Social media engagements, such as likes and follows, have become crucial for driving algorithmic recommendations and underpinning platform economies. This has given rise to disinformation industries that focus on the production and sale of engagements, including Instagram followers—a phenomenon we term the “engagement as a service” market. However, this market poses significant challenges for empirical research as its operations remain obscured from the scrutiny of platforms, their users, and researchers alike. In this article, we propose a mixed-methods approach to make visible the relationship between the engagement market and platform governance, the latter of which increasingly aims to moderate account behavior in terms of authenticity and inauthenticity—what we refer to as “authenticity governance.” By developing this approach, we explore the relationship between the engagement market and platform ecosystems through three case studies: (1) engagement market responses to platform governance; (2) the evolution of engagement as a service; and (3) testing the quality of engagement as a service on Instagram. These investigations allow us to comprehend disinformation as an ongoing negotiation between the engagement market and authenticity governance. Overall, our three integrated approaches can help researchers move forward with the empirical study of disinformation markets that operate at the periphery of platform ecosystems. In short, this article presents a methodological outlook for analyzing (in)authentic engagements as a form of disinformation.

中文翻译：

---

真实性治理和社交媒体参与市场：平台生态系统外围虚假信息的形成

社交媒体参与（例如点赞和关注）对于推动算法推荐和支撑平台经济至关重要。这催生了专注于互动制作和销售的虚假信息行业，其中包括 Instagram 粉丝——我们将这种现象称为“互动即服务”市场。然而，这个市场对实证研究提出了重大挑战，因为其运营仍然受到平台、用户和研究人员等的审查。在本文中，我们提出了一种混合方法来使参与市场和平台治理之间的关系变得可见，后者越来越多地致力于在真实性和不真实性方面调节账户行为——我们称之为“真实性治理”。 ” 通过开发这种方法，我们通过三个案例研究探索参与市场和平台生态系统之间的关系：（1）参与市场对平台治理的反应；(2) 参与即服务的演变；(3) 测试 Instagram 上的互动服务质量。这些调查使我们能够将虚假信息理解为参与市场和真实性治理之间正在进行的谈判。总的来说，我们的三种综合方法可以帮助研究人员推进对平台生态系统外围运作的虚假信息市场的实证研究。简而言之，本文提出了一种方法论前景，用于分析（不）真实的交战作为一种虚假信息的形式。