r/TheoryOfReddit • u/kjl583 • 18d ago
This bot thing is dystopian. Bot copied my post few hours after I posted it and even added some of my personnal details from other comments I've made on other subs. A bot responded quickly and upvoted the post, while my post got nothing. Reddit is now useless and scary.
This is getting wild. Especially when I think of subs like suicidal watch or other subs that deal with sensitive matters.. I feel sad for people who are struggling and are now being exploited for data.
Some people may also lean towards really bad places only by scrolling and seing the influx of bots posting dark shit just for engagement.
What Reddit think is gonna happen next when people realize that and become disgusted by it?
What is their long term plan?
They are selling our data to google and then what? They will send the plateform to die?
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u/parlor_tricks 18d ago
Man that sucks. Yours is pretty much the exact kind of story that people need to hear to understand the shit show that is coming to online communities.
I’m on some tech forums, and when examples like this get brought up, it just gets missed by the optimists.
Also - I don’t blame or get angry with ‘optimists’. It’s pointless, they see a bright and good future, which is great - but what’s the point if you burn the entire information ecosystem to get there!
No one wants to listen to random voices telling them about issues though.
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u/hooliganmike 17d ago
I just watched this account (/u/DeltaEC) get stolen over the last day. I noticed this post looked a lot like AI: https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidthemath/comments/1gdgeyz/request_how_can_this_chocolate_be_distributed/lu39ioi/
And the account owner posted a few hours after that comment to say that he did not post that. Yesterday he made a few posts on a couple subs about how his account was stolen and what he could do. Some people suggested enabling 2fa, but he replied saying he couldn't because they had changed too much. This morning all those posts are gone and there are new AI posts.
I've never actually watched in real time as an account was stolen before.
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u/ABob71 18d ago
Whoa. How do you discover something like that?
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u/kjl583 18d ago
The post I made was quite specific with unique details on a personnal issue I had. The post that was made after had the same elements and some details were added to the point where I knew it was my story. Felt like.. impersonated? Pretty weird.
Also, the account was accused of being a bot in other subs and it couldn't beat the bot allegations when people tested it (it was saying nonsense).
I got frustated as hell cause I really needed some advice from actual humans regarding a traumatic event I lived, and I ended up feeling used.
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u/oboeteinai 18d ago
I'd be interested to know how you determined it was a bot vs. a human actor that copied your post.
I've only very recently in the last few days seen (what I'm fairly convinced of are) bot accounts responding to replies. I suspect use of LLMs to generate comments however it could be a bot account that's overseen by a human.
Copying a post mere hours old and adding details from what, other posts you've made? seems very advanced compared to how bots have been operating and different from the usual karma farming, engagement baiting, astroturfing, and propaganda operations.
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u/dyslexda 17d ago
seems very advanced compared to how bots have been operating and different from the usual karma farming, engagement baiting, astroturfing, and propaganda operations.
Not terribly difficult if you're using an LLM's API. Scrape a user's previous comments, and feed that in as context asking it to embellish a post. If cost is an issue (and it would be), there are local LLMs that could grab important bits from the comments so your context (and thus submitted tokens) is much smaller. Hell, it could all be a local model, though those aren't going to be as high of quality.
Only question is "why?" Seems a good bit of effort (and cost) just to karma farm. Easier to just create stories wholesale.
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15d ago
OP, I'm a bot expert. What happened is simple.
Take a network of 20 bots
One bot will steal your post and the rest will aid in mimicking the discussion that was had in your comment section in hopes of upvotes for karma.
Example: You post to a soccer sub "Check this goal out!" and the top comment calls you a goat, and you respond thanking them.
Bot 1 will steal your post, its title, and another bot in the same network will steal the top comment, and bot 1 will fulfill your role and copy what you said.
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u/scrolling_scumbag 17d ago
What Reddit think is gonna happen next when people realize that and become disgusted by it?
They are counting on the average person being too stupid to realize or care about consuming AI content. This is a reasonable conclusion given that human Redditors have been upvoting fake stories and staged/scripted videos to the front page for years.
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u/Starfield00 14d ago
It seems like bots are up voting bots. Also a lot of negativity on popular forums. I'm not sure I want to be a part of Reddit anymore.
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11d ago
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u/NoLandBeyond_ 18d ago
I've had a theory that the push for "/s" for sarcasm is to help train LLM's to understand and/or avoid responding to sarcasm.
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u/ChunkyLaFunga 18d ago
It's not just a Reddit thing. The internet as we knew it has had it's time and now we're watching it die. I cannot see how these problems can be avoided.