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60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

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Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#171

Post by flomo »

rustybelt wrote: post #106
BitwiseFool wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're giving Reddit too much credit. The frontpage is awash with astroturfing, agenda posts, and an obvious bias being curated by a handful of power mods. Sure, minor or niche subreddits can escape this, but that's probably only because they are non impactful to begin with. "Flairing" posts doesn't do much good either, because the vast majority of users don't filter. I wonder if this actually makes things wo…

Minor niche subreddits are the only things that keep me on the site. The default subs are universally awful.

One of those small cozy niche subs I used to follow is now being spammed by bot reposts. Intelligent posts have dropped off dramatically. It is endemic.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#172

Post by hackerlight »

volkk wrote: post #35

i've stopped following this war/conflict because the amount of bs stemming from both sides is unparalleled from other stuff i've seen historically. i legitimately can't tell what is made up/staged/propaganda from actual facts, and i am guessing i will never know. some of it is very blatant. twitter is filled with bots, and deceit is everywhere. not surprised at all reading this fyi -- i was born in ukraine and i can…

Your last sentence sort of sounds like the both sides fallacy. Like yeah, it's not factually incorrect that both countries have corruption, but what point are you making?

Propaganda and information warfare being used by both sides as the weapon that it is, should in no way begin to imply moral equivalence between the victim (Ukraine) and fascist empire builder (Russia).

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#173

Post by tut-urut-utut »

dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #150
tut-urut-utut wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you see Ukraine vs Russia as black and white, it means you are already manipulated. The conflict didn't start on 24th of February this year. Even if the press pretends it's all clear, there's a long history of events full of nuances going back hundreds of years that can paint the current events in one or other colour.

Yes, the story is long. Yes, there are many Russians in Ukraine, especially in the East. Yes, there were some alt-right people in Ukraine, too. No, none of these justifies starting a full-scale war, killing thousands of people.

> No, none of these justifies starting a full-scale war, killing thousands of people.

That's the problem with conflicts that have a long history. You can conveniently choose a point it time, like you choose 24.02.2022 and make a case for the side you already support.

For example, if you pick a date in 1944 or 1945 and ignore everything that happened before, you can come to the conclusion that Soviet Union did a full-scale aggression on Germany killing thousands of people. Those bastards, how dared they attach a country of poets and thinkers.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#174

Post by BWStearns »

jeroenhd wrote: post #104

Though the conclusion that this algorithm detected more pro-Ukraine bots is true, there's also this conclusion which would make a much better headline: > Pro-Russian non-bot accounts are most influential overall The Ukrainian bot networks are much bigger but also less effective than the targeted Russian troll farms when it comes to the invasion of Ukraine, at least the way this was measured. I don't see how they've c…

Re India there's a good discussion here[0]. Basically Russia was never ambivalent between India/Pakistan like the US, Russia supplies them with most of their arms, and India hopes they can buddy up to Russia and have a RU-IN vs China situation instead of a RU-CN vs India one. Lots of little reasons even though the outcome is somewhat uncomfortable.

[0] https://carnegieendowment.org/2022/04/25/what-is-in-our-inte...

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#175

Post by genman »

Surprisingly complete failure by HN crowd to notice that these "bots" are determined Botometer that has questionable reliability.

You are obviously running into Russian propaganda spin without much analytical thinking. One should have by now learned that extreme care should be maintained about information that puts Russia even remotely into good light.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#176

Post by less_less »

mc32 wrote: post #161
joecot wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans have been so indoctrinated to the idea that every issue must have two sides who should be equally considered, that when we have issues where one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong, they don't know how to comprehend it. Our media has made everything a debate game because it gets viewers, and it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is. There is n…

This is wrong. You are saying, this is so established that entertaining any alternative is wrongheaded. No. That's not how it works. We need dissent even in the middle of battle. We need to re-asses and continuously examine what we hold true to ensure it is still true. People are not gods. We can be in the wrong. This echoes GWBushe's you're either with us, or you're against us. It's a made up dichotomy.

Speaking of made-up dichotomies, surely there's some option in between "news shows should constantly debate X vs Y" and "X is so established that entertaining any alternative is wrongheaded".

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#177

Post by egeozcan »

bergenty wrote: post #153
egeozcan wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where do you see those pictures? I follow some pro-Russian propaganda groups on Telegram just to see the other side of the argument and even they don't seem to have such pictures. A small side-story: In one of those groups I told them I am Turkish (as they really kindly asked the non-Russians following the group to state their reasons for doing so) and out of nowhere they went 15 mins about how disgusting my race is…

A lot of them on Reddit, they even go through the trouble of censoring the flags before they post them.

I'm not a reddit aficionado so I googled "reddit ukraine", which landed me on "r/ukraine" and I went through the first page. The only nazi-like symbol is worn by a bear depicted as a caricature of Russia, on this post: https://www.reddit.com/r/ukraine/comments/xfqauu/go_away_rus...

How do I see "a lot of them"?

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#178

Post by egeozcan »

thrown_22 wrote: post #136
hackerlight wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US has the luxury of not being invaded by a country 3x as big. Ukraine doesn't really have the luxury of picking and choosing who is allowed to defend.

Had the Nazis been purged between 2014 and today Russia would have most likely not invaded. Least we forget that during that period Nazi death squads killed more people in the break away regions than have so far died in this war. The last time US citizens were killed abroad in large numbers by the army of another country was the Alamo and we still remember it.

You obviously don't like nazis but you openly suggest "purging" humans.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#179

Post by mint2 »

volkk wrote: post #35

i've stopped following this war/conflict because the amount of bs stemming from both sides is unparalleled from other stuff i've seen historically. i legitimately can't tell what is made up/staged/propaganda from actual facts, and i am guessing i will never know. some of it is very blatant. twitter is filled with bots, and deceit is everywhere. not surprised at all reading this fyi -- i was born in ukraine and i can…

No offense, but if this is the first time you’ve realized claims should always be validated I hate to say it’s not because that’s a new situation but rather this is the first time you’re aware of it.

Second, that point is the most true about faceless comments on the internet, as your comment notes about Twitter, and according to your own comment the material on Russia/Ukraine bears particular scrutiny and yet in your comment on Russia/Ukraine there wasn’t any concrete evidence cited so at best you’re spreading unverifiable positions while also explicitly professing to not have any clue to what’s happening due to rampant misleading info.

As it happens it seems I was also born in Ukraine grew up in Russia and moved the USA [for the purposes of this comment but not really] so my take gives me special credibility on this matter.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#180

Post by viridian »

drewcoo wrote: post #170
wyager wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong If your model of any political situation resembles a moralizing children's cartoon, 99% chance you are a mark, incapable of identifying propaganda. > it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is 99.9% of issues in the population of issues we ever think about do not have a clear right answer, because if they did we w…

> model of any political situation resembles a moralizing children's cartoon I'd actually be interested in those cartoons, if you have links. Propaganda pointed at kids is fascinating!

Quite a few one dimensional villains come to mind from my childhood:

Dora the Explorer's swiper the fox, G.I. Joe's cobra commander, He Man's skeletor, robbie rotten from lazy town

Still, I'd say it's a stretch to call, say, the oversimplification of the idea that stealing is wrong, propaganda.

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