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Conspiracy Theorists Who'd First Popularized QAnon Now Accused of Financial Motives (nbcnews.com) 152

Posted by EditorDavid from the following-bread-crumbs dept.
QAnon "was first championed by a handful of people who worked together to stir discussion of the 'Q' posts, eventually pushing the theory on to bigger platforms and gaining followers — a strategy that proved to be the key to Qanon's spread and the originators' financial gain..." reports NBC News, in an article shared by long-time Slashdot reader AmiMoJo .

"NBC News has found that the theory can be traced back to three people who sparked some of the first conversation about Qanon and, in doing so, attracted followers who they then asked to help fund Qanon 'research.'" In November 2017, a small-time YouTube video creator and two moderators of the 4chan website, one of the most extreme message boards on the internet, banded together and plucked out of obscurity an anonymous and cryptic post from the many conspiracy theories that populated the website's message board. Over the next several months, they would create videos, a Reddit community, a business and an entire mythology based off the 4chan posts of "Q," the pseudonym of a person claiming to be a high-ranking military officer. The theory they espoused would become Qanon, and it would eventually make its way from those message boards to national media stories and the rallies of President Donald Trump.

Now, the people behind that effort are at the center of a fractious debate among conspiracy enthusiasts, some of whom believe the three people who first popularized the Qanon theory are promoting it in order to make a living. Others suggest that these original followers actually wrote Q's mysterious posts...

Qanon was just another unremarkable part of the "anon" genre until November 2017, when two moderators of the 4chan board where Q posted predictions, who went by the usernames Pamphlet Anon [real name: Coleman Rogers] and BaruchtheScribe, reached out to Tracy Diaz, according to Diaz's blogs and YouTube videos. BaruchtheScribe, in reality a self-identified web programmer from South Africa named Paul Furber, confirmed that account to NBC News. "A bunch of us decided that the message needed to go wider so we contacted Youtubers who had been commenting on the Q drops," Furber said in an email... As Diaz tells it in a blog post detailing her role in the early days of Qanon, she banded together with the two moderators. Their goal, according to Diaz, was to build a following for Qanon — which would mean bigger followings for them as well... Diaz followed with dozens more Q-themed videos, each containing a call for viewers to donate through links to her Patreon and PayPal accounts. Diaz's YouTube channel now boasts more than 90,000 subscribers and her videos have been watched over 8 million times. More than 97,000 people follow her on Twitter.

Diaz, who emerged from bankruptcy in 2009, says in her YouTube videos that she now relies on donations from patrons funding her YouTube "research" as her sole source of income. Diaz declined to comment on this story. "Because I cover Q, I got an audience," Diaz acknowledged in a video that NBC News reviewed last week before she deleted it.

To reach a more mainstream audience (older people and "normies," who on their own would have trouble navigating the fringe message boards), Diaz said in her blog post she recommended they move to the more user-friendly Reddit. Archives listing the three as the original posters and moderators show they created a new Reddit community... Their move to Reddit was key to Qanon's eventual spread. There, they were able to tap into a larger audience of conspiracy theorists, and drive discussion with their analysis of each Q post. From there, Qanon crept to Facebook where it found a new, older audience via dozens of public and private groups...

As Qanon picked up steam, growing skepticism over the motives of Diaz, Rogers, and the other early Qanon supporters led some in the internet's conspiracy circles to turn their paranoia on the group. Recently, some Qanon followers have accused Diaz and Rogers of profiting from the movement by soliciting donations from their followers. Other pro-Trump online groups have questioned the roles that Diaz and Rogers have played in promoting Q, pointing to a series of slip-ups that they say show Rogers and Diaz may have been involved in the theory from the start.

Those accusations have led Diaz and Rogers to both deny that they are Q and say they don't know who Q is.
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Conspiracy Theorists Who'd First Popularized QAnon Now Accused of Financial Motives More

Conspiracy Theorists Who'd First Popularized QAnon Now Accused of Financial Motives

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  • You know the old saying... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SoundGuyNoise ( 864550 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @12:38AM (#60774944) Homepage
    ...about fools and their money.

  • Extreme Websites (Score:5, Funny)

    by JBMcB ( 73720 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @12:41AM (#60774950)

    The arguments about whether the Super Nintendo or Sega Genesis had superior sound quality get really out of hand on 4chan.

  • Why was he Anon and why still anon? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gurps_npc ( 621217 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @12:43AM (#60774956) Homepage

    Why did he not come public and tell the world who he is?

    Even Deep Throat came public, eventually.

    The only reason is that it was obviously a lie. None of his claims ever made any sense what so ever, he is obviously scared of the backlash from his followers as they realize how badly he lied to them.

    • Don't even ask (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Excelcia ( 906188 ) <slashdot@excelcia.ca> on Sunday November 29, 2020 @12:47AM (#60774966) Homepage Journal

      To even grace the whole thing with enough credibility to even ask the question "well, if it's true, then why ____" is to give it far more credibility than it's worth.

      By now it should be clear that this thing started making appearances at Trump rallies because he actively trolls conspiracy theories looking for fodder to put into his speeches. Trump is the first internet troll to become president. It is always, always, always best to just not feed the trolls.

    • Re:Why was he Anon and why still anon? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Actually, I do RTFA ( 1058596 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @01:46AM (#60775040)

      I mean, I don't want to defend any aspect of the nutters, but Deep Throat went public after like 30 years and a retirement. There are better arguments to use. Like... "does any of this make sense" or "WTF?"

      • There are better arguments to use. Like... "does any of this make sense" or "WTF?"

        The problem is, the people believing this stuff honestly and truly believe it is real. Witness the guy who shot up the pizza parlor in D.C. [cbsnews.com] because of the conspiracy theory Hillary Clinton was trafficking kids out of it [reuters.com].

        Even better, these people are so delusional, so incapable of determining what is real or not, they are asking the RNC why they should bother to vote in the Georgia runoff election if the election is rigged [newsweek.com]? A

        • Even better, these people are so delusional, so incapable of determining what is real or not, they are asking the RNC why they should bother to vote in the Georgia runoff election if the election is rigged? And guess who has been spreading that conspiracy theory despite not providing a shred of evidence?

          Biden's margin of victory in Georgia was smaller than the number of people who voted by mail-in ballots in the Republican primary, and then didn't vote at all in the General. I guess they listened to Trump

    • Q glows in the dark.

    • Re:It wouldn't matter even if he did (Score:5, Insightful)

      by bob8766 ( 1075053 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @02:11AM (#60775076)

      Why did he not come public and tell the world who he is?

      Even Deep Throat came public, eventually.

      The only reason is that it was obviously a lie. None of his claims ever made any sense what so ever, he is obviously scared of the backlash from his followers as they realize how badly he lied to them.

      He could come out tomorrow and say,
      "QAnon is a hoax, I made the whole thing up. Thanks for the money, suckers!"
      and those followers would think it was some kind of coverup to keep them from the truth.

    • Re:Why was he Anon and why still anon? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ath1901 ( 1570281 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @07:55AM (#60775442)

      Even if there was a "real" Q, his followers would just claim he's not the real Q or that he's being forced to say X by the CIA. It is extremely hard to change your entire world view once you've invested so much faith and social capital. Just look at how religious groups have handle failed prophecies of either the return of Jesus, armageddon or space aliens. They don't abandon their faith, they find whatever excuses they can to keep believing what they already believe.

      • ^^^ exactly this

        It's just like even though the guy that did the autism/vaccine study has admitted faking it, the anti-vaxxers still flog the non-existent link as if it was gospel truth.

      • It's the same way doomsday cults manage to not predict doomsday correctly many times over yet still keep going on.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hey! ( 33014 )

      In the court of public opinion, there's not statues of limitations for his crime: he's a troll who constructed an elaborate burlesque of Christian Millennialism . He did worse than lie to his followers, he *mocked* them, tricked them into acting out an obscene pantomime of their own religious beliefs.

      And what's worse the thing has taken on a life of its own. It will never completely die down because it's sustained by the stubborn gullibility of the biggest nuts in the whole QAnon fruitcake. Those people wi

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by imidan ( 559239 )

      Why did he not come public and tell the world who he is?

      I think the original Q was a person deep in a paranoid schizophrenic delusion. Having read stuff written by schizophrenics before, the similarity is striking to me. I think that original Q probably wrote most of the early Q posts and then faded away, perhaps because the meds kicked in, or he became institutionalized, or something else. Others took up the cause for lulz or true belief. And, yes, eventually yet others took over because they recognized th

  • you think?

    Best part is the anti-vaxxer fools buying pills with God-knows-what in them.

    • Re:Umm, (Score:5, Interesting)

      by SkonkersBeDonkers ( 6780818 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @09:29AM (#60775556)

      Yep. There was a story recently about a mother whose toddler had been prescribed tamiflu and she went online and consulted with anti-vaxxers who told her to try various "natural" remedies. A few days later the toddler died.

      You know I can appreciate how there are many people today that mistrust "authority", i.e., doctors, politicians, so-called "main stream media", whatever because the reality is that there is a lot of corruption and self-serving motivations out there.

      What I cannot understand is how they go from mistrusting those authorities to trusting random people they interact with on social media where you don't even have the dubious distinction of knowing that they are who they say they are.

      Or a similarly related note, I am always amazed at the right wingers who will rail on about how gov't employees are all corrupt and lazy BUT support cops with blind faith, how are cops not also gov't employees?

      • If they had that much logic working in their brain, they would not be what they are. Dumb people convincing themselves they are tremendously intelligent, with not many people know this but I am smarter than Einstein mentality fall for this.

        Asking why they are illogical is like asking why water is wet.

        • Yeah I "get" it, it's just hard for me to understand how people get there, but I guess it's the same with any sort of blind faith.

          I did recently read an analysis of those that fall for the big conspiracy theories suggesting that it might be that the sort of existential horror that comes from trying to deal with modern life makes it preferable to imagine that there is some single monolithic enemy cabal that is the source of all evil and that one can struggle against than to accept that we're all just inconse

          • Re:Umm, (Score:4, Insightful)

            by apoc.famine ( 621563 ) <apoc.famine@NOSPAM.gmail.com> on Sunday November 29, 2020 @03:07PM (#60776266) Journal

            It shouldn't be hard to understand how people get there - you just need to frame it right:

            Cheers ended nearly 30 years ago. But people are still writing fanfic about it! If a 30 year old sitcom can pull people together to write fanfic, the federal government definitely can too.

            And that's what this is! It's an internet community dedicated to fanfic of the government! Where this is so dangerous is that when you fanfic on the real world, it becomes really easy for people to start to blur the lines between what's real and what's not. And the longer you're immersed in the world the more real it feels. When bronies look out the window in the morning, they don't see plastic ponies galloping over a rainbow. When Qanoners look out the window, they see the world their fic is woven into.

            We know that in almost any fanfic community, some people are going to end up going down the wormhole. Pretty much everyone starts with the light peruse because it's entertaining, then some time later a subset of them are arguing with other strangers about an imaginary unicorn's sexuality and dick shape.

            What makes this different is that it became a community in the public eye. Imagine if bronies showed up behind Biden at campaign rallies! I think there would be similar amounts of WTF from the general public.

            There's a reason that LARP has fake weapons. Can you imagine handing LARPers real weapons and letting them go at each other? They'd hurt themselves and possibly others, and probably cause some property damage in the process. LARP communities have established rules for how their game is played.

            QAnon is not similarly constrained. So we've got government fanfic and an active LARP community around it, and nobody bothered to come up with the rules for it. When that starts blurring with the real world, it's a real problem. And like any community, the deeper you go and the louder you shout that you love it, the more the community supports you and makes you feel welcomed.

            People do all sorts of stupid shit for acceptance in groups. Throughout history we've had all sorts of initiations, trials, loyalty tests, purity tests, etc. And throughout history they have often have spiraled into depravity and horror. Fraternity pledges still die every year due to hazing. When someone wants in badly enough, they'll go to extremes. Marry that with a real-world blurring LARP, and the possibilities are fairly scary.

  • Well what's important is that a whole bunch of morons with internet access who're ostensibly fighting the good fight for child sex trafficking are really just poisoning the well to benefit a lose configuration of casual nihilists.

  • My theory is that QAnon is a conspiracy misdirection created as a conspiracy to distract the low-cognitives from the fact that robots and AIs are slowly taking all their jobs.

  • Does not matter (Score:5, Insightful)

    by PopeRatzo ( 965947 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @01:45AM (#60775038) Journal

    Exposing the scam artists behind Qanon will have absolutely no effect on Qanon followers maintaining their belief in Qanon. We now even have members of congress who are Qanon conspiracy believers. The very first thing disgraced general Michael Flynn tweeted out after he was pardoned by the bloated degenerate who occupies the White House was a Qanon hashtag. They are too invested in their false worldview to give up now. On my satellite TV, there are several networks that espouse Qanon theories through the day every day (and that's not counting Fox News).

    Qanon is the Scientology of conspiracy theories. When you invest so much into a false belief, it becomes indistinguishable from a real belief. This is how cults become mainstream religions.

    • At least Scientology has the decency to only push their nonsense on actors. They're already weirdos, let's face it.

      • Re:Does not matter (Score:4, Interesting)

        by sg_oneill ( 159032 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @04:40AM (#60775218)

        Amusingly a rather large part of QAnons constellation of beliefs is that Hollywoods actors are mostly canibals who secretly run an underground city of kidnapped children who they drain for life essence, andrenochrome. (And yes, if that sounds familiar its because its the same conspiracy theory thats more famously known as the Protocols of Zion, with the serial numbers filed off and the bad guys identity changed. Its all rather lazy as far as conspiracy theories go, although it does point to some worrying things ab

        • Accidental submit.

          What I was TRYING to say was the fact that QAnon is a recycled version of the Elders of Zion, points to some worrying things about the people that run it. Although that shouldn't be TOO surprising to people who have observed the political inclinations of most of 4chans /pol/ posters.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by hey! ( 33014 )

        Celebrities are just the tip of the iceberg. The SeaOrg members who cater to their needs have to come from somewhere.

        It's a marketing strategy. The Church puts extra resources into courting celebrities because their publicity gives them a higher profile for recruiting other people.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dryeo ( 100693 )

        You never ran into Scientologists? I remember running into them about 40 years back, invited me into their nice offices,tried to sell me a copy of Dianetics, gave me some weird tests, got my personal info as I was young and this was before the internet. They then proceeded to send me hand written letters for a year or more. I knew others who got wrapped up in it too, pay more money, take these courses and get the secrets kind of thing.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by DrXym ( 126579 )
      QAnon is like a doomsday cult after doomsday has already been and gone. Disillusionment will set in and people will give up on it. And since all of the major social media platforms are taking that garbage down it will be stripped of the opportunity of new recruits to build its ranks. It'll probably end its days on some fetid shithole like 8kun with a hardcore of adherents rationalising this is all part of the "plan" but it will never be anything remotely akin to what it is right now.

    • Flynn has the intellect of a flea. He was also a Pizzagate believer ... probably still is.

  • Shocking! (Score:5, Funny)

    by locater16 ( 2326718 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @01:57AM (#60775054)
    I am shocked, shocked I tell you, to find people manipulating morons over the internet for their own financial gain!

    Your take from the scams sir

    Oh yes thank you

    • Shocked indeed!

      Just like "We build the wall".

      Also: "Q" clearance. That's for Department of Energy. If he were a "high ranking military officer", he would have a different security clearance.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by DrXym ( 126579 )
      The scams are still coming. Sidney Powell has been hustling these idiots for cash for her "release the Kraken" lawsuit where she misspells the word "district" twice in the title. Apparently she needs millions of dollars which I'm sure will not be resting in her bank account when this is all over.

      • Trump is raising millions every day for "defending the election". But if you read the fine print, the money is not going to that. It's going to the campaign and to pay down debts.

        $100 he declares his 2024 run on or before January 20 so he can keep the donations flowing in and stay as the face of the Republican party. It's going to tear the party apart and ruin it, but it's not like that has ever stopped Trump before.

        It will allow him to keep doing rallies for the next 4 years, and we know damn well that he

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by DrXym ( 126579 )
          I don't believe Trump has any intention of running in 2024. He'll see the money he has raised and will try his best to keep it. As far as his post-presidential career goes, he'll probably start charging for his dumbass rallies and if that fails, phone in his whines to whatever channel is receptive to it. Of course his legal woes may put a dent in this plan.

  • that a conspiracy theory was started by a conspiracy.

    People often accuse others of what is weighing most on their own minds...

  • "reddit is more user-friendly than 4chan"

    lmao

  • ... start a religion!
    This is what a "new age" religion looks like.
    It started with the myriad of dietary trends, then the anti-vaxers, then flat-earthers (which, I still hope, are just trolls) and now this.

  • Far More Serious (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ytene ( 4376651 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @06:21AM (#60775362)
    Unfortunately, this particular phenomenon didn't stop with 3 conspiracy theorists on notice boards.

    The memes quickly spread to platforms like Facebook, where management immediately saw the value they add to their business model. When you have a story that spreads like wild-fire across social media networks, you have a story that will sell advertising like nothing else they peddle.

    Which gives rise to a very interesting, very worrying scenario: if you are the operator of the world's largest social network, and you know or should know that content that is flooding your network is conspiracy theorist nonsense, but that same nonsense is generating you billions of dollars in advertising revenue, what are you going to do? Shut it down? Employ moderators? Ban the hard core initiators?

    What possible incentive do you have to do that? Those same conspiracy theorists are, for you, a flock of geese laying golden eggs. Each meme, each new outrageous story that flashes across your network, is dollars in the bank to you. So instead you're going to lie, obfuscate, delay, you're going to trot on over to Capital Hill and offer a "Mea Culpa" for your failures, then promise to do better. Next year, after the next atrocity, you're going to trot on back to Capital Hill and offer a "Mea Maximus Culpa" for your failures, then promise to do better all over again. On the flight back from Washington to the West Coast, you'll be laughing your socks off, knowing that in the period between your two sham hearings, you earned billions of dollars, many multiples of the total lifetime earnings of most of the "muppets" who sat on the hill pretending to ensure that you stuck within legal, decent limits.

    Unfortunately, bad as this is, in truth it is already worse. Think back to December 2016, when a 29-year-old North Carolina man fired an automatic rifle inside a Washington Pizzeria, wrongly believing he was saving children trapped in a sex-slave ring [nytimes.com].

    It's worth bearing this in mind the next time you hear Zuckerberg and others lie, obfuscate, delay and deceive on Capitol Hill. It's worth remembering that the thing that makes them the most money is a fanatical user - and that nothing makes a user fanatical like wildfire conspiracy theories.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by fred911 ( 83970 )

      ''What possible incentive do you have to do that? ''

      One word, engagement. How else would a platform keep users, collect metrics, sell adds and capture users? They are not public entities, they are business. How can we hold them responsable for the idiocy and ignorance of users?

      WTF we still allow religious organizations to operate tax free, when their only motivation is monetary and we plainly accept the autonomy of their publication as fact that is contrary to the major consensus of experts in whatever fiel

      • The solution starts with education, but doesn't it always?

        Education is the fourth thing after food, clothes, and shelter. In some climates, clothing might be optional, but you've got to have those other things. If you want to be explicit you can add more stuff to that list before education, starting with water and probably ending with health care.

        Sadly, even in this rich country we still have people lacking basic necessities.

  • Censorship by drowning facts (Score:3)

    by chthon ( 580889 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @06:21AM (#60775364) Journal

    Those who complain about censorship and lack of free speech, are the ones who defend conspiracy theories as free speech.

    But conspiracy theories and lies are de facto censorship, because all these untruths bury the real truth easily.

  • Not surprising if true (Score:4, Informative)

    by DrXym ( 126579 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @06:22AM (#60775368)
    People who believe in QAnon are apex idiots. Exactly the sort of marks that con men dream about.

  • A guy has a crazy, stupid idea. Then he sees lots of people who like his crazy, stupid idea, because they are crazier and stupider than him an he tries to sell them stupid stuff.

    All religions began that way.

  • I'm highly surprised (Score:4)

    by quonset ( 4839537 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @07:43AM (#60775432)

    Who would have thought that people involved in deliberate lies and deception would be involved in financial fraud?

  • If the summary is NINE paragraphs long, largely lifted directly from the linked article, it is not a summary. Also; Duh, money.

  • That's the most surprising revelation here.

  • "Conspiracy Theorists Who'd First Popularized QAnon Now Accused of Financial Motives"

    Say it isn't so!

    QTards are even stupider than trumptards, and that's saying something.

  • Make crap up, beg for money to support your ministry/research .. make a bunch of morons think they are part of some special brotherhood. Hand out random 'prophecies' or whatever the Qanon equivalent ( Nov surprise) Rinse .. Repeat and head to the bank. Sadly it's more or less the same bunch of idiots. Where's Ernest Angley when you need him ?

  • Bullshit is a noun (thing) (Score:3)

    by AndyKron ( 937105 ) on Sunday November 29, 2020 @10:29PM (#60777110)
    Trump: noun.-When someone says something so stupid you literally shit your pants. Used in a sentence: Everything that asshole said was Trump. see bullshit

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