VergeCast just did a pretty decent discussion on this recently:<p><a href="https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/27/23892279/today-on-the-vergecast-are-dvds-dead-or-are-they-due-for-a-comeback" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/27/23892279/today-on-the-ver...</a><p>And an article on The Verge: Lies, Damned Lies, and Social-Media Metrics Those view counts on Twitter, TikTok, and Netflix? Be skeptical.<p><a href="https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2023/09/those-view-counts-on-x-tiktok-and-netflix-be-skeptical.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2023/09/those-view-counts-on...</a>
Well I think most people already assume they can be inflated. It sounds like you’re suggesting that platforms might just hit a button and “gift” a video 1 million views. Currently, they’re certainly already gamed, but this gaming is done the hard way: promoting videos, putting them on the user’s front page, etc.<p>I’m not in the industry, but I would imagine that companies cannot just invent view counts out of thin air because it would represent the defrauding of their advertising customers. The views can be “faked” any other way they like, so long as they views actually occurred. Advertisers don’t care if the system was gamed so long as they’re getting eyeballs on ads.