I'm not afraid of you, Ghost!
"Ghost Accounts" are what I'm calling additional accounts created দ্বারা an already existing ফ্যানপপ member to skew the results of a pick অথবা an argument in their favor. I have read things পোষ্ট হয়েছে দ্বারা other Fanpoppers suggesting their existence in the past, but hadn't knowingly spotted any for myself. Tonight I believe I spotted three different people doing this.
The first example I discovered through a series of picks created দ্বারা a user that I had never seen around before. I'm all for new users, so I answered the picks and made some comments. Within the মতামত sections of these picks, I noticed two other users that I had never seen before. The thing is, the three users didn't always answer the same way, but their মতামত were always similarly rude. I decided to compare all three users and I discovered that they had much in common. They had all joined ফ্যানপপ this month, none of them belonged to any spots, aside from their প্রতীকী - their ফ্যানপপ user pages were all blank, and they had all answered picks from the exact same four spots, and only those four spots.
I found the সেকেন্ড example within a pick that had been answered 444 times. This pick had three pages of comments, and on the সেকেন্ড page, I saw the following: Three মতামত that ব্যক্ত the exact same thing, in a row. All three user names were different but fit the same pattern, Girls-first-name followed immediately দ্বারা a two digit number. An example of what they looked like is "Mary25". And all three belonged to users that had no icons, contributions, অথবা information to speak of. Not to mention they didn't belong to a single spot.
The third, and luckily, final example I noticed was within the exact same pick as the সেকেন্ড example. As I mentioned, this particular pick had three pages of comments. After পাঠ করা through them, I went back to check the results of the pick. I found the option that came in সেকেন্ড place particularly odd because in those three pages of comments, I hadn't seen a single one in support of it. This option had been added to the pick দ্বারা a user other than the picks creator. I went ahead and clicked on the person who added this option only to discover, আপনি guessed it, that their user page was blank! In fact, this was the only pick they had ever answered.
Obviously, I have no way of knowing if these are in fact "Ghost Accounts", but the coincidences seem overwhelmingly in favor of that being the case. Since I had never before noticed behavior such as this, and I noticed it three whole times today, I decided to think of three reasons that creating these accounts to answer picks is just plain silly. Without further ado:
#1 - আপনি Know Better!
It's not a presidential election, ফ্যানপপ is for fun! There is no point in seeing your choice win if you know it isn't genuine. Do আপনি really think that seeing your পছন্দ thing "win" a pick will have আরো impact on someone than পাঠ করা your well thought-out, well written মতামত would?
#2 - It's disrespectful to Other Users
There are two main functions to posting a pick. One is that আপনি get to share your opinions with others. The other is that আপনি get to see what other people think. দ্বারা tampering with the results of a pick, আপনি deprive its maker of the latter দ্বারা making ব্যক্ত results inaccurate. I know that when I post a pick, what I most enjoy afterwards is পাঠ করা the মতামত that it spawned from others. It's great to make your opinion known, but use মতামত to do so. I guarantee that they will be read.
#3 - Being in the Minority is OK
So what if your opinion is not the জনপ্রিয় one. Take pride in the fact that you're an independent thinker অথবা that আপনি see something where few others do. অথবা better yet, flex your বিতর্ক skills দ্বারা trying to persuade others to see your point.
So those are my reasons. I know that most of আপনি who are পাঠ করা this are cool, respectful people who realize the idiocy of committing the aforementioned act. I was just annoyed with what I saw tonight so I had to release my irritation somewhere. Thanks for listening.
