I'm going to keep this post short and to the point!
I'm starting to get quite concerned about some of the trends I'm seeing on Steemit. While daily post growth is not a bad thing, the growth of bots blanket bombing the commentary section of posts is a very bad development for Steemit. However, it is one I see as inevitable and getting worse.
Bots can serve a very valuable purpose such as combating plagiarism but they can also be used to spread spam like a virus across the Platform.
Every second spent looking at spam is air time being taken away from others who have spent time, skill and effort writing posts.
Spam is poison for Steemit but what can we do?
What is to stop bots creating spam posts every minute and flooding this great platform with even more poison.
Is the answer limiting the number of posts and comments per user account.
I don't think downvoting will solve this problem. People will always come up with creative ways of abusing the system. We need to anticipate the next move and take corrective action.
I admit I don't have a clear solution but I would like to support line of discussion around this potentially huge problem.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.
Yeah, this is a tough solution, because like you said, bots can be a good thing until people abuse it for spam. Maybe there needs to be a different verification/signup process for bots going forward. Or, if there are the same comments being posted by a certain account that has been flagged by spam, that account needs to be suspended for 3 days. If the same account has multiple offenses, it will be suspended indefinitely.
@bitgeek I agree 100%, though I think that there needs to be some strong signals from devs/mgmt team to assure that Steemit isnt becoming SkyNet.
Until then, curating the good ol' fashioned way will save the day.
This is a real problem and difficult to solve. But somehow we are responsible for this? Why just can't we support each other? Why do some people think that spamming is so "cool"? I mean do they not feel bored? Or is it just a computer that's spamming all the time? And somehow I personally feel that each blogger should have kind of the control on what other people are writing as a comment like "mark as Spam", yes I know that it's not fair and everyone should have an opinion, yes I get that, that's not the point! but how can you stop it?
I agree with your sentiment that we should support each other, but how to know who is a bot and who isn't if they are newbies/minnows? Maybe we have to start following bot-complaint threads to find real people to follow (not in a stalky way, don't worry) :P.
haha :D yeah, maybe... it's so hard to tell who's behind the profile if you don't know them...
I agree x100000000000 @bitgeek. Content creation is going to be stymied by this. I have had maybe 3 comments actually reference work in my corresponding blog post. There is so much potential in this platform. There needs to be a fix and soon. Godspeed brother.
I also just re-steemed this. Let's get the conversation started.
@bitgeek @rossknows Same here. I think it´s a huge problem. I like to share my knowledge with you guys and try to create some awesome content, but it´s getting really worse here on Steemit. Somebody should or let´s say must do something otherwise it will be just SPAM after a while...
Is there something that we could do as content creators?
I got similar concern bro, alot of botty messages on most posts.
Skynet is coming.....
That's a real problemm wish they solve it
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They soon will,probably. Those whale for rent bots and upvote bots lol
Steemit will either grow or die. Bots serve a purpose. I'm not too concerned because bots are like uses that create no value on the platform and spam useless content. After a while the time they spend won't be worth the reward. it will just be a matter of time to come up with the right algorithm/idea. I'm not worried.
I hear you on the bots. Like with anything there is good and bad and same goes with the bots. I don't want to see this platform turn into junk so they really have to keep up with doing something about eliminating the spam bots but keep up with the helpful bots. This is still a new platform so there will be kinks to work out. This is going to be a part of that.
Thanks for bringing this to everybody's attention
Interesting. I do utilize various bots here, they definitely have their uses. A lot of the ones since the latest hard fork are designed to give some of the reward back the community without all the whales upvoting certain posts. It gives everyone a shot at getting more exposure, etc . . .
But . . I see what you mean. It must be coded in to auto-comment on every post that uses the bot. I'm talking in particular about randowhale, booster, minnowsupport, minnowbooster etc . .
I do agree that the bots that scour for copy/paste stuff are useful in their commenting . . but I'm guessing that the auto-comments by the booster type bots are there for a kind of advertisement. And they can get a little crowded in the comments section . .
I'm still pretty new here, so I really don't have a historical context to go on. Were bots used this much in the past? I just don't know. I think that a bunch of things are being tried out right now, and hf19 caused some changes to the system, so the bots (I think) are designed with that in mind.
I still don't know as much about steemit as I should, but I noticed too that there are many spam posts. I appreciate your efforts to find solutions! Thank you in advance!
I see this too and a lot
bot is everywhere and its annoying however i feel that the developers of steemit will be obliged to act very soon
very interesting point and a valid concern! I hope Steemit are already working on a plan to combat this
Is there any real difference if the whales are manually circle jerking or if they've automated the process?
Whale votes will continue to go where whale votes go, some for good, some for evil.
I'm not going to wring my hands worrying about it.
I'm just going to continue pounding out the mediocre posts and comments I always have and trust that, someday, I'll be able to afford that sweet looking latte in the showroom window at Starbucks.
There have been bots on steemit since before I joined.
Spam bots, troll bots, vote bots, flag bots, the list is endless and they all get 5 minutes of fame before they disappear and a new one turns up that is supposed to be a big problem.
Thanks for a very good post the best part for me about steemit is always reading my replies, I love it if someone read my post so even it the answer is not always what you expected at least you know it was read by someone.
Bot rocks
This is an already solved problem. Comments can be flagged, taking rep and rewards from the account, and if the rep gets low enough posts and comments will always be hidden by most interfaces, including steemit.com
This is as true for bots as it is for human spammers, the blockchain makes no destinction. Posts are rate limited to one every 20 seconds and no limit per day per se, but I did find this
The above redacted as no longer relevant since HF 19
The limit was actually raised to encourage more posting!
Since I was the one who wrote this post, I'll reply here for clarity. While this decreasing rewards curve used to exist, it is no longer in place.
Thanks for this, I didn't realize it was dependent on the square rewards curve
If I remember right, this 4-post "limit" was removed before HF19.
Yes it was
Didn't know we had bots on steemit
Definitely an issue. Reading up and looking at the posts and comment sections here I have been trying to wrap my head around the bots. There seem to be a few kinds:
Also, one of the tactics appears to be tagging the posts not with a traditional tag so it appears in a category, but with only the name of the account posting it, maybe so other bots can more easily find and upvote them? This would make hunting in the usual categories by plagiarism/spam hunting bots less effective perhaps?
I am not a bot programmer, so I don't really know what the limitations are, but if it can be scripted I guess it can be done. For all I know one bot can do all of that stuff above.
All I know is my number of followers is almost 100, but I haven't even gotten 40 upvotes on my genuinely self-produced content posts, but my comments sometimes get short replies and are upvoted. I then check if the content looks good then follow and upvote. In checking my follower list I found plagiarism stuff and unfollowed, but I am worried that is the tactic to get non-botters to follow and upvote bot stuff.
I don't know. I have only been here a month and have a full time job, so I can watch this stuff all the time. But there is definitely the feeling something is off. I have made a few comments in similar posts where whales seem to circle, here's to hoping Steemit doesn't drown in bots.
Bot generated posts should get stamped "BOT GENERATED POST"
You are correct and I wrote a post on this very subject. Sadly I don't have enough people reading my post to make any kind of difference. It is an idea for creating a net wide education.
Good post man, nice to see that others notice this and want to see change.
These spam bot get more upvotes than I get for my original content. I'm new here and trying to stay positive that I will gain a following that enjoys to read what I write.
but still it is daunting to see a bot get 10 upvotes and a post I worked hours on get little to none =(
I see many copy and pastes of complete articles. Many accounts trying to chase the money rather than become part of a community, produce content, enjoy content produced by others and interact talking about the topics they enjoy.
@zebbad