I guess there's going to have to be a law, since the perpetrators just can't control themselves.

to them it's isn't so much "doing nothing and getting paid is a crime"

it's "being nobody and getting paid is a crime."

Little fellow will be disappointed by every other field trip he goes on for the rest of his days.

If media companies want a consistent user base, media companies can politically lobby for their users to receive wages high enough to include disposable income. If media companies won't go to bat for their subscribers, why should their subscribers give them anything more than short shrift? (there's your phrase for the day)

I had an old Archie comic (WHERE EVERY WORD IS IN ALL CAPS!) where the word FLICK appeared. There was slight smearing of the print. Sure looked like the word FUCK to me at the time.

I LOVE that sketch

or expecting grease on their palms

yeah I'm not thrilled with the methodology "just buy a domain, lie on Wikipedia, and LLMs will buy your bullshit." I certainly don't doubt it, either.
It really is like the old SEO days, only the LLMs whitewash your lies for you. People trust what pops up at the top of Google results as being fact.

This article makes it seem that it is, somehow, a legitimate product.

I guess it must not be available in regions where the law prohibits surreptitious recording.

there can be only one

sounds almost like the Acadian dish "Poutine Rapeé" (not to be confused with the Quebecois dish "Poutine" aka Cheese Fries with Gravy).

Poutine Rapeé is a big potato dumpling made with salted pork and onion inside a mixture of grated potato (with most of the starch removed) and cooked potato. Form into balls the size of two fists and boil until the ghosts of your ancestors tell you they're done. Delicious!

as if a human didn't ask it to access the data in question, however many times was necessary for it to happen.