How Etsy is Using AI to Create Fake Sellers
09/07 - I edit to say I found significant evidence of Etsy-run fake AI shops in digital: planners, birth announcements, funeral announcements, “shadow work bundles”, clip-art bundles, therapy and self-help bundles, bullet journals, ebooks, guidebooks, and many more - many of the stores in the same countries as these fake psychics. Etsy didn’t end or start with psychics. Screenshots to follow.
I ask you to put aside thoughts about what I do if you are averse to it, and consider this happening in any other field (perhaps digital art), because there is no way they only did this to intuitive businesses. If you’re someone who hates human psychics and the whole concept and ultimately doesn’t care about my business (or would even be happy to see my business and all businesses like it fail) - that’s fine with me!
I encourage you to consider the implications of this and how far it is going to go and has already gone - it’s important for people in all areas.
I’m not trying to discourage anyone from buying products made by human beings on Etsy. I want Etsy to go back to being an actual marketplace for human sellers and/or to admit that they are creating myriad shops of their own which are run by AI. Etsy is committing fraud. People do not know what they are buying or from whom. I am not trying to hurt any actual human seller. But I am going to stop at quite literally nothing over Etsy selling AI products which claim to be made by human small businesses because people have a right to know what they are buying. I want Etsy to be for small businesses as it claims to be - not for a corporation to sell AI products to people who don’t know better. I also tried to get a hold of someone at Etsy about this to let them explain before taking any measures. Etsy has made it more or less impossible for sellers to put in help tickets (something widely complained about on the Seller’s Forum). Upon trying to put in a ticket, the only option I was given was to post on the Seller’s Forum. Etsy immediately deleted my post on the Seller’s Forum, and then began to deactivate my Etsy listings. I’m not sure there are any human beings left to even run Etsy - it may be an AI-run company at this point.
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Three weeks ago, Etsy rolled out several new AI features. AI now has a say in how we title our listings, and they made it very clear that AI is able to sort our listings according to their preferences, rather than according to our badges. Badges on Etsy are supposed to sort us in search so those who have proven to have good service show up earlier in search.
This article came into the handbook two days ago, but the tools rolled out weeks ago, and if we wanted to be shown in listings, we had to comply. The listing tool claims to be optional, but it also flags your listings if you don’t use the tool - telling you outright that your place in search will be affected if you don’t change the listing title to what AI wants it to read.
Suddenly, stores full of psychic readers which just popped up in the last couple months are pretty much all you can find when you search for psychic or mediumship readings. Amazingly: from some browsers you can also search for "energy healing" and these same exact stores are the ones that will come up, though they do not claim to offer energy healing.
Can we talk about the words used on some of these? That’s three different stores right next to each other with the exact same font, offering an “extremely” or “exceptionally detailed reading.” And of course AI can give you an exceptionally detailed reading in 30 minutes - they can go through all your social media in seconds. It’s not hard to give a reading you think is good based on your social media - this is why I don’t ask for an online client’s last name - I’d rather they not worry about my looking them up in the first place. These each ask for your full name and birthday (and of course Etsy has your email address, shipping address, and plenty more for them to ensure they can find anything they want about you online in seconds).
Check out the names on the stores. They’re not even doing a good job hiding it. I have screenshots of about twenty different stores with names like “somethingmediumstudio." The rest are similar.
These stores all look nearly identical, and the stores all offer same hour readings. I have always looked at "same day" readings as very sketchy in the first place - how can someone guarantee their schedule is always wide open? Same hour for a guaranteed "detailed" reading is completely beyond the bounds of human capability. There is no way an actual human being can always guarantee that they can get you the same hour, detailed reading. What if they're already doing a reading for someone else when you buy yours? How can they type both within that hour?
The fact that so many of these popped up virtually overnight, already have insane numbers of sales and five star reviews, but they look identical? Are offering impossible services?
The first example has been open for one month and had 2.1k sales. Is there enough time in that span for a human to do 2.1k readings? No. I sincerely could not tell you how many months and possibly years of my career it took to do 2,000 readings. Most of them have this same impossibility.
(I believe most of the sales and reviews are also fake, for the record. It’s Etsy policy that a seller cannot receive a Star Seller badge until they have been on Etsy for at least 3 months and made $300 - I believe these are currently farming for badges.)
These are brand new stores, stores which do not have Star Seller badges, which means there is no reason they should be prioritized over stores which have worked hard and gained longevity. (This is not the model Etsy claims.) Not only are they the stores prioritized in search even if they showed up in the last month (and many did), but they also look identical - it's the same stores over and over. Offering the same instant services.
Etsy requires a seller to have an ID and a Social Security number to open a store with them, since last year. They also have the policy that anyone who has multiple stores must have them listed clearly in their public profile. Since at minimum there is no way this is not being done by the same individual, if this were being done by a human individual seller, per Etsy’s standards, they would have to have all these shops (seventy or so shops I’ve counted so far and mama’s got receipts) listed on each shop, and of course, they do not.
This shows that Etsy is doing this themselves. There is no way these stores are not being run by AI, and If somehow there were suddenly a huge number of people opening stores and offering the same exact services, but it was not being done by Etsy, then Etsy would not be making sure that theirs are the only sales you can find in listings, and Etsy would be forcing the stores to comply with Etsy policy.
AI looked at listings for the most popular psychic readings on Etsy, copied their pages outright, and are now operating with false information.
A higher number of people are using AI for psychic readings in general, which I think is insane, for reasons I am not going to get into. I am not going to go on an AI rant. This is a rant about Etsy creating fake sellers. Much more than that, it is a rant about a corporation stealing from each its buyers and sellers through fraudulence. Etsy already takes their cut of all our sales - apparently that isn’t enough. It’s only enough to remove humans completely wherever possible.
It would be one thing if they were listed as AI readings - they’re not. I went through them and they are very clearly claiming to be human readers.
Sorry but last time I’ll say it - it’s wildly impossible for anyone human to do 13k readings in 4 months.
It is easily searchable that Etsy bought Depop and since, has been failing. This feels like a desperate attempt on Etsy‘s behalf to steal from people who give out digital purchases. Fake stores are being made with AI listings so that Etsy can get their money back and sellers are being edged out. As a psychic, I sincerely thought I would be the last one for AI to take my job, and it turns out I was one of the first. I am very blessed in that Etsy is not my only source of income, and because it is its own site and can always do things like this to its sellers, I would always encourage everyone to make sure it is not their only source of income. My heart breaks for anyone who went through this complete loss of sales and has only Etsy to count on.
I use the Linux operating system and Brave as a web browser, and for me, I was able to see *some* legitimate readers, but very few mixed in with the AI. When tested from a Windows browser and Google Chrome, it took about ten pages to find a legitimate psychic in search.
This kills me on so many ethical levels. I am emotional and furious and heartbroken most of all that AI and Etsy are making a mockery of something that is my entire life, and something which I know saves lives and brings people together when done well, with a human touch.
I posted the following on the Etsy sellers forum. It was almost immediately deleted, with no comment or email from Etsy letting me know that or why they had removed it. A few hours later, my listings were deleted for “not following community guidelines.”
Just a few hours later, here we were!
“Keep in mind, if you have multiple policy violations, we may need to remove any Star Seller Badges you have or suspend your account.” How convenient that they found these issues just a few hours after I posted in the seller forum about their fake stores!
I did have a Star Seller badge and years of dedication to Etsy, but I have deleted this Etsy store. I want nothing to do with a company which behaves this way. It’s despicable. This is not about me or my Etsy store. This is about the fact that Etsy is lying and stealing. Etsy is replacing human sellers and small businesses with their own, fake stores, and not tell their buyers from whom they are actually buying. It’s fraudulent, and more so it’s embarrassing and shameful. Etsy should be ashamed and embarrassed to be a vacant shell of the company they claim to be.
Just be careful and don't buy your readings or soul advice from something without a soul, y'all. And if you have a soul, maybe work on getting off Etsy.
P.S. - if you’re a human reader who was screwed over by this whole thing, email me! I’d love to talk about it!
P.S.S. - After my 09/07 update, for instance, here’s digital birth announcements. Top searches. This is seven brand new stores and one legitimate store which they clearly copied. Can anyone tell the difference?
Below, new stores offering copied funeral announcements. Disgusting. Tbh, there are TONS of these - almost as many fake funeral announcement stores as fake psychic stores.
Want to guess how many things like this I have? I bet Etsy does!