When Israel pays students to post on social media, it's terrible. But what about Turkey?

Last month, the world media breathlessly reported "Students offered grants if they tweet pro-Israeli propaganda." Reaction from the usual suspects was immediate and scathing, as if somehow it sullies the idea of social media to begin with. How dare Israel take advantage of the same tools that every company on the planet is trying to exploit?

Today a story was released that will certainly get no such reactions:

Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has launched a massive project to boost the party’s social media presence by hiring over 6,000 new employees for its newly formed social media team, according to daily Star.

Over 900 districts will have its own AKP social media representatives, with a 1,000 staff to be located in Istanbul, 600 in Ankara, and approximately 400 in İzmir.

The team will be responsible for converting AKP sentiments into trending hashtags, Star reported.

The move came soon after the AKP was dealt a clear defeat in social media when Gezi protesters turned websites like Twitter and Facebook into tools for organizing protests, voicing mostly anti-government sentiments.

Do you hear that? It's the sound of a big yawn when someone other than Israel tries to take advantage of Twitter and Facebook.

By the way, there was similar concern when the State of Israel put this infographic on Buzzfeed - even though the article admitted that the UK government also posts on BuzzFeed.