@Navakashi Yes ! I don’t mind answering—anything that gets the word spread.
1. Views? Well there’s a speculation there but only because the counter is fickle and will change even if the author skims through the chapter if that’s the case then clearly a bot can click in a chapter and skip to the bottom and comment. However this is mere speculation, and if it is true not all views are going to be fake (not out of hope. I just did a little bit of testing once) as for votes…NAH whether it be from the inability of the bots or scammers not caring enough you will never get a vote from a bot— or at least that is my experience.
There are a two ways lemme break them down:
Vague comments/inproper addressing: scammers and bots alike essentially copy and paste (evidence of this is the same one commenting the same two exact things on two different stories of mine. I believe it was The Curious case of Roe Jekyll and Not so Average? If not Not so average then a recent chapter in A fate as Cursed as Mine) but point is that copy and pasting is use. So when they try to flatter a author vague and general compliments are sprinkled in (I.E your work is amazing! Has been used but nothing listing why) you can always ask about what they liked so much it isn’t rude and in my experience I never got responses. And then in proper addressing…or I consider in proper. Is that since these are often mass produced ‘Dearest Author’ or ‘Author’ is something commonly user—they don’t bother to call the writer.
Second one though and possibly the biggest is 100% trying to get people to communicate offsite. There is plenty of scams connected to this, but if they want to take you off site biggest red flag there is.
And last but not least is more so a safety message: don’t trust offers from random people online. Just like you wouldn’t trust a random offer from a stranger in real life. If you do both can potentially hurt you (be it different kinds of hurt)
Hope this helped!
