Changes

Sometimes genuine grassroots organizations are recruited into corporate-funded campaigns. In June 2003, for example, the [[Gray Panthers]] participated in protests against [[WorldCom]] that were funded largely by the telecommunications company's competitors such as [[Verizon]]. According to the Gray Panthers, this reflected a policy decision that the organization made prior to and independently of its funding. However, an article in the ''Washington Post'' raised questions about failures to publicly disclose the corporate funding which paid for full-page advertisements that the Gray Panthers took out in several major newspapers that called on the federal government to stop doing business with WorldCom. The ads said they were paid for the Gray Panthers but did not mention that [[Issue Dynamics Inc.]] (IDI), a PR firm that specializes in "grassroots PR," had provided most of the $200,000 it cost to place the ads. Verizon spokesman [[Eric Rabe]] has declined to say how much the company is paying IDI, and Gray Panthers Executive Director Timothy Fuller has declined to say how much of the funding for its "Corporate Accountability" project comes from IDI. Notwithstanding the egregious nature of WorldCom's corporate crimes, the lack of transparency in these funding arrangements by WorldCom's corporate competitors raises the question of whether the Gray Panthers campaign should be considered genuine grassroots or astroturf.

==Telecom astroturf==