Bots are bad if for no other reason than they add an inorganic weight to the system even if its nothing more than being a non-active account that follows just 1 other person. They are as serious threat because of how they can be weaponized like zombie computers where the few or the one has control over the many and can thus create a false level of influence or impact. Twitter already does this via its tweaked algorithms, promoting in an inorganic way ideas it wants to push as being widely shared. They kind of have to because of the nature of online interactions were if let unaltered and were able to be restricted to real people only those in power would be exposed for it wouldn't take long for the public to realize just how much they've been lied to and manipulated until now.
The key to control is making anyone who challenges the approved narrative feel like as if they are the exception, the outsider, the one who goes against the majority. If that isn't enough to coerce them into group compliance it is often enough to get them them to stand done, stop challenging the narrative. Its small percentage of the population that can't be easily manipulated and who can see BS when its deployed because that type of person has to be one who doesn't care if they are a part of the majority and that runs counter to our inner biology where there is safety in numbers.
I did say a bot that is nothing more than follower of 1 other person. Multiply that by millions and the bots are artificially inflating the perceived influence level of that account they are following.
XBot123@Twitter has 10 million followers, why are so many following XBot123? Maybe I should follow them too.
If its an account that has no activity and follows no one then depending on how twitter factors those accounts into any numbers(if at all) then it has no impact. Someone more technically savvy would look closer and see thru the façade but how many average every day user does that?
If the social network has a sensible design, those bots should be as if they don't exist (free expression wise). Of course, they could be designed to try to diagonalize against the algorithms and existing design, but that's not a free expression issue per se.
Correct but this is Twitter and even if we assume they are trying to minimize the bots presence the fact they are also trying to manipulate the system (ie promote desired ideas, accounts while doing the reverse to undesired speech) means the risk of unintended consequences goes up. You can't build a system (in terms of software) with rules and then bend or brake those rules for your own benefit and not expect that could lead to unintended side effects. Let's assume everything works that still doesn't change the fact that an account has X number of non-real users following it giving the false impression that Xbot123 is more popular than in reality.
All of that said bots are created to do something , to make an impact on something. They could be inactive due to the owner relinquishing control or something going wrong but bots aren't created to better the system for all but to benefit one or more in particular and that will by design change things in a non-organic way. Bots are very easy to make. You can create very realistic acting chat bots with no actual coding experience using Microsoft's power apps platform so just imagine what kind of AI like bots those with actual talent could make.
Oh, definitely. Even for ads they're not all bad. If I advertise to a bot that DOES happen to have a large following it earned, AND it retweets it, I'd be happy.
Bots are bad if for no other reason than they add an inorganic weight to the system even if its nothing more than being a non-active account that follows just 1 other person. They are as serious threat because of how they can be weaponized like zombie computers where the few or the one has control over the many and can thus create a false level of influence or impact. Twitter already does this via its tweaked algorithms, promoting in an inorganic way ideas it wants to push as being widely shared. They kind of have to because of the nature of online interactions were if let unaltered and were able to be restricted to real people only those in power would be exposed for it wouldn't take long for the public to realize just how much they've been lied to and manipulated until now.
The key to control is making anyone who challenges the approved narrative feel like as if they are the exception, the outsider, the one who goes against the majority. If that isn't enough to coerce them into group compliance it is often enough to get them them to stand done, stop challenging the narrative. Its small percentage of the population that can't be easily manipulated and who can see BS when its deployed because that type of person has to be one who doesn't care if they are a part of the majority and that runs counter to our inner biology where there is safety in numbers.
But... if I have control over a million bots, each with basically no followers, and with zero reputation, I have basically no power at all.
And if I have a million followers, but each has no followers, I might get a million retweets for each post, but it's effectively of zero influence.
(I'm setting aside issues concerning trying to attack the system with numbers, and computationally overwhelming it.)
I did say a bot that is nothing more than follower of 1 other person. Multiply that by millions and the bots are artificially inflating the perceived influence level of that account they are following.
XBot123@Twitter has 10 million followers, why are so many following XBot123? Maybe I should follow them too.
If its an account that has no activity and follows no one then depending on how twitter factors those accounts into any numbers(if at all) then it has no impact. Someone more technically savvy would look closer and see thru the façade but how many average every day user does that?
If the social network has a sensible design, those bots should be as if they don't exist (free expression wise). Of course, they could be designed to try to diagonalize against the algorithms and existing design, but that's not a free expression issue per se.
Correct but this is Twitter and even if we assume they are trying to minimize the bots presence the fact they are also trying to manipulate the system (ie promote desired ideas, accounts while doing the reverse to undesired speech) means the risk of unintended consequences goes up. You can't build a system (in terms of software) with rules and then bend or brake those rules for your own benefit and not expect that could lead to unintended side effects. Let's assume everything works that still doesn't change the fact that an account has X number of non-real users following it giving the false impression that Xbot123 is more popular than in reality.
All of that said bots are created to do something , to make an impact on something. They could be inactive due to the owner relinquishing control or something going wrong but bots aren't created to better the system for all but to benefit one or more in particular and that will by design change things in a non-organic way. Bots are very easy to make. You can create very realistic acting chat bots with no actual coding experience using Microsoft's power apps platform so just imagine what kind of AI like bots those with actual talent could make.
Oh, definitely. Even for ads they're not all bad. If I advertise to a bot that DOES happen to have a large following it earned, AND it retweets it, I'd be happy.