The New York Times published a blog posting which documents some of the strange and interesting history of the usage of bots, including the sales of access to them, in order to essentially buy popularity on Facebook and other social networking sites as as well as their use by political parties. The article also describes how they have evolved in the never-ending battle to outwit the bot detection efforts by those sites.
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Friends, and Influence, for Sale Online
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by MrGuy on Monday April 21 2014, @02:16PM
It's interesting that the new battlefield is for a second-order APPEARANCE of popularity, rather than the first-order ACTUAL popularity, on the demonstrably strong theory that people are more likely to like things that it appears other people already like. The apparent affect ("looking popular") actual drives the apparent cause ("being popular").
Social Proof [wikipedia.org] is one of the more powerful forces in human behavior.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Monday April 21 2014, @02:22PM
Being considered "popular" is a sure sign that whatever "it" is, "it" is idiotic. Or, put another way -- most people are stupid, so whatever they like collectively is also stupid.
(Score: 2, Funny) by clone141166 on Monday April 21 2014, @04:54PM
I think I kind of agree with that statement. I am concerned that I'm agreeing with something Ethanol-fueled said though! :P
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday April 21 2014, @08:58PM
Me too! Gawd, don't you just hate "me, too" posts? But if we all agree with Ethanol-fueled, doesn't that mean it is stupid, and he has just refuted his own post?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Thexalon on Monday April 21 2014, @03:06PM
This isn't really a new phenomenon - only the scale of it is new. It was and remains not at all uncommon for a physical crowd to be created by paying people to show up and do whatever it is those who hired them want them to do, with the goal of setting up a spectacle that looks good on TV. If you watch a campaign rally on TV, it is very likely that the vast majority of the shots you see of the crowd were planned out by the campaign organization. Sports teams during playoff season may be doing some of the same thing, although there may also be actual organic fan passion as well. I generally assume at least some the folks camped out in front of the store for the latest product are paid to do so (and not admit to being paid).
The apparent popularity driving actual popularity is also why political campaigns regularly go to great lengths to pretend that their candidate is winning in the polls, regardless of what the polls actually say (and regardless of whether the poll was rigged, which they certainly can be).
These techniques are all about trying to use your reptilian brain to override your somewhat smarter monkey brain. And yes, it works.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday April 21 2014, @04:36PM
I completely agree with what you say, and I like your pic too, you are cool! 'friend me?
If I may stop my job for a sec, I agree, the social network is just a new battlefield, and the reptilian brain has been stimulated by mass media long before bots started flooding the intertubes.
See you on FB.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by clone141166 on Monday April 21 2014, @04:59PM
Reminds me of that trick you can do where if you stand in a crowded street and then point and stare at the top of a tall building for long enough, eventually other people will crowd around and try to see what you are looking at, thereby attracting even more people.
(Score: 0, Offtopic) by timbim on Tuesday April 22 2014, @02:25PM
Don't not back talks my reptile brain sir. - Cletus
(Score: 3, Informative) by hybristic on Monday April 21 2014, @04:07PM
This TED talk [ted.com] describes this exact same concept. Being the first/only person doing something is weird, but the second person is the one that validates everyone else doing it too. The more people doing something, the more socially acceptable it is to like it or partake in it. So even if that "second person" isn't real, it creates an illusion that the person or idea is socially acceptable.
(Score: 4, Funny) by VLM on Monday April 21 2014, @02:27PM
"outwit the bot detection efforts by those sites"
LOL yeah right:
"Hey boss, people think our social network is important, should I try to stop them?"
"What are we hiring idiots now? Just put on a show then get back to work on changing the TPS report headers."
(Score: 2, Interesting) by RandomSchmoe on Monday April 21 2014, @02:54PM
One thing they don't mention is that fake followers / friends don't increase engagement or sales, at least for small businesses. Facebook is making a lot of money selling friends who never add to the conversation, engage real customers, or bring traffic to your main site. So SMBs are wasting a lot of money and in some cases hurting their reputation among real followers.
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(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday April 21 2014, @06:16PM
The key is the medium sized business, the more Dilbertian the better.
So your performance metric goal for this year is to spend $100K on social media or less, to acquire 100K or more facebook "likes". And you can buy yourself a 10% pay raise that way by purchasing $10K worth of likes. I'm not seeing any problem for either the "assistant executive vp of social media" or for facebook. The biggest problem is not spending all your budget means next years budget will be cut. Someday the bubble will pop, and that will be a bad day indeed for those two, but till then its all good.
Someone who spends time screwing around on social media probably doesn't have much money anyway. I guess McDonalds or Walmart could make it up on volume, but...
(Score: 1) by RandomSchmoe on Monday April 21 2014, @06:47PM
But any business, especially small or medium sized, should be watching return on investment. A $100k investment in social media should eventually result in $100k or more of revenue. For large business there is brand recognition, etc., but for smaller businesses that would usually require customer purchase, which won't increase much with fake "likes".
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