I run a reddit clone (conceptually; I wrote my own codebase after struggling with reddit OSS for about a year) and I have decided not to astroturf. It is deceptive, and while the deception may not harm every participant, it can harm some of them. As the saying goes, "there is no such thing as a point of view from nowhere"; even if your fake accounts attempt to take on different arguments, they are always tainted by your experience and the value of the contribution suffers. If a person makes a decision based on the consensus among 20 contributors, but they are actually 2 contributors, I believe that an immoral deception has occurred, especially if that decision is major or important.
I suppose if all your comments were things like, "Cool story, I'm glad you posted it", there's not much of a problem, but that doesn't seem like it would really drive engagement.
I have been a member of sites that grow organically with [almost] no activity. You just have to find a group of people that don't necessarily mind a slower pace; it really only takes a relatively small base of active users to get a snowball going. I don't think resorting to astroturfing is a necessity and I do think there is a permanent taint on sites that gain success by dubious methodology like this instead of slower, truer organic growth.
I suppose if all your comments were things like, "Cool story, I'm glad you posted it", there's not much of a problem, but that doesn't seem like it would really drive engagement.
I have been a member of sites that grow organically with [almost] no activity. You just have to find a group of people that don't necessarily mind a slower pace; it really only takes a relatively small base of active users to get a snowball going. I don't think resorting to astroturfing is a necessity and I do think there is a permanent taint on sites that gain success by dubious methodology like this instead of slower, truer organic growth.