• 0 Posts
  • 6 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
Cake day: June 16th, 2023
  • SomeAmateur@sh.itjust.workstoNo Stupid Questions@lemmy.world•Is there any proof behind the idea that "reddit is filled with bots"?English
    12·
    3 hours ago

    Vote count matters. It not only can get you to the front page but shows that people agree with the post. Votes attract votes too, so it might only need a few bots to get the ball rolling. Using voting bots you can manipulate what people think is popular AND get many more eyes on it at once.

    For example leading up to the election there was SO MUCH politically driven stuff on the front page. To be fair there always is but well above baseline. Mind you this is just a good recent example, not meaning to take sides here.

    Election results come out, and so many on reddit are shocked and furious that their preferred side lost. How could it have happened? Everywhere they looked they saw their side was clearly more popular!

    Echo chambers are real on their own (an NPR interview I listened to after the election called them “information silos”) and I think bots could have been easily used to manipulate them

  • SomeAmateur@sh.itjust.workstoNo Stupid Questions@lemmy.world•Is there any proof behind the idea that "reddit is filled with bots"?English
    4·
    6 hours ago

    Imagine you want to buy a (thing), and instead of going to a bunch of “10 best (thing) 202X” sites you do the sensible thing and head to the (thing) subreddit.

    You get a super helpful comment on the (thing) they like and prefer. You’ve never heard of this company before but you decide to at least check them out. Bringing traffic to their site, browsing there selection and maybe even buying the (thing) you had no idea about otherwise

    What if that comment wasn’t real, but a AI LLM powered bot? No it’s not your cheap run of the mill bot, but it could be well worth the effort if a company is willing to pay for it.