Bots everywhere or am I losing it?

https://slrpnk.net/post/24615062

Bots everywhere or am I losing it? - SLRPNK

While browsing the fediverse I come across more and more accounts that seem … a bit off, a little uncanny. The stuff they post seems random, their comments slightly weird. What’s going on, is the fediverse being overrun by bots? Or am I as a fanatic anti-AI person just losing my mind and seeing the enemy everywhere? I hate the fact that I now question every interaction that seems a bit off - it seems such a stupid waste of my time and I’m afraid I might just end up blocking real people who happen to express themselves in a strange way - as a neurodivergent person I know how bad I would feel about being ostracized as ‘too strange to be real’. How would you handle this?

Every account on reddit fediverse is a bot except you.

Jokes aside, I haven’t noticed anything. I don’t really see what would anyone gain by setting up bots posing as real humans. Especially on Fediverse. I’m not saying it’s never happening but I don’t think it’s very common.

The ‘why’ is what I am wondering about. If I were an evil fascist I would fill this place with bots to keep the lefties arguing with the void instead of going outside for direct action. Other than that, curious programmers watching their creations interact in the wild?
Out of curiosity is your instance still federated with .ml or that other tankie haven I forget the name of. If so, yes you probably are seeing a lot of bots. It’s quite obvious when you look at downvote and upvoter brigades. Pretty unusual for five people to all vote within half a second of each other. Then to not see any other votes for.
The “tankie” instances are the least likely to have bots. They’re the most vehemently anti-AI and the moderators most active in banning any kind of bot-like activity. Hexbear, the one that all the dronies clutch their pearls about most and accuse of brigading the most doesn’t even have downvotes - they are incapable of mass downvoting.
Yeah, but they’ve been trained to treat anyone who disagrees with them as non-human