Are you being followed?!

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Are you being followed?! 3

I get this creepy feeling that the more reviews one writes, the more it seems like the number of followers increases and it's not all of it real. Who are these 23 people following me? A few, 3 or 4 I know, and they are friends I knew from before Parfumo, a few others are folks I met on here, but I wonder how "real" the rest of the followers are. 

Anyone else feel that? 


In these days of bots and fake, AI generated content, I tend to prize authenticity above all else.

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@Raluko111 I'm not sure if there's a correlation there, as I wrote tons of reviews for a long time without much of anything/don't find my count increases as I continue to write reviews now.

For me, I notice it usually happens after making a new fragrance friend - swapping recommendations, chatting more with somebody in the shout-outs or on posts, then we naturally end up following each other to keep in touch (or I'm assuming it's them, since I also recently followed them too - whoever "them" is on any given day). 

I think Parfumo is the only fragrance platform I've seen that actively combats AI generated content and bots... so I'm guessing they wouldn't utilize that, if they have warnings everywhere on the site to not use AI in UGC?

Maybe users are just following you more because you write helpful reviews, about fragrances people want to hear about. ☺️ I follow TONS of other users here that I don't actually know or even interact with (beyond giving them "awards") - purely because I enjoy reading their content! 

Last edited by Gourmandgrl on 07/05/2025 - 04:57 PM; edited 1 time in total
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I really don't know how this works, I have only 11 followers and I wrote quite some reviews. I can't see who these followers are either which is why I don't follow someone else (because what's the use if someone doesn't know or can't see that I'm following her/him and it feels sort of 'secretly' also that way). Is there a way you can see who is following you?? Not that I mind, I just don't know what it means Smile

Edit: I Just looked through the website and I also can't see which action one can take to follow someone else so maybe it just happens when you look at someones homepage more often (?) I sometimes do that when someone seems to have same preferences and such. Could it be that I then get 'registerered' as 'a follower' of that person?? So without knowing? 

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@Ringtale  here’s how you follow someone (screenshots)! You have to opt in, Parfumo doesn’t subscribe you to someone involuntarily.

I personally like that follow lists are private; I might be less inclined to follow others if this were visible, simply because I don’t want to seem creepy by following someone I don’t really know/talk to regularly. 😅 I follow people I interact with - but also follow tons of other people only because I enjoy reading their stuff, and don’t want to forget how to find them.

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I don’t know who these people are either. 23 followers but when I write a review or something I only get 3 or 4 likes. 
@Raluko111 you have one more follower now by the way 😁

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Awww, thanks @Ceesie  I follow you as well. 🙂That sounds kinda stalker, hehehe. 

I know what you mean @Ringtale about following. Sometimes, I see some awesome writers, but if they never reply to a comment, I don't really feel comfortable to follow them. Is that weird? It kinda feels like I invade their privacy or something by doing that.
 

Hi, @Gourmandgrl! I think Parfumo is not as strict about AI as we think. I was surprised to see blogs that were most definitely AI generated, but I received a message from an admin that they don't have any policies regarding blog content. 

Also, I love reading reviews, but I've noticed there are users who pop 100+ reviews all of a sudden and I was curious who they were, so I checked out their page. In only a short amount of time, their follower number went from 20 to 90+. I thought that was really weird. At first I thought they were users like me, who'd moved content from Frag@#%$*a, so a lot of reviews were posted suddenly. But then I started seeing a hard to believe number of daily reviews popping up from these users over and over. So, forgive me, but who smells 20-30 perfumes a day and writes daily reviews? 

Other users have also noticed accounts like these, I know I'm not the only one. 

Why does it matter? Because I don't want to be surrounded by fake machine-generated reviews. If AI had a way of analyzing fragrance, it might have been interesting. But it does not. In any case, I really want to read opinions on fragrance from other people, not 0's and 1's.

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I wish there was a way to see all the users who follow you or give awards; not sure if it’s intentionally done like this or just oversight by the devs/not a high priority feature. I’m in the same boat, I know of a few people who follow me, as they tend to comment on statements and reviews, but 36 is a big number compared to the 3 or so likes I get per review. 

PS shoutout to whoever marks my reviews as “helpful,” I feel like lots of my reviews get the “helpful” or “very helpful” accolade and it’s mostly one user, whoever you are, you are a gentleman and a scholar 🫡

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Probably more folks feel comfortable following someone because it's anonymous.  I believe Don made a comment a while back that the mods were debating allowing a user to see who is following the user. It doesn't matter to me. I suppose people follow for different reasons. The ones I follow are more or less aligned with my likes and dislikes, so I always checkout their reviews for potential new discoveries. 

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Hi, @Gourmandgrl! I think Parfumo is not as strict about AI as we think. I was surprised to see blogs that were most definitely AI generated, but I received a message from an admin that they don't have any policies regarding blog content. 

Also, I love reading reviews, but I've noticed there are users who pop 100+ reviews all of a sudden and I was curious who they were, so I checked out their page. In only a short amount of time, their follower number went from 20 to 90+. I thought that was really weird. At first I thought they were users like me, who'd moved content from Frag@#%$*a, so a lot of reviews were posted suddenly. But then I started seeing a hard to believe number of daily reviews popping up from these users over and over. So, forgive me, but who smells 20-30 perfumes a day and writes daily reviews? 

Other users have also noticed accounts like these, I know I'm not the only one. 

@Raluko111 I didn't realize Parfumo doesn't have regulations around AI on blog posts! 

That is interesting about the user with 100+ reviews and jumping in follower count. I wonder if that was one of the users talked about here in the forums before who was copying/pasting reviews from other sites; it seems like there was an issue for a bit with accounts like these, but I think they said on the forum post they looked into those user(s)/took care of them when they came up?

You're right 100+ reviews in a day would be madness (if not copying these over from "the place that shall not be named") 😂 but I am someone who regularly pops out 20+ statements in a day, so hopefully anyone who follows me has turned off the statement notifications haha! 

I just have a huge backlog in my phone's notes app of thoughts I've jotted down from testing, and then often upload them in bulk/all at once. I am also one of the crazy ones who will test 20-30 fragrances in one day, if given the chance (like being at a store I live further away from, so I need to take the opportunity to smell all the things I can 😅)! And no AI is used in my writing.

Bottom line though: I can only speak for myself, but haven't seen an increase in users (for me) from writing reviews/statements. So I would think your increase might truly be because you just write really helpful reviews! 🏆

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Omnipotato

PS shoutout to whoever marks my reviews as “helpful,” I feel like lots of my reviews get the “helpful” or “very helpful” accolade and it’s mostly one user, whoever you are, you are a gentleman and a scholar 🫡

Agreed, feels so encouraging to get a "helpful" or "very helpful"! I select this on reviews too if it's really helpful/deserving!

Last edited by Gourmandgrl on 07/02/2025 - 11:39 AM; edited 1 time in total
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Ceesie

I don’t know who these people are either. 23 followers but when I write a review or something I only get 3 or 4 likes. 
@Raluko111 you have one more follower now by the way 😁

I think part of it might be that many people opt to follow someone without getting notifications of their reviews. I personally do this, so I'm not getting a bajillion emails haha - then I just go back to who I follow periodically to read what they've written; but it's sometimes easy to forget!

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Gourmandgrl

@Ringtale  here’s how you follow someone (screenshots)! You have to opt in, Parfumo doesn’t subscribe you to someone involuntarily.

I personally like that follow lists are private; I might be less inclined to follow others if this were visible, simply because I don’t want to seem creepy by following someone I don’t really know/talk to regularly. 😅 I follow people I interact with - but also follow tons of other people only because I enjoy reading their stuff, and don’t want to forget how to find them.

Thanks Gourmandgrl, although I probably won't use it. I just check out reviews of those who write about perfumes, giving me the impression they have a taste I can relate to and see their collection sometimes to see if there's anything worth while checking out etc. It's fun enough that way Smile. It also doesn't appeal to me that, when there is a new follower, you get 'congrats' asif being followed is a merit...I write reviews hoping to inform others, not to 'gain' followers Smile 

I also like the 'helpful' comment though because it makes me more mindful about what kind of reviews really are informative. 

Last edited by Ringtale on 07/02/2025 - 02:13 PM; edited 1 time in total
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Raluko111

I get this creepy feeling that the more reviews one writes, the more it seems like the number of followers increases and it's not all of it real. Who are these 23 people following me? A few, 3 or 4 I know, and they are friends I knew from before Parfumo, a few others are folks I met on here, but I wonder how "real" the rest of the followers are. 

Anyone else feel that? 


In these days of bots and fake, AI generated content, I tend to prize authenticity above all else.

I just have one follower 🤷‍♀️ 

0
PerfumeL0v3r
Raluko111

I get this creepy feeling that the more reviews one writes, the more it seems like the number of followers increases and it's not all of it real. Who are these 23 people following me? A few, 3 or 4 I know, and they are friends I knew from before Parfumo, a few others are folks I met on here, but I wonder how "real" the rest of the followers are. 

Anyone else feel that? 


In these days of bots and fake, AI generated content, I tend to prize authenticity above all else.

I just have one follower 🤷‍♀️ 

Don't know if it helps @PerfumeL0v3r, but I often read your threads and visit your profile to see if there is a new Guerlain in your collection 😀 so not following you doesn't mean 'not interested' 😉.

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I personally like that our followers are kept hidden. I don't think that should be a focus of this platform, but then again I'm kind of old-fashioned and don't really care for that sort of thing. 😁

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@Ezroni couldn't agree more on all counts! But hopefully this thread helps OP with their concerns about bots/AI, too.

@Ringtale totally understand, every approach is valid! Glad you at least know now you won't be automatically subscribed somewhere you didn't opt in (original guess), since that would be confusing 😅

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It's not only one user who posts 10 reviews per minute or has really "interesting" stats. There's a pattern of it that you notice (others have as well) of a couple of users. 

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Ezroni

I personally like that our followers are kept hidden. I don't think that should be a focus of this platform, but then again I'm kind of old-fashioned and don't really care for that sort of thing. 😁

Yes, I agree. It's better balanced to keep it anonymous. Otherwise it might devolve into cliques of people giving awards out of obligation, "you give me one, I give you one, etc". It already kind of is like that.

Having said that, if it wasn't anonymous, it might be easier to trace fake accounts or fake followers, awards.

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Most fake accounts show up in the weekends or when Don is away (he told us once if I remember it well). Then the whole forum often gets invaded with fake accounts (always saying 'new user') posting messages containing links (spam!). Very annoying !

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Ringtale

Most fake accounts show up in the weekends or when Don is away (he told us once if I remember it well). Then the whole forum often gets invaded with fake accounts (always saying 'new user') posting messages containing links (spam!). Very annoying !

You mean those weird links and posts that show up in Forum? Those are certainly annoying, but the accounts I`m referring to don`t appear as `New User.`

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Raluko111
Ringtale

Most fake accounts show up in the weekends or when Don is away (he told us once if I remember it well). Then the whole forum often gets invaded with fake accounts (always saying 'new user') posting messages containing links (spam!). Very annoying !

You mean those weird links and posts that show up in Forum? Those are certainly annoying, but the accounts I`m referring to don`t appear as `New User.`

Yes, I mean those. as for other possible fake accounts, I never noticed, but I think I don't use the site that thoroughly maybe. What would be their goal I wonder? 

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Ringtale
What would be their goal I wonder? 

1) Hack an older, inactive account

2) Pump it with copy-pasted reviews, statements, add some wall posts from other hacked accounts

3) Give awards to these reviews with botted accounts

4) Once you finally appear trustworthy, you can start scamming people on souk

There’s been an influx of such cases. Parfumo team is doing their best to keep the botters at bay.

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Wusubi
Ringtale
What would be their goal I wonder? 

1) Hack an older, inactive account

2) Pump it with copy-pasted reviews, statements, add some wall posts from other hacked accounts

3) Give awards to these reviews with botted accounts

4) Once you finally appear trustworthy, you can start scamming people on souk

There’s been an influx of such cases. Parfumo team is doing their best to keep the botters at bay.

Oh dear!! Must be very pittyful people then!

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Smirky

Probably more folks feel comfortable following someone because it's anonymous.  I believe Don made a comment a while back that the mods were debating allowing a user to see who is following the user. It doesn't matter to me. I suppose people follow for different reasons. The ones I follow are more or less aligned with my likes and dislikes, so I always checkout their reviews for potential new discoveries. 

I completely agree. I'm very introverted and I find it a lot more comfortable to do anonymous following. Following and unfollowing can't also be used for bullying when it's anonymous (lots of this type bullying used happen for example at Fragram where you can see your followers). And yes there are tons of reasons why people start following others. It can be for example that someone likes your writing style, certain type of content that you're creating, or perhaps you're from the same country that the people following you or maybe you know each other from somewhere.

I do have a few friends here, however I have no idea who most of my followers could be. A couple of months ago I had a weird situation that someone followed and unfollowed me almost daily. So my follower count was one more or one less depending on the day for a long time which I found very weird. I don't know if it was the same person who couldn't decide wheter to follow me or not, or if it was a glitch or some bot account or something but I found it super bizarre 😅 Fortunately that hasn't happened lately and my follower count has been stable for a while lol.

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I agree with you. @Gourmandgrl  @Lempi 
I'm also very introverted and I don't like SNS, so anonymity is very helpful to me. lol

Forexanple,It's not fair to say, "Give me an award because you're my follower."This is just an example.
For example, even if someone writes really useful things, they may not have received an award. So I think the number of awards is irrelevant in the first place.

And,I don't think it's appropriate for a review site to have an increase in the number of awards due to personal relationships.(Of course, the important thing is that everyone is free to have their own standards!)

By the way, I hardly follow anyone.I think it's healthier for a review site to not know who is following someone.

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