Talk:astroturfing

Presumably this is a noun, not a verb. If so, the part of speech and definition need to be changed. — Paul G 09:00, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Actually I find evidence that people "are astroturfing" and "have astroturfed", so they are used as verbs. I haven't really come across the infinitive though, so I'll leave that off. --Bequw → ¢ • τ 03:28, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Tea room discussion

Note: the below discussion was moved from the Wiktionary:Tea room.

Aside from the noun sense already mentioned at the entry, I've seen this used quite a bit as a present participle and also astroturfed as the past participle. The problem is I haven't seen it used in the infinitive verb (astroturf), so how should I format the entries? Should astroturfing be the 'lemma' article in this neologistic case? --Bequw → ¢ • τ 03:36, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

See Astroturf which I have added with 2 cites for the verb in the not so figurative sense. I can't find much for astroturf as a verb. One thing for sure: astroturfing isn't an adjective (no comparative, no predicate use). DCDuring TALK 04:17, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Completely different sense/idea. See astroturfing which is political jargon for a PR campaign that shows fake "grass roots" support for an idea (heance the play on a word for "fake grass"). Astroturf is a very regular verb (infinitive, past, participles, etc.), whereas the question remains about astroturfing. --Bequw → ¢ • τ 19:19, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

The figurative sense of the verb will certainly be identical to the literal sense in its inflection. Whether "astroturfing" in the political sense is a noun (forms a plural, etc.), I don't know. DCDuring TALK 19:27, 7 September 2008 (UTC)