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Notes -
Just noticed some obvious botting action on Reddit. I know this is likely common knowledge, but it's still freaky to see it firsthand.
Currently, the top post on all of reddit is this thread complaining about LED Lights on cars: https://old.reddit.com/r/BlackPeopleTwitter/comments/z6wiz7/getting_blinded_any_time_i_drive_after_sunset/
But more interesting are the replies nested under the top two comments. Emphasis mine.
First:
Second:
I only noticed because of the emphatic capitalization of "jack". I thought I was having a deja vu.
Of course, notice the usernames look like they were randomly generated in batch using noun+adjective+4 digits.
I assume these are GPT bots deployed by spammers, scammers, state actors, all the other dregs of society. Or maybe it's less sophisticated than that, considering the identical quotes.
It's deeply worrying as I still find value in Reddit both for general entertainment and specific info finding (like product reviews, or Quora-like research). As automation like this becomes pervasive and impossible to tell apart from actual posting, Reddit will become ever less useful of a platform to me. This might be ok for a few more years, but at some point, I think enough users will demand a platform that uses some sort of real person verification because otherwise everything just becomes advertising and scams. But then there is more impetus to virtue signal given the lack of anonymity. I trust that VCs and entrepreneurs will somehow figure out clever solutions, but until they do, it sure feels helpless to be subject to forces that seem impossible to combat.
There's a whole industry built around making websites look more active than they actually are. Whether that's paying people pennies per comment, using bots/gpt, or copying threads/comments from elsewhere. You can find thousands (maybe millions, lol) of reposts on reddit where the top comments are the same as top comments from previous threads, or from comments on the url that was posted (like youtube comments).
Making a website appear more active helps bring in and retain new users. I personally think TikTok uses this in order to bring in more content providers; they see their video gets thousands upon thousands of likes and stick around. I think its all inflated. And so many non-sense comments.
I also think that some websites/channels just get too large. If you go on a popular youtube channel and leave a comment, the chances you'll ever get a reply are slim to none, despite there being thousands or millions of people flooding onto that page. Go to a smaller channel and you can have long, thoughtful conversations in the comment section. Same happens on Reddit. The average comment in /r/askreddit will have no replies. Make a comment in themotte ("back in the day") and you were almost guaranteed a reply, no matter what you said. Even in subs that are fairly inactive these days, like theschism, will still result in replies if you make a comment.
I wonder what the critical mass for an online community is? What's the point where you're less likely to get a reply? What's the point where you're less likely to even have someone read your comment?
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Probably not a language model. Reddit has had spambots since it was available on the web. A very common form of reddit spambot just reposts pieces of other peoples' comments - not to push a message or anything, just to gain karma, so the account can get past simple spam filters and be used later or sold. Same for repost bots - repost old posts, get karma, use or sell.
Looking closer - conclusionfirm's comment has been removed, while breathagreeable's is still up - breathagreeable has an active post history, while that's conclusionfirm's only comment - from your SS, conclusionfirm's is newer than breathagreeable's - and conclusionfirms' comment is a direct substring of breathagreeable's! So it's almost certainly that spambot strategy, breath posted a real comment, conclusion reposted a substring of it to get karma - and not gpt3 or anything.
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I got the impression GPT is more varied. But I could be convinced either way.
Ah, the eternal struggle of monetization. So long as users expect their network to be free, entrepreneurs will have a hell of a time converting those user metrics into payouts. The coupling of userbase to profit is weak. The coupling of bots to lost users is weak, too, since it’s so nonlinear. Kind of makes it hard to source a solution.
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OTOH, I almost hit a cyclist when going home today because I didn't see him because all I saw was lights in the darkness.
If the bots manage to get something done about the megawatt floodlights on rich people's cars nowadays, then I, for one, welcome our new AI overlords.
My understanding is that it is slightly less about the brightness of the headlights and more about cars getting taller and thus the angle of the headlights isn't quite sufficient to keep them out of your eyes if you drive a car that seats the driver lower to the ground.
Also we don't use Adaptive beam headlights whilst Europe does.
Source is mostly this video: https://youtube.com/watch?v=c2J91UG6Fn8
It's actually safer for the driver of such a car since they get visibility further out, but obviously if everyone does this it just leads to everyone being blinded.
I'm in the Netherlands. Southkraut is in Germany, it apparently doesn't help.
No surprise: nothing is going to be sensitive and accurate enough for that to ever work well. The manufacturers don't really even have to care, after all, it's not their customers who are blinded, it's the other guys. And it's always going to err on the side of not dimming, since that's what the customer would want - and on the other hand, thank God for that, imagine driving along and your car turns your headlights off all of a sudden because it has somehow decided someone's coming.
This so-called driver assistance technology never works well. I've never seen any work well. Even the self-canceling turn signals only ever self-cancel when you don't want them to. But that's another rant for another time.
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Aye, I thought I was the only one who's bothered by the proliferation of ever-brighter headlights.
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When you create a reddit account it will suggest a random username with this format.
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I get two bulbs for 21$ but I have a 2004 Chevy Trailblazer. My first car was a Geo Metro with 9$ tires that Tire Kingdom wouldn't sell me unless I also got an oil change or something because it was so cheap. I like safetyism and features but some things seem to have wildly swung in cost.
Do new car headlights really cost 200$?
From what I understand, yes or more for many vehicles. Because we've shifted from standardized incandescent/halogen bulbs in fixed unique-per-model reflectors (previously full round or square reflector assemblies) to fashionable unique-per-model LED headlights that are a single replaceable unit. When my the bulbs in my older basic car burn out, I buy new ones at the store for a few bucks and replace them in a few minutes. The OEMs say (and might be right) that the LED assemblies can be expected to last the lifetime of the vehicle, but it's far more expensive to replace the whole thing if it breaks or you get in a collision.
There is probably a good comparison to how phones no longer ship replaceable batteries (or memory on laptops) because the tight integration allows better performance and lower part counts (cheaper), at the cost of making line replaceable units larger and more costly.
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Not sure. I’ve got an 07 car and just had to pay $700 for an air compressor, so that was fun.
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Yeah, I had noticed bots taking comments/parts of comments I and others had made and reposting them elsewhere in the same thread. Trying to farm upvotes I suppose
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A little off-topic, but only a little: When I was watching the youtube trailers for Disney's newest Star Wars show Andor, I was also getting a lot of "bot vibes" from the comments. I would see 3 or more comments in the past 24h posting the same praise verbatim all by accounts with what appear to have a name and a face. Especially visible faces, certainly too visible for anyone doing anything interesting on the internet. (Nobody posting here would or should be using a youtube account like that).
I wasn't sure if these are bots paid for by Disney, with extra visible faces and names to appear real in a "methinks the bot doth protest too much" kind of way. Or, if they are influencer shills. Either way, it seemed really unnatural. Andor didn't seem especially unnatural, it's just the last trailer that interested me enough to watch. I suspect other corporate products have this issue too.
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Practically speaking;
This is only a problem in subreddits with a large enough user base and an obvious political slant. Avoid those like the plague and take everything you read in those with mountains of salt.
Subs with <15k subscribers and no obvious political slant. Subs for niche hobbies or apolitical things like cooking, mountain biking, bird watching, etc. Are where you can let your guard down.
And I would make the argument that the latter is what you should use Reddit for. Discussing things that are not popular (true definition) enough to be discussed elsewhere.
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Oh, I'm sure they will, but this seems like a monkey's paw curls situation. I'm fairly persuaded that the situation Darryl Cooper describes in We're all John Hinkleys Now is going to worsen.
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