about the followers of the comedian-turned-politician.
    There is no indication that any of the companies mentioned in Mr. Camisani Calzolari’s paper have bought followers—rogue bots often attach themselves to people and brands without payment. But some firms do buy a social media following. Fake profiles are at the centre of a very vibrant and growing underground economy, says Barracuda Networks. On eBay, the e-commerce site, for instance, the firm’s researchers have found 20 sellers offering to set up such profiles.
    For start-ups a strong social media following can boost business. A small mom-and-pop shop struggling to sell its goods can look like a booming upstart thanks to a swollen Twitter account, or an artificially high number of Facebook likes. For major international companies, a small number of followers in the early stages of engagement with social media can be embarrassing at best and damaging to brand perception at worst. Buying crowds of fans— even if they aren’t engaged with the brand—can give an artificial boost to a business.
    For now, the trick works. "Normal people don’t know yet that there is this black market. Most have total trust that a brand’s followers are real, " says Mr. Camisani Calzolari. But brands are already finding diminishing returns. When everybody has a large following, the impact is much diminished. And consumers are starting to cotton on to sharp practices. "The number of followers is a superficial measurement unless they are engaged, " argues Carly Donovan of Ogilvy Action, an arm of Ogilvy & Mather, the advertisement and public relations agency. Money can buy you friends—just not very good ones.
The phrase "a swollen Twitter account" in Paragraph 5 refers to a______.
选项 A、Twitter account with bigger online storage space
B、Twitter account with an excess of fake followers
C、Twitter VIP account
D、Twitter special account for business
答案B
解析 语义题。“swollen”原意是“肿胀的，涨水的”，文章第五段第二句表明一家努力销售其商品的小型夫妻店会看起来像是一个迅速崛起的新贵，这是多亏了“a swollen Twitter account”或者脸谱网“赞”链接被人为刷出高数字，由此可知“swollen”指推特账户里粉丝人数的虚假增长，所以选[B]“有过量假粉丝的账户”。[A]“拥有更大网络存储空间的账户”、[C]“贵宾账户”和[D]“商业专用账户”均不符合文意。
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