Forums » Smalltalk » Bot frequency

Hi everyone,

I know there is for 120% sure somewhere a post about this, but yet I'm too lazy to search (tried though).

Is it an impression I have, or is it every time there's a major event coming up on site (like Kim is outermostly busy trying helplessly to get it all in place) that bot frequency is increasing? The last week, I reported more bots posting than the last two month together. And this just before our beloved Epic Weeks will start. I do not have statistical proof of this, but it feels like that. It's been two weeks now that the forum sometimes strongly slows down (for me) and that bots reappear. Maybe it's coincidence, maybe it's true. Maybe someone can lighten this mystery before riddles will grab and squeeze our brains in the Epic Week.

This is no ranting, just an impression that haunts my mind.

Thanks

I can't ease your concerns, but I promise I'm not a bot! (... although I acknowledge that this is something a bot would say)

A bot is as cold as a block of ice coming from outer space. It's less sympathetic than a frozen prison door.... So no you're not a bot.

@Kim: do we get extra points if we help to shoot down external AI driven bots disturbing the peaceful war of Epic Week?

I've reported one myself but I don't think they're much of a big deal. Maybe the frequency in Epic Week has something to do with Search Engine Optimization?

The bots want us to buy weed gummies soooo bad

That’s the one I see repeatedly. The bot-model that lists a few dozen links seems to be coming from the same bot-farm. I may be wrong, but being on the far side of the world, it appears to me that they have the timing figured out so their posts stay up the longest while the mods are offline.

That could be a part of the explanation, updates, optimizations and our moderation team busy as hell. Only this week I reported 9 bots, from weed-gummies to life-care… but only six other since February.
I know it’s not big deal, we get quickly rid of those, the record is bot deleted after less than a minute. I was very pleasantly surprised and had to give congratulations for that one.
So let’s not be too much disturbed by stupid advertising in the next few days, only few hours left 😉
Lizbeth bot hunter stays on duty!!

I too wonder what contributes to a surge in bot activity.

I suspect forums in general allow the creator to cast a wide net via relatively low effort. No videos/ audio required.

I've actually recently been reporting fewer bots than over the past couple months, but that probable relates more to how often I'm properly looking through the forums.

Nah, that was last year.

The bots are basically always posting crap at a high rate. It looks like there are more bots to you in the lead up to big events because we're busy getting stuff ready, so stuff doesn't get caught quite as fast, so more people see each bit of spam before someone deletes it. I feel like I am personally deleting the same amount of spam as usual, I'm just doing it more clumpily rather than constantly throughout the day. Hope that makes sense.

Thanks Kim,

I knew there was a relation, if it is only moderation staff being busy, my feeling was right. 😊🤗
I’m not getting insane, what a relief.
Yet I’ll keep on chasing them
😁
I’m at number 12 this week

It must be exhausting trying to keep our beloved forum clean, and then comes again that doe with weird posts… 🤣 oh no, her again…

You and the mod team are troopers. Thanks for all you do. I’ve seen good websites simply abandoned due to onslaughts of bots. The bots I see here are usually one at a time and easily ignored and are gone quickly. I’ll try and be more vigilant in reporting the trash.