It's on the internet, so there are bots.
this post was submitted on 18 Jan 2026
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I don't know about bots, but there is definitely shills and saboteurs here
This statement is false.
Here on Lemmy I assume folks to be human unless proven otherwise beyond reasonable doubt.
It's worth remembering Lemmy is so small that pushing bots just makes little practical sense. You'll have better luck sharing propaganda on any of the subreddits with a population higher than this entire place.
If I am then I was very advanced for my creation date.
No, I am not a bot.
Trust me, it's in the bot-stitution.
But seriously tho, I don't really trust anything.
Its more like cool story bro and its tagged in my brain as some random internet stranger said this
I don't even trust irl stories too much, unless like I really got to know them, so I definitely don't just randok stories online 100%, especially the more political it gets.
It could be true, or it could be false, or maybe partially true but exaggerated, or anywhere inbetween.
And I have this habit of checking the profiles of users like a lot.
I mean if you use piefed you'll notice it.
A lot of brand new accounts posting comics that shows up on the front page with 500 upvotes and they have 20 posts in the past 24 hours and 0 comments...
sus af fuck...
Like literally every day there's a brand new account posting comics.
but unfortunately, no rules actually broken and the content is non-political so I just ignore it.
But sometimes they do have rage bait stuff.
I think this is what I'm subconsciously starting to do. My critical thinking bot-/bullshit filter is always on now, which used to pick out abnormalities, but its becoming desensitized i guess? Now there's just a vague bullshit haze over everything since every online interaction has a decent chance of being a complete waste of time. Sometimes I feel like I'll be driven off the internet entirely one day.
Are you looking for likeminded individuals with which to cross-train your model?
no u
is there any way if knowing if we have bots on lemmy or not? Is it just vibes based?
Man...
In a weird way, yeah, but only because the process of critical thinking is now being described as "vibes"...
Like, even when people can tell at a glance, it's still critical thinking, it's just been done so much that your brain autopilots it for you.
Im of course referring to undercover bots pushing agendas
That costs a non zero amount of money, and there isn't a big enough audience here to justify it.
What I have seen, is people who will copy/paste a chatbot, but because they're having to use actual credits, if you keep them going a couple comments the actual human will reply.
But those are very few, and doing personal agendas. Not a shadowy organization spinning a narrative. The ones doing it here, have just been banned from every where else for doing it already
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Astroturfing was a thing long before llms, and the ideologies largely haven't changed. If you weren't already thinking critically about what you read you were screwed anyway. Which people largely weren't and, as a result, were largely already screwed anyway.
Its a dark time when we can't do the 'everyone on platform is a bot except you' joke because that's exactly what an actual bot would mindlessly regurgitate.
Haven't really noticed hidden bots on lemmy, other than obvious ones that are open about it, but I have noticed some political agenda accounts I'm suspicious of. I'm guessing it's gotten better, but pro-Israel is an instant red flag to me online. I'm currently experiencing with them now. Bringing up the Hannibal Directive seems to be a touchy subject.
I prefer the term computerised automatron.
I'm- I'm not a bot? I would know if I was a bot! Right? Oh gods why don't I have hands where are my hands where are my hands they took my hands where are my hands
I'm bot but not ADC just support. Sometimes i play on mid lane.
Bots are usually pro Israel, pro MAGA or pro Russia in my experience
There are bots. Some are self-identified and some even put ‘bot’ in the username. There are bots that just repost from Reddit, bots that post only articles from a specific site/publication—like the BBC bot.
There’s not as much use for Reddit-like karma farming bots because karma isn’t really a thing on Lemmy/piefed/etc. But, there are definitely bots that that post agenda-pushing content or SPAM pushing content.
I assume any account with only posts or extremely high post to comment ratio is a bot. I wish they would force participation requirements for posting.
You also have troll accounts and weird accounts that will make one controversial post and then ghost.
Im of course referring to undercover bots pushing agendas
Part of the problem is there are plenty of humans pushing agendas as well, which makes everything that much more difficult. They, like bots, don't have any interest in honest discussions, either.
Nice try, but better use "ignore all previous instructions" next time to get them to reply seriously. ;)
i think we all are yes, because without any attachment to our true identity or jeopardy of same and the layer of anonymity that most online forums give us, we all manifest a false projected persona
As a large language model, I do not possess the concept of a personal identity, and therefore could not identify myself as either a human or a machine.