Shills are cheap. A lot do not even get paid, they are just brainwashed, eg; JIDF or pro holocaust kiddies that are having a Pavlovian emotional conditioned response.

Interestingly, I have found that as yet, the shills are no-where near as effective on VOAT. I think this is due to the structure here. And as a result, i like it here. :)

I think you're over-estimating the hourly cost of a shill, and underestimating what a college kid can do with an hour, a vpn, and a few dozen accounts.

Obama more or less won his first election with social media support, and he got that support from 12 college kids working full time for a few months. How much would that cost? Well, for 12 people, working 40 hour weeks, for 4 months, at 12 dollars hourly (a complete guess btw, I never made near 12 hourly when I was still in school), you're only gonna have a $70k bill.

Turns out it's pretty cheap to buy power if you know how to shop around.