My astrophotography in the movie Project Hail Mary
rpastro.square.site

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563 points

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wallflower

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3 days ago

169 comments

rpastro ・ 3 hours ago

Hey everyone, I’m the astrophotographer, but I’m not OP. I’m assuming OP picked up my article and posted here and that’s ok! So I quickly created an account here to comment.

Having a quick read through the comments I just want to say thank you for the kind words! Please follow my IG (https://www.instagram.com/deepskyjourney) to see more of my photography, and the reddit article if you want to drop a comment with any questions :)

https://www.reddit.com/r/ProjectHailMary/s/NbRv3sj3fs

Cheers,

Rod Prazeres

  • pants2 ・ an hour ago

    Hi Rod, the images you have on your gallery and instagram are stunning but very low-resolution (unless I'm missing something). You mention in the article about preparing IMAX-ready photographs. Is there a way to download those full-res versions of your images?

    • embedding-shape ・ 33 minutes ago

      > Is there a way to download those full-res versions of your images?

      Maybe because HN is usually geared towards "programmers" rather than "artists", but asking for a (free?) download of full-res versions of a photographers photos is a bit like asking a developer who is publishing commercial desktop software for the source code of the program :)

      Maybe at least ask to be able to pay for a high resolution version (not just printed), I know I'd be interested in that too!

    • bryceacc ・ 16 minutes ago

      I assume that is on purpose, you have to buy prints. Curious if the full res digital would be for sale but I am guessing not

  • hermitcrab ・ an hour ago

    Very cool. Major bragging rights. And it is a great film to be associated with.

  • glidefarrow ・ an hour ago

    I was thrilled to read through to the end of the article and discover a fellow Brisbanite! My friends and I were discussing this movie the other night, they will be stoked to keep an eye out for your images.

  • sllabres ・ 2 hours ago

    Congratulations :-)

    Very nice shots. It must be a great feeling to see one's own footage in a feature film!

    How long do you do astrophotography?

  • dheera ・ 28 minutes ago

    Also a fellow astrophotography enthusiast here! I love to photograph deep sky objects in the context of their landscapes. There is a lot of math, stacking, tracking, and denoising in the process, but I keep every image very real as what you would see if your eyes were a lot more sensitive. A lot of people don't realize how big some objects are in the night sky -- for example, Barnard's Loop is as large as about half the entire constellation of Orion, and Andromeda appears 6 times the size of the moon. We just don't see them because many of these objects are very dim -- not small.

    https://www.instagram.com/dheeranet

  • lgl ・ 2 hours ago

    Hey Rod, your last name seems portuguese(?)

    Congrats on this, not only you got credits on a feature movie, you got one of the good ones. Cloud 9 for you, enjoy!

    • rpastro ・ 2 hours ago

      Nice catch. I’m Brazilian but have been living in Australia for over 20 years and thank you!

  • fosco ・ 3 hours ago

    Can you share what equipment was used to capture those images?

    • rpastro ・ 2 hours ago

      I’ve had multiple setups over the last 2 years, but for the images displayed in the movie there were two main setups: a William Optics RedCat 51 II and an Askar 130PHQ, both paired with a ZWO ASI2600MM Pro camera, typically on a Sky Watcher NEQ6 Pro mount, along with narrowband and RGB filters depending on the target.

      • hermitcrab ・ an hour ago

        What sort of magnification do you need to get photos like that?

  • bravoetch ・ 2 hours ago

    First time in ages I sat through the credits!

DorkyPup ・ 7 hours ago

This is incredible and wonderful news, huge congratulations! As someone who works at the intersection of design and engineering, the detail about delivering "starless versions" so the credit typography doesn't compete with the bright stars is exactly the kind of invisible technical problem-solving I love reading about on here.

On a personal note, I find it very refreshing to hear that a major studio opted for real captured photography. Love that they specifically wanted the authenticity of real narrowband data and that speaks to the production team's vision. Enjoy the premiere night, feel incredibly proud. I was already planning on watching the movie this weekend (it releases here on the 26th) and now I'm doubly excited because I know this neat little tidbit.

I'm pretty sure this "Dad did something crazy" moment is going to be a core memory for your kids. Congrats!

  • vintagedave ・ 6 hours ago

    I'm curious how the starless versions are created. From the steps at the end, I couldn't see a 'this is how stars are removed' step. Maybe it's part of stacking (but most stars would remain present?) or the calibration process treating stars as noise?

    • knappe ・ 3 hours ago

      Traditionally (pre-ai) you would use another image of the same part of the sky and negate the items that you want to remove from the image

      As an example terrestrial telescope mirrors get dusty. You're not going to break down the scope just to clean up the dust as this is a many days operation in most cases. So instead you would take "flats" that were of a pure white background and thus showed the dust in its full, dusty, glory. When you take your actual images, you negate (subtract from the original image) the flat and thus any noise generated by the dust. You can use this same method for removing brighter stars from an image that would otherwise saturate the ccd and wash out the background. Turns out it doesn't work for planes. Ask me how I know!

      • dotancohen ・ 2 hours ago
        ・ 5 more
         

          > Traditionally (pre-ai) you would use another image of the same part of the sky and negate the items that you want to remove from the image.
        I'm not an astrophotographer, so I'm interested about why that method would work for stars. Are not stars fixed in relation to the images taken? I could see how the technique would work with planets, maybe, but not stars.

        Why does the technique not work with aircraft? Because they generally fly on fixed routes?

        • recursivegirth ・ an hour ago
          ・ 4 more

          Earth moves - that's how you get the next shot without repositioning the telescope.

          This time-lapse probably better visualizes it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFpeM3fxJoQ

          • dotancohen ・ an hour ago

            As the Earth rotates over the course of the night, the background stars and nebulae move as a single unit, no?

            Maybe for some close stars parallax might work to remove them over the course of half a year. But no way could the Earth's rotation during a single night move background stars out of a nebulae.

          • hatthew ・ an hour ago
            ・ 2 more

            Sure, but the nebulae also move along with the stars. The questions is how one can subtract the stars without also subtracting the nebulae. (I'm assuming different filters and/or a database of known star positions)

            • dotancohen ・ 33 minutes ago

              The ESA catalog is not precise enough to remove a star from an image of the structure of a nebulae - never mind Hipparcos. Filters while photographing and image processing in post are the way to go.

              Don't forget that not only does the star need to be removed, but also the diffraction spikes. Those are internal reflections in the lens assembly - not mapped by any star catalog ))

    • inaros ・ 3 hours ago

      >> I'm curious how the starless versions are created.

      Its done with using dedicated astrophotography software (StarXTerminator). Example: https://astrobackyard.com/starnet-astrophotography/

      So these are more artistic photo works than real science photos...

      Rod Prazeres the Astrophotographer, has given this interview where he talks about the process: https://www.astronomy.com/observing/the-astrophotography-of-...

      • dotancohen ・ 2 hours ago
        ・ 3 more
         

          > So these are more artistic photo works than real science photos...
        I disagree. If there are many flies around a statue, and I photograph the statue but remove the flies in the photo (via AI or any other technique), then I'm still producing an image of something that exists in the world - exactly as it appears in the world.

        I agree that the claim "no generative AI used" is technically incorrect, but I do feel that the image does not contain any AI-hallucinated content and therefore is an accurate representation of reality. These structures appear in the image exactly as they exist in nature.

        • robotfelix ・ 44 minutes ago

          It uses machine/deep learning, but it's hard to characterise as "generative AI".

          AI-related definitions aside, if it's a strictly subtractive/destructive tool that is removing light, it's arguably not much different to filtering frequencies!

      • teraflop ・ 3 hours ago
        ・ 5 more

        So this part of the blog post is essentially false: "no generative AI of any kind"

        I have yet to see a precise technical definition of what "generative AI" means, but StarXTerminator uses a neural network that generates new data to fill in the gaps where non-stellar objects are obscured by stars. And it advertises itself as "AI powered".

        • cj ・ 3 hours ago
          ・ 3 more

          I don't consider photos I take on iPhone to be "AI generated" or even "AI augmented" even though iPhone uses neural networks and "AI" to do basic stuff like low light photography, blurring backgrounds, etc.

          • teraflop ・ 2 hours ago

            I agree that I wouldn't call these photos "AI generated", because the majority of what you're seeing is real.

            But that's very different to saying that no generative AI was used at all in their production. "AI augmented" sounds pretty accurate to me.

            Likewise, if someone posted a photo taken with their iPhone where they had used the built-in AI features to (for instance) remove people or objects, and then they claimed that no AI was involved, I would consider that misleading, even if the photo accurately depicts a real scene in other respects.

          • hatthew ・ 40 minutes ago

            As a photographer and machine learning guy, I would call a lot of modern phone photos AI augmented. AI to stack photos or figure out what counts as the background is a little bit of a gray area, but an img-to-img CNN is about as close as you can get to full AI generation without a full GAN or diffusion model.

        • inaros ・ 3 hours ago

          So funny people are downvoting you...

          https://astrobackyard.com/starnet-astrophotography/

          “StarNet is a neural network that can remove stars from images in one simple step leaving only the background. More technically, it is a convolutional residual net with encoder-decoder architecture and with L1, Adversarial and Perceptual losses.”

    • roblh ・ 6 hours ago

      I feel like the stars are probably pretty easy to mask out since they’re very bright relative to the rest of the image. Once you have the mask, each one is small enough that you could probably fill it with the values from adjacent pixels. Kinda like sensor mapping to hide dead pixels. That’s just a guess though, I’m sure there’s more to it than that.

      • touisteur ・ 6 hours ago
        ・ 2 more

        Bright stars are so bright they literally mask areas of the sky. You'll probably need deconvolution algorithms (CLEAN being the standard some time ago, don't know whether some AI/deep-inv approach works nowadays...) to remove them.

        • joshumax ・ 5 hours ago

          There are several “AI” deconvolution tools to remove stars which work exceptionally well: two of the most popular ones being StarNet and RC-Astro’s StarXTerminator. I’m willing to bet that the author used the latter for star removal as it’s become something of a standard in the astrophotography world.

throw0101d ・ 7 hours ago

Somewhat related, nature photographer/youtuber Danni Connor had her recording of a red squirrel used in the movie Dune (Part 1) for the sound of the desert mouse (muad'dib). Her interviewing with (Oscar-winning) sound designer Mark Mangini on it:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtfzjehDg74

* transcript: https://otter.ai/u/PA9dbWFA7BgPgLZN9CSo1WFAjXk

* https://www.iflscience.com/wildlife-photographers-viral-squi...

* https://markmangini.com/Mark_Mangini/Blog/Entries/2021/11/7_...

Story of her 'adopting' the squirrels:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tDlh62AVPo

The name of the squirrel is "Baby Pear"; her viral tweet:

* https://twitter.com/DaniConnorWild/status/127534941750838476...

j_bum ・ 7 hours ago

Incredible work, OP. What a proud feeling you must have. Congrats!!

My wife and I saw the movie this weekend, we thought it was great. I adored the book, yet I recognize a book can’t be perfectly translated to the screen.

I thought the directors did a good enough job at translating the sci-fi into something the masses would enjoy.

Kudos to you

  • superchink ・ 6 hours ago

    Would you recommend reading the book first?

    • alistairSH ・ 6 hours ago

      As a general rule, always read the book first. In this case, that holds true - there was too much in the book to cover completely in the movie. It's a pretty quick read as well - you could probably bang it out in a long afternoon, if you were inclined.

      That said, I never read Harry Potter and can't imagine going back and reading it now. So, YMMV.

      • elictronic ・ 6 hours ago

        I don’t think it does here. This has been one of the times where I enjoyed the movie more than the book. I liked the character in the book, in the movie I couldn’t take my eyes off them.

      • qingcharles ・ 4 hours ago
        ・ 2 more

        I watched the Harry Potter movies first and then read the books and thoroughly enjoyed the books, and the movies didn't spoil them at all.

        • 9dev ・ 2 hours ago

          They might be a special case considering the audience, books, author, actors, and the movies themselves grew alongside each other; it’s pretty singular, I think.

    • TyrunDemeg101 ・ 5 hours ago

      Both are wonderful. I thought the movie was an excellent adaptation of the book.

      But I am glad I read the book first, I got much more out of it - it goes a lot more in depth into the science and engineering challenges that occur throughout. Which I appreciated. I'm not sure I would have read the book in the same way if I had seen the movie first.

    • RulerOf ・ 3 hours ago

      I watched the movie and then read the book.

      I tend to prefer movies as a storytelling medium, and enjoyed watching the story unfold that way. I ended up just wanting to know more about things that were implied in the movie but not explained, and the book filled in those gaps well.

      So if you want to do both, and want to get something new when you do each, then, having done it that way, I would recommend it.

      Edit: reviewing my app history, it took me somewhere between 10-11 hours to read the book, and I do not read fiction especially fast.

    • csours ・ 5 hours ago

      I read the book before watching the movie - I'd recommend the opposite.

      Watching the movie first will set the stage for a lot of details that work better in a book than a movie.

    • j_bum ・ 5 hours ago

      That’s a tough one. I’d recommend the book first, but I can see arguments for both orders.

      By reading the book first, you’ll have a better background and understanding of the context of the plot, the science, and the overall objectives of the mission. There are also several “twists” in the book that were cut from the movie for runtime.

      I enjoyed the movie after reading because I got to see the story “come to life”.

      But I could also understand the perspective of enjoying the movie first, and then having the story/world expanded 8x with a 16hr book.

      You’d could equate “movie -> book” order to watching the LoTR standard editions first, and then watching the extended editions.

      I listened to the audiobook narrated by Ray Porter (on Audible) and would recommend that production if you enjoy audio.

      I don’t think you can go wrong either way :)

    • aczerepinski ・ 6 hours ago

      Book is better but they’re both good. I don’t think order matters.

      • geerlingguy ・ 6 hours ago
        ・ 2 more

        I agree; the movie is more of a relationship/self-reflection/friendship story, with some pop science and space stuff mixed in to keep it interesting.

        The book is more of a true sci-fi novel, with the relationship stuff keeping it interesting.

        I liked both a lot, and think both could be enjoyed fully with or without the other, in either order.

        • estebank ・ 6 hours ago

          I found that I would have enjoyed the movie a bit more if I hadn't read the book, but it was still a solid 8/10. I'm really glad that a movie like this did well in opening weekend.

    • dahart ・ 5 hours ago

      The book is fantastic, I’d recommend reading it one way or another. ;) Speaking personally, I lose some motivation to read a book after seeing the movie. But book-based movies of course rarely if ever live up to the book. I read first, so I can’t speak to the other way around, but I think I was looking forward to the movie a lot more than I would have if I hadn’t read the book. I also suspect I was more forgiving of the movie than if I’d seen it cold.

    • zyberzero ・ 6 hours ago

      Not the parent, but I've seen the movie and read the book. I think there are a few gaps in the movie that's explained by the book, but there are some artistic freedom as well between the book and the film.

      I would recommend reading the book first at least.

    • gukov ・ 6 hours ago

      The audiobook version is amazing, if that’s your thing.

    • throw0101d ・ 5 hours ago

      > Would you recommend reading the book first?

      I recommended it to a co-worker, who ended up going with the audio book, and found he found it good.

shubhamjain ・ 7 hours ago

Amazing! Kudos to Hollywood, for going to this length to license the work, credit the author, involve him in the project. To respect realism as a goal for its own, even though "no one will notice" and a similar image might be "just a prompt away." I know how common is the latter these days.

  • tomasphan ・ 7 hours ago

    I doubt that good looking IMAX quality astrophotography is just a prompt away.

tills13 ・ 3 hours ago

As more an more companies lazily use AI to achieve the same thing I am doubling down on supporting -- even if I don't really care about the subject -- anything that supports actual, real human art.

0x38B ・ 7 hours ago

Me and my brother just saw the movie tonight and we stayed for the credits. I thought the images were beautiful.

  • Tommix11 ・ 6 hours ago

    I loved that they changed the ending. I did not like the ending in the book.

    • embedding-shape ・ 6 hours ago

      About to see the movie in two days, read the book ages ago and remember I wasn't too fond of the book ending either, so now I got a bit more excited :)

      • Sivart13 ・ 2 hours ago

        I don't think they changed much about the ending. There's one scene added that's not in the book, but the outcomes are all the same.

    • minitech ・ 6 hours ago

      What changed about the ending?

      • 0xf00ff00f ・ 6 hours ago

        No spoilers please, not everyone has seen the movie!

mourner ・ 4 hours ago

Amazing achievement, congratulations! Can't seem to be able to read it though, it greets me with "Sorry, you have been blocked" CloudFlare page — is this a HN overloading the website, or did the host accidentally block IPs from Ukraine perhaps?

scientism ・ 3 hours ago

That's really great news. For anyone looking for the astrophotography equipment, this is from one of his posts:

Telescope: William Optics UltraCat 76 Mount: Sky-Watcher Wave 150i Camera: ZWO ASI2600MM-Pro

Faaak ・ 2 hours ago

A bit indiscrete, but how much does the licence cost? Is it around hundreds, 1k, 10k?

Levitating ・ 2 hours ago

This is kind of in line with the story, where amateur astronomers data from around the world is used to test a hypothesis.

I am currently reading the book.

mkehrt ・ 5 hours ago

I was wondering what these images were! I wasn't sure if they were real photographs or not. They're great!

  • inaros ・ 3 hours ago

    The stars were stripped out with neural network tools (StarNet++/StarXTerminator) at the studio request so text credits would read cleanly over them. The underlying nebula data is real, but removing every star from the field puts this firmly in the category of art photography, not scientific imaging.

    No one has ever or could ever observe a nebula with zero stars in the frame.

hectdev ・ 6 hours ago

As an amateur astrophotographer, I am both so envious and so happy for you. What a wonderful recognition of your talent and dedication to the craft. Kudos!

TyrunDemeg101 ・ 5 hours ago

Congrats man! That's an awesome accomplishment!

Amazing movie and the end credit visuals WERE incredible!

AnDaltan ・ 4 hours ago

Dude, amazing! The images are beautiful and it's 1000 times better when you know they're real and not CGI/AI.

  • inaros ・ 3 hours ago

    They are not real ... https://astrobackyard.com/starnet-astrophotography/

    • HeavenFox ・ 3 hours ago

      That is not what starnet does. It just removes the star from the picture you took, nothing else. It also predates generative AI by a few years.

      If by "not real", you mean "you removed the stars so it no longer reflect reality!", then real photograph doesn't exist. For example, OP uses narrow-band filters, and it's common to map H-alpha wavelength, which is red, to green in the images. Does that make it unreal?

      In the end, astrophotography is more art than science; the goal is more about producing aesthetically-pleasing images than doing photometry. Photographers must take some artistic license.

      • inaros ・ 3 hours ago

        https://astrobackyard.com/starnet-astrophotography/

        “StarNet is a neural network that can remove stars from images in one simple step leaving only the background. More technically, it is a convolutional residual net with encoder-decoder architecture and with L1, Adversarial and Perceptual losses.”

    • BenjiWiebe ・ 3 hours ago

      They're a lot more real than CG/AI. It's very rare and maybe not even possible to have a "true" astrophotography photo. At those light levels, eyes and camera sensors work very differently and even a "plain" astro photo has either been processed a lot, or else doesn't look like what our eyes would see.

      • inaros ・ 3 hours ago
        ・ 2 more

        >> They're a lot more real than CG/AI.

        Fine, but is still art photography with heavy processing. Not to criticize the amazing work of Rod Prazeres, who has now commented on this thread.

        • HeavenFox ・ 3 hours ago

          Even straight-out-of-the-camera JPG files have been heavily processed - they are just hidden behind the RAW processor which we have taken for granted; not to mention smartphone photographs, which employ neural network in the processing pipeline.

manyaoman ・ 6 hours ago

Those shots are stunning. Too bad I rarely pay attention to the credits. I always assumed a lot of effort goes into them though, and this post seems to confirm it.

gwbennett ・ 6 hours ago

Great, great work! Congratulations and Bravo Zulu! Looking forward to seeing the movie this weekend.

khazhoux ・ 4 hours ago

Everyone do yourselves a favor and skip all trailers and go see this movie. It was a delight start to finish. I was so glad I knew zero what the story was.

stogot ・ 5 hours ago

This post makes me want to go see the movie now. Is it in imax? I didn’t enjoy the book (Martian was his best) but maybe I will enjoy this

  • Levitating ・ 2 hours ago

    Why? I am currently reading the book as well, and I even though I am not a scientist I feel like I am finding small technical/scientific mistakes that shouldn't have had to be there.

double07zip ・ 7 hours ago

This is amazing. Your photos are art!

inaros ・ 2 days ago

[flagged]

  • kdaker ・ 2 days ago

    OP, who seem like an accomplished astrophotographer is sharing a proud moment involving his work. All you can say is how bad the movie is? You can share this in on a post about the movie itself. Btw beautiful photographs OP.

    • quietbritishjim ・ 7 hours ago

      I don't see any reason to suggest the HN submitter is the same as the article author, especially considering the high volume of submitted articles by the submitter.

    • inaros ・ 4 hours ago

      This is supposed to be a smart community..but you and at least at 30% here dont seem to be able to grasp, the OP is not the Astrophotographer.

    • inaros ・ a day ago

      Its seems the post is part of a coordinated pump on the movie here by Amazon Studios. As you can see, if you look at the amount of related post coordinated with the release. And never seen for any other movie...

      • dwringer ・ 7 hours ago

        People have been talking about the book on here since it came out; I see no reason to believe people aren't genuinely interested in it. I loved it, personally.

      • dcminter ・ 7 hours ago

        Even if promotional (which I doubt even if other posts are), this ticks the 'is interesting and not shallow' box for me.

      • jebarker ・ 6 hours ago
        ・ 3 more

        > Its seems the post is part of a coordinated pump on the movie here by Amazon Studios

        Is there any evidence for this?

        • inaros ・ 3 hours ago
          ・ 2 more

          The studios behind Project Hail Mary have documented histories of fake online promotion and the industry to do it again is booming. I don't have proof that Amazon MGM Studios is astroturfing HN or Reddit about Project Hail Mary. What I do have is a chain of documented facts that should make anyone reading enthusiastic comments about this film pause and consider the source...

          Project Hail Mary is produced by Amazon MGM Studios and distributed internationally by Sony Pictures. The film cost $200 million to produce and needs roughly $500 million to break even. Amazon MGM has had a string of expensive flops (Crime 101, Melania, After the Hunt), and there was reported internal pressure for this film to change the narrative.

          Amazon MGM's Head of Global Marketing is Sue Kroll, who spent 24 years at Warner Bros. serving as President of Worldwide Marketing and Distribution. Her deputy for international marketing, Charlie Coleman, also came from Warner Bros. Awards head Juli Goodwin spent nearly 20 years at Warner Bros.

          This matters because Warner Bros Home Entertainment was caught by the FTC in 2016 paying YouTube influencers (including PewDiePie) thousands of dollars through ad agency Plaid Social Labs. Warner Bros settled with the FTC. Also lets not forget Sony Pictures invented a fake movie critic in 2001, and around the same time, were caught using employees posing as moviegoers in TV commercials for The Patriot. Sony at the end paid $326,000 to Connecticut's AG and $1.5 million in a class-action settlement...

          The industry to do this on Reddit and other public forums is openly thriving. There are companies that will, right now, post on Reddit and HN? as "organic users" for paying clients. They describe these services on their own websites:

              • Onemotion Group (onemotion.group) openly advertises "real-looking posts, comments, and threads that catch on" with a focus on "organic posts, community replies, and making threads spread naturally." 

    • Single Grain (singlegrain.com/agency/reddit-marketing-agency) sells "conversation monitoring," "question response systems," and "thoughtful comments and contributions that establish your brand as a helpful community member." 

    • OutreachBloom describes monitoring subreddits and responding with "helpful" answers using pre-warmed accounts with built-up karma.
          Specially an agency called Iron Roots (ironrootsinc.com) lists both Amazon Studios and Warner Bros. as clients...

          Describes services including "engaging communities with compelling content and fostering active, loyal brand advocates across platforms."

          I am not claiming Project Hail Mary is being astroturfed. I am pointing out:

              1. Both studios behind this film (Amazon MGM and Sony) have documented, FTC-adjudicated histories of deceptive online promotion. 

    2. The marketing leadership at Amazon MGM comes directly from Warner Bros., where this behavior was institutionally tolerated. 

    3. An entire commercial industry exists to post as organic users on Reddit, HN, and forums, some of these agencies list Amazon Studios as a client. 

    4. The financial incentive is massive: a $200M film from a studio desperate to prove its theatrical strategy works. 

    5. The penalties when caught have been trivial relative to marketing budgets ($326K for Sony, consent decree for Warner Bros.), and there is no ongoing enforcement mechanism for community forum manipulation.
          When someone on HN or Reddit posts an enthusiastic take about a major studio release, the question is not whether astroturfing happens. We know it does, the companies that do it have websites. The question is whether you can tell the difference between a genuine fan and a paid account?
          • embedding-shape ・ 29 minutes ago

            I'm gonna just take a shortcut, and watch the movie, then make up my mind. Astroturfing or not, making up your own mind is part of the fun of being alive. Then "a genuine fan or a paid account" doesn't even matter anyway, because they're both as important when you make up your own mind.

            Speaking about that, have you seen the movie yourself?

  • vintagedave ・ 6 hours ago

    Deadpool's humour was violent and crude. I don't remember anything like that at all in Project Hail Mary.

    It was a buddy film, and an American one, so had that culture in its humour, sure. But it was light-hearted and quite fun.

  • kvgr ・ 7 hours ago

    Why are some people so narrow minded? Different style, get over it. Not everything SciFi must be "true scifi like Star Trek". This rant reminds me of Big Bang theory.

    • izzydata ・ 7 hours ago

      Star Trek is true scifi? I always considered it to be soft scifi due to it being more about social issues in space rather than the more hard scifi about the fictional science. At least the book of Project Hail Mary is closer to hard scifi than Star Trek as they spend a lot of time describing the science. The movie rightfully skips most of this tedium in favor of a beautiful spectacle.

      This is the first time I've heard of the idea of "true" scifi though.

      • ceejayoz ・ 7 hours ago
        ・ 4 more

        Star Trek is largely fantasy.

        • BenjiWiebe ・ 3 hours ago
          ・ 3 more

          IMO if "fantasy" tries to explain things as being technology, it's (soft) sci-fi. If it describes it as magic, then it's fantasy.

          • ceejayoz ・ an hour ago
            ・ 2 more

            Technobabble is just tech-sounding magic.

            • izzydata ・ 21 minutes ago

              They have different writing styles generally, but it is still pointless to call Star Trek a fantasy for the same reason why you wouldn't call Lord of the Rings a science fiction. If you have a spectrum from fantasy to science fiction with 5 being the middle then maybe Star Trek would be a 6 and Star Wars being more of a 5.

              Personally I'd classify Dune to be more of a fantasy than Star Trek just because of the style it is written in being very mystical and prophetic.

  • ggambetta ・ 7 hours ago

    That's just, like, your opinion, man. I loved the book and I loved the movie.

    • inaros ・ 5 hours ago

      I do not deny that people enjoy it. I am saying that the film humor, dialogue, and emotional treatment strike me as pitched at a comparatively childish level.... ;-)

  • ceejayoz ・ 7 hours ago

    I enjoyed the hell out of it.

    Consider the possibility that your opinions are not universal.

    • throw0101d ・ 7 hours ago

      > Consider the possibility that your opinions are not universal.

      Critic and audience reactions are generally positive:

      > On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 94% of 326 critics' reviews are positive. The website's consensus reads: "A visually dazzling space odyssey that's carried along effortlessly by the gravitational pull of Ryan Gosling at his most winning, Project Hail Mary is a near-miraculous fusion of smarts and heart."[47] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 77 out of 100, based on 55 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.[48] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.[49]

      * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Hail_Mary_(film)#Criti...

      • inaros ・ 5 hours ago
        ・ 12 more

        Did you watch the movie? Those reviews are manipulated...

        Do you believe in the concept of objectivity? Meaning some movies are Objectively better than others, some Reviews are Objectively better than other?

        If I bring a bunch of kids and teens to the movie, and at the end they all cant stop talking about how much they loved the rock, should I give an Oscar to Ryan Gosling?

        • ceejayoz ・ 5 hours ago
          ・ 3 more

          > Do you believe in the concept of objectivity? Meaning some movies are Objectively better than others, some Reviews are Objectively better than other?

          In this context? Absolutely not. One person's favorite movie is another's least.

          > If I bring a bunch of kids and teens to the movie, and at the end they all cant stop talking about how much they loved the rock, should I give an Oscar to Ryan Gosling?

          It's OK for a movie to not be an Oscar contender.

          • inaros ・ 5 hours ago
            ・ 2 more

            IMDB has it at a 8.5/10

            I am happy we can agree those metrics mean nothing...

            • ceejayoz ・ 5 hours ago

              As I said an hour ago, to you:

              > 100% of online reviews should be treated as manipulated.

              IMDb is review bombed to shit, both positive and negative.

        • throw0101d ・ 5 hours ago
          ・ 8 more

          > Do you believe in the concept of objectivity?

          When it comes to the concept of entertainment? No.

          Is the 2003 movie The Room (written/directed/produced by Tommy Wiseau) "objectively" good or bad?

          * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Room

          If it is "objectively" 'bad' why do (many) people have such a good time watching it? Are they "objectively" happier after watching The Room? Are people "objectively" happier after watching Project Hail Mary?

          What is the purpose of "art": in general and/or particular works of it?

          • inaros ・ 4 hours ago
            ・ 7 more

            >>When it comes to the concept of entertainment? No.

            You are confusing taste and quality....

            If there is no objectivity....then you would have no basis to explain why a film is better or worse than another, A student first iPhone short would be equal to The Godfather. A child banging pots would be indistinguishable from a Symphony.

            The moment you say something is good or bad, we can talk about craft, skill, storytelling structure and emotional impact, all of which can be measured and compared and where this movie fails on all parameters...

            You can personally dislike something excellent...for example few people can appreciate the genius of Miles Davis, and enjoy something mediocre... Too many to quote here...but Project Hail Mary is one :-)

            • throw0101d ・ 4 hours ago
              ・ 3 more

              > If there is no objectivity....then you would have no basis to explain why a film is better or worse than another, A student first iPhone short would be equal to The Godfather. A child banging pots would be indistinguishable from a Symphony.

              What is the purpose of "art": in general and/or particular works of it? What makes (a work of) 'art' 'good'?

              Is PHM 'good' in its purpose? Is The Room? Was 2023's Barbie? When a child is banging on pots, is he accomplishing his purpose in his 'creative act'? Is Schoenberg's atonal music objectively 'good'?

              * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJg4XbzSV9Q

              * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atonality

              > I think Michael Bay sometimes sucks (“Pearl Harbor,” “Armageddon,” “Bad Boys II“) but I find it possible to love him for a movie like “Transformers.” It’s goofy fun with a lot of stuff that blows up real good, and it has the grace not only to realize how preposterous it is, but to make that into an asset.

              * https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/transformers-2007

              • inaros ・ 2 hours ago
                ・ 2 more

                >> What is the purpose of "art": in general and/or particular works of it? What makes (a work of) 'art' 'good'?

                So many things...But anybody at The Juilliard School or Berklee College of Music can tell you if you are good or bad on your musicianship...Anybody at the California School of Cinematic Arts or American Film Institute Conservatory can advise you on your future as a future Director...and anybody at the Pratt Institute can comment on your quality as an Artist.

                Why do you dismiss the concept of Quality?

                • throw0101d ・ 2 hours ago

                  > So many things...But anybody at The Juilliard School or Berklee College of Music can tell you if you are good or bad on your musicianship...Anybody at the California School of Cinematic Arts or American Film Institute Conservatory can advise you on your future as a future Director...and anybody at the Pratt Institute can comment on your quality as an Artist.

                  Can anyone else tell us that, or only certain 'gatekeepers'? Who gets to judge the amount of Quality in a thing, or whether something is Good for its Purpose?

                  > Why do you dismiss the concept of Quality?

                  "Quality" as in the amount of 'Goodness' something has?

                  * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_(philosophy)

                  * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Form_of_the_Good

                  An Axe is a bad Chair because it does not have the Qualities for (e.g.) sitting, but that is not its Purpose.

                  Were the folks that made PHM trying to make Art or Entertainment (or a mix of the two)? If PHM was made to be Entertainment, and people were entertained, was it not Good at its desired Purpose? Did 2007's Transformers have the Quality of Entertainment that it set out to have? Roger Ebert seems to have thought so.

            • ceejayoz ・ 4 hours ago
              ・ 3 more

              > If there is no objectivity....then you would have no basis to explain why a film is better or worse than another

              This is indeed the case. You can consult many film experts and get very different top ten lists. Some critics may hate The Godfather. Some won't get Citizen Kane. Some love a good popcorn fluff movie and find this year's Oscar contenders pretentious.

              It becomes a matter of general consensus. And that consensus appears to be that it's a pretty satisfying movie; https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/project_hail_mary. (High art? No. But that wasn't its goal.)

              • inaros ・ 2 hours ago
                ・ 2 more

                You say there is no objectivity, but then you immediately appeal to consensus, Rotten Tomatoes scores, and whether the film achieved its goal :-))

                Those are all attempts at objective measurement. You are using objective frameworks to argue objectivity does not exist. :-)

                The fact that critics disagree does not prove there is no objectivity. People disagree about scientific questions too, but that does not mean science is purely subjective. Disagreement just means the question is hard, not that there is no answer...

                The whole reason you cited that score is because you believe it points to something real about the film quality. That is an appeal to objectivity whether you realize it or not. :-)

                I argue those manipulated reviews [1] are not...

                [1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47520761

                • ceejayoz ・ an hour ago

                  > You say there is no objectivity, but then you immediately appeal to consensus…

                  Yes? Consensus is frequently how we handle things that don't have an objective answer. Which restaurant is the best in your city? Who knows? But you can say "a lot of people like restaurant X" just fine.

                  > The whole reason you cited that score is because you believe it points to something real about the film quality.

                  Opinions are real. They're just not objective. Objectively, most of the vetted reviewers RT tracks seem to hold positive opinions of the film, as do their (much less trustworthy) regular old users.

                  If it's a box office flop after a few weeks, that'll be good evidence for your theory. I'll be surprised, though.

    • inaros ・ 7 hours ago

      I heard children loved the rock...

      Now go to IMDB:

      https://www.imdb.com/title/tt12042730/reviews/?rating=1&ref_...

      sort by worst review and you will see the comments and reviews make a lot of sense...If you believe like some of commentators this is a 10/10 movie, you also probably believe these reviews are not manipulated...

      • ceejayoz ・ 7 hours ago
        ・ 6 more

        > sort by worst review

        This is about the worst methodology you could possibly use here.

        > If you believe like some of commentators this is a 10/10 movie, you also probably believe these reviews are not manipulated…

        100% of online reviews should be treated as manipulated.

        • inaros ・ 5 hours ago
          ・ 5 more

          >> This is about the worst methodology you could possibly use here.

          By the contrary. It is the absolutely best methodology. I am surprised you cant see why.

          You should do the same for hotel reviews or amazon products. Its about the CONTENT and nature of the bad review. The best way to judge a movie, hotel, or product is often to read the negative reviews first, because negative reviews reveal the failure modes. A positive review just usually tells you what worked for someone. A negative review tells you what can go wrong, and whether that problem matters to you.

          You should always start with the worst reviews because they reveal the real weaknesses. Then you judge whether the criticism comes from an unreasonable person or from somebody thoughtful and fair. If the negative reviewer is intelligent, specific, and or balanced, that review is often more valuable than ten positive ones, because it shows the actual risks and not just the hype.

          Use it for movies, books, hotels and amazon products...

          • ceejayoz ・ 5 hours ago
            ・ 2 more

            > A negative review tells you what can go wrong, and whether that problem matters to you.

            You accidentally made my point here.

            "Whether that problem matters to you" is a matter of opinion. You apparently find the smattering of negative reviews to match your opinion; that's fine! But they don't match mine, or everyone's.

            Opinion-wise, the movie seems to be doing just fine. This weekend we'll get the actual metric that tends to matter, the % drop-off after the first week. That tends to be a pretty good indicator of actual public opinion and word of mouth.

            (And frankly, at this point, I tend to assume the negative reviews on Amazon are competitors review bombing. They're no more immune than the positive ones.)

            • inaros ・ 4 hours ago

              [dead]

      • throw0101d ・ 6 hours ago
        ・ 4 more

        > sort by worst review

        Now go to IMDb again:

        * https://www.imdb.com/title/tt12042730/ratings/?ref_=tt_ov_ra...

        and look at the score distribution.

        • inaros ・ 5 hours ago
          ・ 3 more

          That is the kind of metric that got Trump elected....

          • throw0101d ・ 4 hours ago
            ・ 2 more

            “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” — H.L. Mencken

            • inaros ・ 4 hours ago

              Dont disagree :-)

  • kevinsync ・ 7 hours ago

    I don’t even know what to say here -- you’re entitled to your opinion obviously, and I disagree with it deeply, and the spirit of HN is to avoid personal attacks and reply with curiosity, but you kinda laid it out very plainly above. Where’s your imagination gone? Your connection to child-like wonder? Empathy for your fellow man?

    Project Hail Mary isn’t Arrival, it’s ET mixed with Castaway. It’s about friendship and loneliness and the fragility of the human experience and the triumph of the human spirit!

    Normally I’d just say “you didn’t get it, it wasn’t for you” but given the insufferable and total dismissal above, I’d wager it actually IS for you LOL but you chose not to receive the message.

    Anyways, everybody’s a critic these days, I get that. I’d just encourage people to soften a bit and appreciate things for what they are (not what we want them to be)

    • johnbarron ・ 7 hours ago

      >> It’s about friendship and loneliness and the fragility of the human experience and the triumph of the human spirit!

      So is every Disney movie and that is what this but with the crappy Amazon Studios take on it.

      >> Anyways, everybody’s a critic these days,

      Do you believe a movie can objectively be considered good or bad? If you do you then believe some are better critics than others, the same some way some are better Coders than others or better Basketball players than others?

      • kevinsync ・ 6 hours ago
        ・ 2 more

        You're asking the wrong person lol. I can give you a list of "objectively bad" movies that I think are incredible for a variety of defensible reasons.

        Just off the top of my head as I briefly scan shit sitting on the shelves of my office:

        - Joe Dirt

        - Death Wish 3

        - Thrashin

        - Hackers

        - Mortal Kombat

        - Uncle Buck

        - The Incredible Burt Wonderstone

        - Tapeheads

        - Prayer of the Rollerboys

        - Weekend at Bernie's

        Not exactly Fellini, and some are barely even Andy Sidaris if we're being honest, but every movie in that list is amazing for different reasons. An objective critique of any of them (especially in context with "film", as a shapeless, vague concept) misses the point and the spirit of each and every one. But I am an uncultured heathen, so ...

        • funkychicken ・ 6 hours ago

          Uncle Buck is on your list of objectively bad movies?!?!?

inaros ・ 7 hours ago

[flagged]

  • austinthetaco ・ 7 hours ago

    This is hn not reddit. This feels like a wildly out of place and inappropriate comment for this kind of discussion.

    • johnbarron ・ 7 hours ago

      The movie got 12 posts here on HN, pumped by Amazon Studios within the day of release but suddenly it cant be discussed?

      • austinthetaco ・ 6 hours ago
        ・ 12 more

        If you have some proof of astroturfing you should write a blog and then share on hn, it might make for a very good post here. otherwise it feels wildly inappropriate (not to mention incredibly unlikely that they would spend marketing money on astroturfing here of all places). Andy Weir has written some books that are incredibly successful in the tech industry circles with Hail Mary being the current most popular if not slightly under The Martian, chances are there's just going to be a lot of talk about it. But even if there is astroturfing, telling people to not watch the movie in a thread where someone is showing off their space photography is inappropriate and misplaced.

        • inaros ・ 6 hours ago
          ・ 11 more

          The author of the great Astrophotography is not the OP of the HN post.

          And that is already one starting and possible isolated indicator of astroturfing, ....when the movie related posts got no traction, they went looking for related subjects...

          • austinthetaco ・ 5 hours ago
            ・ 4 more

            Under the assumption that amazon has decided to astroturf on this niche tech news site, that is still okay and allowed to do as long as the article provided is interesting. There are countless posts here which are just blogs from various companies, sometimes posted here by the companies themselves. Meta, Apple, small startups, movie companies, whatever. It's all allowed here as long as the content posted has substance and is interesting, thats all. What's important is that the comments are productive and interesting and not being used as a soapbox, which is likely why your parent comment is negatively voted. There are countless platforms for you to suggest others not see a movie, but a hn post about astrophotography is not that.

            • inaros ・ 4 hours ago
              ・ 3 more

              >> Under the assumption that amazon has decided to astroturf on this niche tech news site

              Even Microsoft astroturfs here...

              Satya Nadella, Microsoft FY2019 Q1 earnings call [1]:

              “In fact, this morning, I was reading a news article in Hacker News, which is a community where we have been working hard to make sure that Azure is growing in popularity and I was pleasantly surprised to see that we have made a lot of progress..."

              [1] - https://www.fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2018/10/24/mi...

              • austinthetaco ・ 3 hours ago
                ・ 2 more

                there is a stark difference between a division aimed at developers attempting to astroturf on a tech industry (mostly developer) news aggregator and a movie studio.

          • dahart ・ 6 hours ago
            ・ 5 more

            That proves nothing. You are making assumptions. Did you look at the submission history of the poster?

            HN runs on user-submitted posts. People submit things they find interesting, and things they believe others will find interesting.

            • inaros ・ 5 hours ago
              ・ 3 more

              >> HN runs on user-submitted posts.

              Its about the timing.

              • dahart ・ 5 hours ago
                ・ 2 more

                You are still making assumptions.

                • inaros ・ 5 hours ago

                  That is how every investigation starts....

          • compiler-guy ・ 5 hours ago

            I don't think I have ever submitted my own work to hn, but I'm not astroturfing what I do submit.

  • dahart ・ 6 hours ago

    Those handful of 1-star reviews seem the same as the 1-star reviews on all movies, including all of the good movies you probably liked: “boring”, “overhyped”, “doesn’t live up to the book”, etc.. Are they manipulated? Go ahead and name a movie you like without looking at the reviews first, if you dare, and then let’s check the reviews.

    I liked the movie and loved the book. Did you read the book? You seeing to be ignoring opinions from real people in this thread. What if the good reviews are as genuine as the bad ones? All I can conclude from bad reviews is that some people have different taste than me, and occasionally some people are in a bad mood when they watch something and it spoils the experience.

    What is an example of actual SciFi? What do you mean about there not being any?

    • inaros ・ 6 hours ago

      My problem with the movie is not that it is humorous or accessible. Scifi does not have to be solemn like 2001 or mythic like Dune. The probleme is that reduces a huge premise to a childish emotional register...

      The premise is an interstellar mission, species level extinction risk, first contact, scientific problem solving. The film frames this through cute banter, soft sentiment, and quips that shrinks the movie scale.

      So it treats a genuinely huge science fiction premise in a disney type emotional level. The humor feels adolescent and tonally deflates the stakes. Instead of using first contact, isolation, and extinction level danger to create awe or intellectual depth, it turns them into a cute, reassuring buddy experience.

      Bust fit Deadpool level jokes, with the first Alien humanity ever encountered? Really?

      Plus the direction is bad, the pace is bad and Ryan Gosling I am sorry is no great actor who can talk to a rock for 2 hours and carry on a movie....Also it is not just a bad movie it is also bad Scifi, because it wastes the genre central strength meaning using speculative ideas to confront us with something bigger, stranger or more unsettling than ourselves.

      You had everything....extinction of the stars of the universe, first contact, humanity in danger, a regular human trust into the most important project... but instead we ignore the scientific challenges, and logical problem solving who are by the way are a major part of the book.

      And this is what I mean by Good Scifi vs Bad Scifi...

      They even managed to squeeze some kind of half baked love relationship almost unrelated to the core plot for Ryan Gosling, that is so badly delivered and is so ambiguous... you almost wonder who is partner was, and what any of that had to do with the movie delivery...

      They managed to turn an alien into a lovable emotional device. No wonder kids love it...

      • eipi10_hn ・ 5 hours ago

        The bust joke is natural for me when 2 total different species encounter at a more friendly interaction level (after their first interactions).

        The humor in this is no way Deadpool level. I'm saying this as a hater of Deadpool because of its depraved jokes. And I just feel lighthearted with the humor in this movie.

        This fits exactly your example of seeing the worst reviews and seeing that the review is unreasonable and exaggerated.

      • mrbungie ・ 5 hours ago

        > The premise is an interstellar mission, species level extinction risk, first contact, scientific problem solving. The film frames this through cute banter, soft sentiment, and quips that shrinks the movie scale.

        God forbid showing the humane side of both tragedies and big stakes missions in an aesthetically pleasing and humorous way.

        > So it treats a genuinely huge science fiction premise in a disney type emotional level. The humor feels adolescent and tonally deflates the stakes. Instead of using first contact, isolation, and extinction level danger to create awe or intellectual depth, it turns them into a cute, reassuring buddy experience.

        I'd say that's exactly what makes the movie charming for the "masses" and it's OK if you are not into that, but don't make it sound like it is an absolutely terrible movie just because it does not comply to your definition of a good scifi movie.

      • dahart ・ 5 hours ago
        ・ 5 more

        Is your problem with the movie or the book? It sounds like you didn’t read the book…? It is a buddy story and the author Andy Weir has stated he wanted the story to be different from the typical scary first encounter and send a positive hopeful message.

        Again, name any movie you like and go look at the 1-star reviews. You will see the very same rants you’re making here. You can trash any SciFi movie this way because it’s fiction.

        So when you said “no actual SciFi” you just meant you thought it was bad sci-fi? The book spends a lot more time on the scientific challenges, so if that’s what you want, maybe you should read it before commenting on this story any further. I can see why they chose to skip that stuff for the movie.

        You’re entitled to your opinion. I, and others here and online, disagree with it, and we’re not being paid by Amazon. I don’t know why you keep saying Disney and Deadpool over and over again, especially since those two are very different and this film is very different from either, but some people actually like the film, and it appears to be more people like than dislike. Is that why you’re coming on so strong, because you expected pushback?

        • inaros ・ 5 hours ago
          ・ 4 more

          This is why the bad reviews are important and support my argument: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47518428

          • dahart ・ 5 hours ago
            ・ 2 more

            That’s not a compelling argument. Sometimes bad reviews can be useful when there are a lot of them, but you’re taking them out of context and ignoring the mountain of good reviews, and furthermore making unsupportable claims about why there are good reviews. Some 1-star reviews are also people who were in a bad mood, or had a rare/unique experience. Occasionally bad reviews are competitors and occasionally trolls who like saying mean things. In this case, the 1-star reviews on IMDB (the site you pointed to) are less than 1% of the reviews, and 6-star and above are 97% of all reviews.

            You named Dune and 2001. Let’s look at IMDB’s 1-star reviews for them:

            (2001) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062622/reviews/?ref_=tt_ov_ql_...

            (Villeneuve’s Dune) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1160419/reviews/?ref_=tt_ov_ql_...

            (Lynch’s Dune) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087182/reviews/?ref_=tt_ov_ql_...

            Do the same for products that you like and paid for. I’m certain that an honest application of that test will demonstrate that you’re cherry-picking, made up your mind here for some reason and are unswayed by facts.

            • inaros ・ 4 hours ago

              The number of reviews are irrelevant. The nature and content of the reviews are highly relevant.

              Plus film critics are overwhelmingly white and male... https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/jun/11/film-critics-wh...

              Very much like HN audience ;-)

              If I have 100 reviews saying 10/10, loved the movie, thumbs up!.... I learn nothing. Indian audiences for example always give extreme positive reviews to movies.

              If I have a detailed bad review, that tells me why its a bad movie, its not about support for my opinion, its about understanding if the reviewer traveled the same road, to get to the same conclusion.

          • romanhn ・ 2 hours ago

            Since you have multiple times refused to answer the question of whether your have read the book, I'm going to assume you have not. I found the movie to be a pretty close adaptation to the written material, so your strong feelings seem entirely misplaced (and I guess you don't like Ryan Gosling, fine).

            That said, my family - both kids and adults, with entirely different interests and preferences - enjoyed the hell out of it. That, to me, makes for a good movie, whatever your definition of "objectivity" is. Listen, it's OK not to like something popular, but consider that the downvotes and responses you're getting are not astroturfing, but simply you swimming against the current. Sincerely, - real human.