Livingston

Nov
19
2007

Astroturfing Turkey: Shelfari

Book widget maker Shelfari has been accused of one of the largest astroturfing incidents ever by competitor Library Thing, with a massive astroturf spamming campaign using the handle “schaufferwaffer.” Shelfari CEO Josh Hug admitted astroturf occurred, but blamed an intern:

As for the astroturfing, that was an unintended work of an unexperienced but well-meaning intern who failed to make himself known as he commented on blogs. That was not our intent and we were unaware that was going on. It has stopped.

1341132749_8850981c28_m.jpgThe astroturf disclaimer occurred in a post from Seattle bookseller Michael Lieberman and in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. However consider, that in one case the VP of marketing followed up schaufferwaffer and supported his claims. And then look at this Google search for schaufferwaffer and see the widespread proliferation of astroturfing comments on behalf of Shelfari (image credit: pakalwaters).

Since the incident and the public disclaimer on the astroturfing early last week, Shelfari’s blog has gone silent.

Shelfari’s a well funded company that’s recently received money and a board member from Amazon. Yes, the same Amazon that angered many authors across the social media sphere with their Kindle reader that gives away intellectual property for free.

Yet what’s most alarming about this incident is the lack of attention here in the social media world. Outside of O’Reilly Radar, meyerweb, and select industry specific blogs, nobody’s talking about this astroturfing turkey! And this is not the first case of unethical marketing by Shelfari.

Here’s the deal, folks. Companies will keep doing this unless we marketers call out our brothers and sisters. This kind of marketing is absolutely unacceptable, and Shelfari needs to do much more than slough off the incident on a “well meaning intern.”

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by Geoff Livingston | Internet Marketing |

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