RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids

RevisionDojo, a YC startup, is running astroturfing campaigns targeting kids
74 comments on Hacker News.
RevisionDojo is a YC-backed test prep company ($3.4M raised) that sells International Baccalaureate (IB) test prep. Over the past year, users on r/IBO sub-reddit have documented a pattern of unethical marketing practices: *Astroturfing:* Coordinated campaigns where accounts pose as students sharing "cheatsheets" and "predicted exam leaks." Other accounts then upvote, leave supportive comments, and ask follow-up questions—creating the illusion of organic student excitement. Multiple threads have exposed this pattern [1][2][3]. *Paid fake posts:* High school students report being offered payment to write promotional Reddit posts [4]. *Pressuring critics:* Users who post negative reviews report being contacted directly by company representatives, told it's "a shame" they're posting publicly [5]. Critical comments receive coordinated mass downvotes [6]. *Soliciting copyrighted materials:* They use TikTok influencers and fake reddit posts to persuade students to sell them official IB exam papers, violating IB policies [7]. The r/IBO moderators are actively investigating [8]. These practices appear to be working great for them. Recently, they acquired OnePrep (oneprep.xyz), a free SAT prep tool that was already popular on r/sat. Since the acquisition, the same manipulation tactics have been deployed at scale: 150 Trustpilot reviews in a window of a few days [9], and widespread coordinated Reddit manipulation—multiple accounts posting "tips" that recommend Oneprep, coordinated upvoting, and fake enthusiasm in comments. The most prominent example was a 2,000+ upvote post removed by moderators for manipulation, but it's part of a sustained campaign across the subreddit. *Sources:* [1] https://ift.tt/JdV7zoe [2] https://ift.tt/u2A05Is [3] https://ift.tt/mzlOjfE [4] https://ift.tt/QoplUXY [5] https://ift.tt/Ofav5Rq [6] https://ift.tt/j43Uagc [7] https://ift.tt/2tLwRmG [8] https://ift.tt/qjL2vul [9] https://ift.tt/5ouLChl