Meaning of Shill®
\ ˈshil
Definition of shill
(Entry 1 of 2)
1: to act as a shill
2: to act as a spokesperson or promoterthe eminent Shakespearean producer … is now shilling for a brokerage house— Andy Rooney
Definition of shill
(Entry 2 of 2)
1a: one who acts as a decoy (as for a pitchman or gambler)
b: one who makes a sales pitch or serves as a promoter
The Conniving Roots of Shill
Someone who shills today may very well be employed to simply extol the wonders of legitimate products. But in the early 1900s, when the first uses of the verb shill were documented, it was more likely that anyone hired to shill was trying to con you into parting with some cash. Practitioners called shills did everything from faking big wins at casinos (to promote gambling) to pretending to buy tickets (to encourage people to see certain shows). Shill is thought to be a shortened form of shillaber, but etymologists have found no definitive evidence of where that longer term originated.
Modern Example
On CryptoTwitter, you hear “shill” used a lot as a colloquial term for sharing something, specifically something that Shill A wants Shill B to buy into — for example, a token project, or an NFT, or just engagement with the post itself.
Shill A (farms engagement): “I’m buying big today. Shill me your NFTs.”
Shill B (is being farmed): “Check out my latest NFT artwork.”
Shill A may have a legitimate buying interest, or could be farming engagement.
Shill B may be knowingly or unknowingly being farmed. If knowingly, then contributing to the shill thread without hope of the item that they share being sold. If unknowingly, then with hope.
Zoom Out
If we zoom out, this is the dynamic at the heart of every social network.
Shill A (platform, farming content): “Post your great content here so I can monetize it”
Shill B (user, being farmed): “Ok, here is all of my content and the rights to all of it.”
We go into this detail in length here 👇
Name Rights
Our calling our software Shill is an ode to the hidden dynamic at the heart of social networks; a tongue in cheek criticism of the way that all of the social networks work, and the culture that we seek a reversal of.