You mean the failed persuasions were "crackpot talk" and the successful ones were "status quo". For example, a lot of persuasion was historically done via religion (seemingly not mentioned at all in the article!) with sects beginning as "crackpot talk" until they could stand on their own.

Social media has been flooded by paid actors and bots for about a decade. Arguably ever since Occupy Wall Street and the Arab Spring showed how powerful social media and grassroots movements could be, but with a very visible and measurable increase in 2016

It’s been pretty transparently happening for years in most online communities.