Back when we were seeing groups doing this I kept thinking wtf? I didn't really know what I was feeling at the time but now I think it was "this is not organic".

How many of these things that go viral irl are actually funded ops?

Maybe not that many, but some.

Yes I remember when this came out yrs ago..stepson played it nonstop..husband and were not fans at all. But out in the middle of nowhere, there were no 'gyms' etc that they could find on it. And now there are. 100% distrust. Now the stepson let's his kids play it. Keep saying, why are you helping 'them' spy on us. Answer is always the same: " haha conspiracy theory something something haha". Annoying af.

I used to play Niantic's Ingress game quite a bit 2014-2015. I used to wonder why the portals were almost always given to statues, memorials, churches etc... a few years later what did I see but groups like antifa ripping down many of those same monuments. burning churches. makes you wonder if they were using that map data and getting orders from the likes of Google.