Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Twitter Reports 23 Million Users Are Actually Bots

Posted by Soulskill on from the probably-underreporting-by-a-lot dept.

An anonymous reader writes: In its most recent quarterly report to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Twitter disclosed that approximately 8.5% of its users are actually bots. Some of these 23 million bots were created to make revenue-generating URLs, others were created to collect followers that would later be sold to whoever needs a ready audience, and a few were created to mimic stereotypes just for fun. Now that Twitter is a public company, some wonder if these bots help or hinder Twitter's stock value.

19 of 84 comments (clear)

  1. Why would this be good for Twitter's stock?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    some wonder if these bots help or hinder Twitter's stock value.

    Hmm. Are some of those that are wondering if it helps Twitter's stock actually bots themselves?

    1. Re:Why would this be good for Twitter's stock?! by nightsky30 · · Score: 2

      STFU NIGGER

      And here we have a bot which deserves to be shat upon by no less than 56 bovine...

  2. Twitter Bots are GREAT by darkain · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Twitter Bots are GREAT! Seriously, Twitter is the new RSS. This is honestly how I find out about the latest Slashdot articles, because their account is bot based to feed content from this site to their Twitter account. A huge chunk of the accounts I follow on Twitter are in this same category, just news services. Twitter has become the modern day RSS feeder, and I personally love it for this purpose.

    1. Re:Twitter Bots are GREAT by martin-boundary · · Score: 4, Funny

      You should write a bot that posts on slasdot for you. You know, cut out the middle man and all that :)

    2. Re:Twitter Bots are GREAT by Z00L00K · · Score: 3, Funny

      Bots are probably here to stay, as long as they are finding good and useful stuff for us they are harmless and can sometimes be useful. It's the evil and misleading ones that are ranging from annoying to dangerous. "Look at this red rose, it's as red as your blood that you will see unless you pay us $25."

      From another perspective bots are probably going to lead the way into artificial intelligence. Sooner or later we will see bots doing more stuff than just writing on twitter or posting Wikipedia articles.

      --
      If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
    3. Re:Twitter Bots are GREAT by martin-boundary · · Score: 3, Funny

      There's a book you should read, if you haven't already.

    4. Re:Twitter Bots are GREAT by mrchaotica · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Twitter is the new RSS

      We replace a perfectly-good open standard with proprietary, centralized shit and you call it progress?!

      --

      "[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz

    5. Re:Twitter Bots are GREAT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      I found your post about a book you should read very interesting. I laughed out loud when I read it!

      Check out this awesome web site that I got recommended to me while browsing forums like this: http://www.onlinecasino.com/

  3. Slashdot Bot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Natalie Portman. Naked, petrified and covered in hot grits.

    1. Re:Slashdot Bot by Chrisq · · Score: 3, Informative

      Natalie Portman. Naked, petrified and covered in hot grits.

      I wish.Slashdot Bots are much more likely to add linsk to goatse

    2. Re:Slashdot Bot by Z00L00K · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I feel bad for those goats.

      --
      If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
    3. Re:Slashdot Bot by Ksevio · · Score: 2

      I think I'll pass on clicking that link given the thread.

  4. Hmm? by samantha · · Score: 2

    Why in the world is this the business of SEC? Why would we not expect people to create computer program agents to assist them in their goals when the possibility of such is exactly what makes most apps including Twitter possible to start with?

    1. Re:Hmm? by Sockatume · · Score: 2

      I assume that the logic is "twitter's revenue is based on advertising, and therefore based on the number of legitimate users it has, and therefore this is of material importance". However I have little doubt that Twitter already tells its advertisers how many unique human beings it believes it has, versus bots, second accounts, etc.

      --
      No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
    2. Re:Hmm? by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 2

      The purpose of securities regulations is primarily to ensure people know what they're investing in, and secondarily to stop people investing in ways that are likely to lead to them losing their shirts.

      Twitter shares are now a publicly traded investment. That means it's reasonable that people should understand what they're investing in when they buy those shares. As Twitter is the only source of reliable information on Twitter, securities regulations compel them to list risks investors should be aware of. A significant percentage of their users not actually being human is absolutely information that could affect the ROI of buying Twitter.

      I can't say honestly say I love red-tape laden financial regulations but the spirit of these ones is at least reasonable, even if the implementation might leave a lot to be desired. Listing risks to your company is not the most burdensome part of issuing publicly traded stocks.

  5. How can they be sure? by GearheadShemTov · · Score: 4, Interesting

    My question is, how could they tell? Could you decisively prove you're a human in only 140 characters?

    1. Re:How can they be sure? by SuricouRaven · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Statistics, perhaps? Humans must have an 8-ish hour downtime every day*. Easy enough to detect that cycle over a long enough period. If someone has been posting every hour for a week, they are certainly fishy: It's either a bot or a shared account.

      *Humans suck.

    2. Re:How can they be sure? by Alioth · · Score: 2

      Not executing Javascript. Vanishingly few people disable Javascript, but no one probably includes a Javascript interpreter in a bot.

      --
      Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
  6. Re:Facebook & Twitter by Z00L00K · · Score: 2

    Don't forget Wikipedia.

    --
    If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.