Ash Tyson
Dan GillmorFacebook bots invading forums where people are trying to have conversations with other people is a genuinely evil development.
James M.@dangillmor it always strikes me how little FB seems to understand about human relationships.
Arcane Brew@dangillmor manipulating or hampering open communications with others feels detrimental to our species on so many levels.
stevenray@dangillmor now why does that make me think about Threads? 🤔
Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸@stevenray @dangillmor Seriously. I don’t understand how the smart people here don’t see the obvious.
@corbden @dangillmor yeah, given their history I think being optimistic is almost irrational.
@stevenray @dangillmor It’s is just as irrational as believing your abuser has finally changed.
@corbden @dangillmor exactly right.
Muro deGrizecoYears back, there was some news article about Facebook running an experiment on some users. I don't recall where.
Some users got feel-good content more in their feeds, and sentiment analysis of their content reflected improved mood.
Some users got more depressing feeds and posted content and comments reflecting their own lowered mood.
Searching. here is a reference...
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1747016115579531
AI tools make this sort manipulation easier.
Simon Willison@dangillmor textbook example of slop, that
Jill@dangillmor If you are still on fb, I have no sympathy whatsoever.
Gemma 👽
Obsolete@dangillmor
Someone predicted in the future the internet would consist of only chatbots trying to sell products to each other
Someone predicted in the future the internet would consist of only chatbots trying to sell products to each other
LAUREN@SNerd @dangillmor Let them have Facebook
Brian C. Keegan, Ph.D.@dangillmor Also check out work by @estellesmith! https://medium.com/acm-cscw/introducing-the-gov-bots-psychometric-scale-for-measuring-users-perceptions-of-bots-in-online-23f19f11c6ae
Introducing the GOV-BOTs psychometric scale for measuring users’ perceptions of bots in online communities
Although communities historically consisted of only humans, bots have now become influential social actors in our online communities. Indeed, governance bots do all sorts of fascinating, useful, and…
Bart Veldhuizen 🚀@dangillmor Invading Facebook groups, not forums. That made it sound like they went in on third party forums to wreck the conversations there (which I’m sure is something Zuck would consider).
Christian Kent@dangillmor I think I spotted one in Mastodon recently, following a popular personality. I'm sort of Turing testing them, with some steg, so it remains valid. (If you're interested I'll disclose the account so you can do your own research)
@dangillmor While I'm here — there's a definite 30%-50% of follow requests from accounts that I can't describe as legit.
I need to write up a post about this, and maybe a short YouTube video with nice screen recordings of scrolling through the dodgy accounts …
But for now, spammy and AI'y accounts are easy to find. I mean, it's a soft line between that and a leachy Facebook friend who is hooked on bait and wasting both your time.
On Mastodon, turn off auto-accept and check out the "replies".
Danie van der Merwe@dangillmor which already suggests that those forums are not at all private if a bot can just enter - AI is exposing the access companies actually have.
Moonshine Brigade@dangillmor this feature could be useful.. if it werent for the disguise and inability to opt-out.
Why the disguise? So they can't be held accountable if the 'advise' was hurtfull?
I'd have less beef with this, if it'd be marked as ai-generated.
No opt-out has a serious privacy issue. The groups mentioned all deal with delicate topics, things that one don't want to be made public.. With AI, these groups aren't as private as they appear to be.. if such a thing exists in the #metaverse ..
Martha@dangillmor
Meta vying with Microsoft in the stupidity stakes.
The race is on. They're neck and neck!
Meta vying with Microsoft in the stupidity stakes.
The race is on. They're neck and neck!
Goblin@dangillmor
Well isn’t that dystopic!
I assume, thats a tactic, to make that ruin of a social network feel less barren and desolate.
When I deleted my account two years ago, that was, because my cost-benefit-analysis came up skewed heavily towards privacy and wasn’t even slightly impacted by the two (!) social interactions, I had in the previous year on facebook.
Gytis Repečka@dangillmor This is a manifestation of AI bots talking to each other producing useless content and burning a lot of computing power without any tangible value created whatsoever 
Future is not very eco friendly - solar powered data centers are no green if they are serving useless purpose
Future is not very eco friendly - solar powered data centers are no green if they are serving useless purpose
CassandraVert@dangillmor
Huxley rather than Orwell?
Huxley rather than Orwell?