Unfortunately, most if not all of those accounts are all too genuine—often users who have been on the site for well over a decade. PC hardware attracts almost as much vapid tribalism as politics and pro sports.

> PC hardware attracts almost as much vapid tribalism as politics and pro sports.

This seems to happen a lot where a lot of money is on the line. How much of this long-term astroturf? Just because the account has been around for a long time doesn't mean they can't be an "influencer".

Years ago, I managed one of the larger performance computer hardware forums on the web (its still around, albeit having changed owners a time or two since I left).

We knew pretty well that most of the audience was kids, and knew most of the marketing people from the major chipmakers. The brands were just starting to wake up to the idea of community engagement at the end of the tech magazine era / start of the Youtuber era, and as best I can tell there were no signs of any of today's astroturfing behavior - yet all of the tribalism was there.

Its certainly more influenced now, but even back in the day everyone wanted to justify their own purchases by insisting it was the best possible thing ever.

> everyone wanted to justify their own purchases by insisting it was the best possible thing ever.

This post-purchase rationalization is a frighteningly powerful cognitive bias. Users can get quite hostile even if you simply suggest that they should have bought a lower-end model from the same company, and will readily lie to themselves about their usage patterns to justify their purchase of a device that is only superior in a few irrelevant microbenchmarks. And that's before anything like brand loyalty gets thrown into the mix.

It's sad, I'd expect more from people that presumably pick parts and build PCs based on benchmarks.

That level of fanboity should be reserved for the teenagers and the XBox vs Playstation debates about their gun shooter du jour that looks indistinguishable on both without a magnifying glass.