Memes

No, you fuck off. "People liking something that they do not" is obviously not what prompted OP to claim astroturfing.

It probably has to do with how far this thread, and YTPremium conversations in general, are deviating from the average conversation on Lemmy. Stances on convenience, privacy, and blocking ads are harshly different in this context compared to any other thread about anything else. I mean, this is the userbase that will umpromptedly talk about the benefits of using Linux, Firefox, uBO and SearX because of privacy concerns in almost every other thread.

And this is happening in Google's favor, no less, a company that has shown time and again to not be above things like this.

In fact, why does YTPremium discourse keep coming back? Why not the other million premium subscriptions? Why do we not keep talking about Twitch Prime, which is in a similar situation? Why are the alleged lurkers so eager to stop their lurking and talk about all the benefits of YTPremium every once in a while?

There may be many reasons for this, both assuming honesty and otherwise, but one of the possibilities is certainly that an astroturf campaign may be going on at the moment. If, in addition to this, @Sheeple 's claim that many of the accounts supporting YTPremium are weeks old (tbh I don't care enough to check if this is true), then it is, with all probability, astroturfing.

Or maybe it's not, and everyone here is just sharing sincere opinions that just happen to align a little too well with YouTube's own marketing campaign. But you got to understand that, given all these factors, at the very least it's sus as fuck.