Hello, not sure if this is the right place to ask, but is anyone else being massively downvoted on every comment? I noticed this started happening after the DDOS attacks on lemmy.world. If you check my profile, you’ll see what I’m talking about. Almost as soon as I post a comment it’s at -10, etc.

Have I pissed off someone, or is it a possible bot attack? I try to keep most of my comments cordial, which is why this is confusing me. Thanks.

  • PriorProject@lemmy.world
    26·
    11 months ago

    This looks weird to me.

    • Kbin downvotes are public, you can see who made them at https://kbin.social/u/@artifice@lemmy.world. Kbin doesn’t federate downvotes from Lemmy though, so you can only see downvotes made there. I stalked your profile a bit on kbin and there was nothing weird. Mostly no downvotes, and in the few cases there were some there was no correlation of people across threads. The worst I saw was like three people downvoting a series of comments in a single thread, which is not weird or stalky.
    • Downvotes are also not anonymous to Lemmy instance admins. They are recorded in Lemmy’s DB with a link to who made them. This isn’t exposed via the web-ui or app-api, so regular users cannot see them… but admins (and users with their own Lemmy instance) can.

    I would consider reporting this to info@mastodon.world. If someone is actually sockpuppeting 10-20 accounts and profile stalking, that sounds to me like bannable abuse and something the admins might be interested in looking into. Now, of course, if you’re the one who has been harassing people in old comments, moderated comments, deleted comments, or DMs… admins might decide to ban you all. Two wrongs don’t make a right, and often result in two bans. It’s also possible that admins have bigger fish to fry and won’t have time to investigate… but if I were admin I’d be interested in early instances of mass-sockpuppeting so I could think about ways to detect and react to it.

    Edit: As an aside, the animated profile icon is pretty annoying and it may be that people downvote just for that.

    • artifice@lemmy.worldOP
      1021·
      11 months ago

      Haha, definitely haven’t harassed anyone. Didn’t even know the animated icon worked tbh, am on mobile, it’s just a static picture for me. Thanks for the tips! I’ll contact the admins/mods, maybe I can be their test dummy.

      • Rooki@lemmy.world
        121·
        11 months ago

        Probably because of your profile banner as it could kill/harm people with epilepsy. And for that i downvote someone tbh. As a “warning” for those in need.

        • artifice@lemmy.worldOP
          324·
          11 months ago

          I agree, I will change it as soon as I’m able. Never thought of it that way honestly. I’m curious to see if the admins can tell who, or what exactly, is behind this.

          • Rooki@lemmy.world
            2·
            11 months ago

            Thank you! Yeah admins will be able to tell you at least if they probably are bots.

      • SpringMango@lemmy.worldEnglish
        81·
        11 months ago

        I believe @rooki has a solid point. Your banner, and icon to a lesser extent, really hurt the eyes and if someone was epileptic it could be an issue. Not to say they aren’t neat but I could see someone getting up in arms over it.

  • freamon@endlesstalk.orgEnglish
    201·
    11 months ago

    Activity on your account certainly seems unusual. This post is getting 1 downvote a minute when I’m reading it, which is more engagement than usually happens on Lemmy, good or bad.

    • Fedegenerate@lemmynsfw.comEnglish
      32·
      11 months ago

      Fortunately accounts are free and the points meaningless.

      But, you could find out. Abandon this account for a time and come back. If the insta-downvotes start again then you know it’s bots, if not then you get to laugh at the someone or someones that wasted all that time… Well they still wasted their time even to set up bots but you know what I mean.

      You could also ignore or migrate. I don’t think Lemmy is equipped to tackle this kind of trolling, except that accounts are free and the points meaningless. To me that’s solution enough, YMMV on how attached you get to your account though.

      Didn’t mean that as a reply, just a comment, my bad.

      • GreenDust@lemmings.worldEnglish
        71·
        11 months ago

        The total point count on your profile may be meaningless, but votes on a comment/post absolutely have an effect within context. If you want to post to a community about something, the post may never get seen by many if it amasses a bunch of down votes. If you want to weigh in on a subject in a particular thread, a down voted opinion will be drown out by all the other comments.

        • Fedegenerate@lemmynsfw.comEnglish
          2·
          11 months ago

          Interesting, you get alerts for replies on deleted comments, I deleted and reposted as a stand alone as that’s what I originally intended to do.

          I agree though, I think the correct solution for OP is migrate, and that’s what they said they’re going to do. Fortunately, accounts are free and the points meaningless.

          I don’t think ignoring is that bad a solution though. Rarely is Lemmy so active downvoted comments are relegated to the shadowrealm.

    • artifice@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      1717·
      11 months ago

      Yeah, it’s extremely strange. Seems like I’m being targeted by bots. Useless internet points and all, but it’s a bit alarming that I’ve been singled out this way.

      • freamon@endlesstalk.orgEnglish
        32·
        11 months ago

        It might just be that your username is alphabetically near the start of the most popular instance.

  • Fedegenerate@lemmynsfw.com
    71·
    11 months ago

    Fortunately accounts are free and the points meaningless.

    But, you could find out. Abandon this account for a time and come back. If the insta-downvotes start again then you know it’s bots, if not then you get to laugh at the someone or someones that wasted all that time… Well they still wasted their time even to set up bots but you know what I mean.

    You could also ignore or migrate. I don’t think Lemmy is equipped to tackle this kind of trolling, except that accounts are free and the points meaningless. To me that’s solution enough, YMMV on how attached you get to your account though.

      • Fedegenerate@lemmynsfw.com
        21·
        11 months ago

        It makes it impossible to quickly assess whether a how-to video is legitimate or full of misinformation and mistakes.

        I guess if someone is operating under the premise “what is popular is correct” they would find value in votecounts. I dunno, I might browse weird though; I dont read community names, usernames or look at vote count.

        I always saw votes as being for the entity (YouTube, Reddit etc) so they can serve up what’s popular to users so they’re more attractive to users.

        Again, lemmy is rarely active enough for comments to be banished and all of which is ignoring the fact that the numbers are meaningless just migrate.

          • Fedegenerate@lemmynsfw.com
            2·
            11 months ago

            All roads lead to the same end though: migrate. If you care about your comment numbers migrate and the downvotes stop. Account numbers don’t grant you any special treatment so migrate because you don’t lose anything. Accounts are free and your score means nothing, just migrate.

            This very much seems an argument for arguments’ sake.

    • artifice@lemmy.worldOP
      914·
      11 months ago

      I appreciate the advice. I’ll just create a new account. I found a tool that will migrate my community/block lists, so it’ll be effortless. It is pretty funny and pathetic if you think about what’s happening with my account here. Honestly I feel weirdly honored that someone actually wasted their life on this lol.

    • artifice@lemmy.worldOP
      38·
      11 months ago

      Yeah, I’ve been in contact with a couple others stating the exact same thing. This is very interesting, I hope the admins will get back to me soon.

      • Historical_General@lemmy.world
        11·
        11 months ago

        I have a similar problem, idiots who have a political disagreement with me have downvoted my posts, by 4 points on a few comments and up to 40 on a post - which is bad since that potentially degrades an entire community’s experience.

        Who should I contact for help/info btw?

        • artifice@lemmy.worldOP
          27·
          11 months ago

          I’m not sure anyone can help you there honestly. If you’re being downvoted do to a disagreement, then that’s what the voting system is for. What’s happening to me and others is mass, targeted, downvoting. Either using a script/bots, or multiple sock puppet accounts.

  • octoperson@sh.itjust.works
    31·
    11 months ago

    Iirc, the names of the accounts making up- and down-votes is part of the information that’s synced between instances, and so available to admins if they care to look. Wonder if there could be some sort of mod tool to identify coordinated vote manipulation