Live data from Hacker News

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

theprint.in

251–260 of 309 posts

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

#251
post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And on the flip side, there's also the assumption that posters who are ill-informed, aggressively partisan and posting repetitive shit constantly throughout the day are bots. But that's actually how ordinary people behave when spending too much time on social media... (There are clearly enormous effective coordinated propaganda campaigns on Ukraine's behalf, but I'm pretty sure kids on Reddit shouting about killing '…

Sufficiently advanced fanboys are indistinguishable from bots.

On internet, nobody knows you're a bot.

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

#252
post #21

eh, by now, I think we are all pretty well resigned to Twitter, FB, TT, etc., being organs of propaganda with a social veneer. By propaganda I mean propaganda, to disseminate the establishment take on things. Occasionally you get the dissenter's take or opposition's propaganda, but it's pretty much all propaganda, mostly from, to borrow a hippie phrase, "the man". Not everything "the man" says is automatically wrong,…

personally I think the meaning of that "the Man" phrase is something like.. "a person of authority (male) acting to further authority (and its privelages/power/profits) for its own sake" .. in other words, the presentation is appeal-to-authority directives, given for the sake of reinforcing the existing authority and its privileges. This is typical for military-to-civilian communication, defending and advancing big b…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37oJqWp4rJM

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

#253

Little wonder that things are ridiculous as they are, there are hundreds of PR companies engaged in pro-Ukrainian messaging. Well, that is how they frame the activity - but it is debatable who is ultimately benefiting from the endeavor, aside from the US defense contractors who are definitely making out like bandits. https://iccopr.com/ukraine-communications-support-network/

It really sucks that we never discuss the incentives of war for the military industrial complex, and more importantly, its ability to influence the us government. It's always assumed that everything is purely good vs evil.

But of course pointing this out makes me a terrorist or a russian apologist, and therefore a bot. beep boop!

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

#254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure but to an external observer it matters, especially if my country is explicitly supporting their cause.

Why does it matter? I'm also an external observer in a country that's supporting to Ukraine but I recognise the reality that Azov is an unfortunate necessity created by multiple Russian invasions.

How though? Ukrainians were in the same boat as the polish as undesirables under nazism so I don’t see why it would be a necessity.

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

#255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I’m going to be honest, Nazis don’t feel like people worth having around and so subhuman in many ways. A bloodthirsty person isn’t a human, it’s a monster that needs to be… purged, like we do with common murderous criminals. Yes, I’m actively campaigning for the lynching of Nazis.

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

#256
> The bots also increase online discussion around motion, observed the research paper, by tweeting posts with words like “moving”, “go”, “going”, “leave”, which are potentially associated with staying or fleeing the country.

Pick 'leave'. Is this "I think _we_ should leave" or "I think _they_ should leave". Without context these words could be used in either way. I searched the paper for the word "leave" and it wasn't there, so the article pulled this example from nowhere.

I am also not convinced whether the sentiment isn't also just amplified from that of real people. On page 11 of the paper [1] the "lag" seems to be the content from the bots becoming less emotive over time. On the other hand, page 12 in the conclusion it appears to amplify with time, which could also be somebody getting more exasperated. I don't know whether this could be concluded to have real intention behind it.

[1] https://arxiv.org/pdf/2208.07038.pdf

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

#257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If those users are legit, sure. But lets be honest...writing bots in Reddit is stupid easy. I have done it myself. Most things that appear on the front page are most likely not legit. Darknet Diaries, a podcast on hacking, had an episode proving how Apple Podcast top 10s are rigged through bots. Episode 27, specifically. And the thing is...if we can easily do it by pushing mediocre podcasts to the top of a list, why…

If it was true then we would see an overflow of pro Putin bots as we see on other platforms such as Twitter. Is the kgb and it’s army of trolls not aware of Reddit?

Im not so sure. Reddit isn't super popular in Russia because it got banned around 2014 right when it was really getting popular in the west. Twitter only recently got blocked there this February, so I believe more Russians are familiar with it than Reddit. Just a theory

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

#258

Little wonder that things are ridiculous as they are, there are hundreds of PR companies engaged in pro-Ukrainian messaging. Well, that is how they frame the activity - but it is debatable who is ultimately benefiting from the endeavor, aside from the US defense contractors who are definitely making out like bandits. https://iccopr.com/ukraine-communications-support-network/

It really sucks that we never discuss the incentives of war for the military industrial complex, and more importantly, its ability to influence the us government. It's always assumed that everything is purely good vs evil. But of course pointing this out makes me a terrorist or a russian apologist, and therefore a bot. beep boop!

Greetings fellow bot. I don't believe that war profiteers are the prime mover in this case, but I do think their direct benefit creates a feedback loop that will only prolong the suffering. What we are seeing right now is the continuation of plans made many years ago. Do you remember when Hillary Clinton proposed a no fly zone over Syria while running for president, and everyone just sort of gave her the benefit of doubt and assumed she didn't know that would lead to war with Russia (all so the US could act as air cover for ISIS)? I'm pretty confident that was her intent all along, which may explain the magnitude of the meltdown the establishment had when she lost her opportunity to execute that plan. You remember how Russia spent decades reminding everyone that NATO expansion into Ukraine was an actual no joke red line, and everyone believed them except Biden - who everyone just assumed screwed up yet again with his habitual bluffing? Well the evidence favors this all being very intentional, like the PNAC and the Iraq war - we've got yet another think tank proposal that matches subsequent warmongering: https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR3063.html

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

#259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reddit has gotten...weird. It's at the point where I almost consider that most of the people I'm talking to there on the mainstream subs actually are bots.

What about HN then? This thread looks full of anti-Reddit "bots" to me…

nah this thread is just bots, reddit is very single ideological trash. it has the illusion of discourse with only a single verdict ( in almost every sub ). The amazing amount of people who have no idea about Eastern politics instantly becoming ^experts^ is dumbfounding.

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

#260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I’ve only ever used Reddit for like diy, maker type subreddits and those are pretty hard to fake. Between Reddit and twitter, it sounds like we are being manipulated to the moon and back.

Can someone create a Reddit where posts are videos instead of text? The community could downvote people hiding their faces if those chose. In the age of deepfakes would that even solve the problem?

TikTok?
Post reply on HN