We’re trying to build communities. A good way to do it is to have bots post content, so there’s stuff to see on our feeds.
It’s always a balancing act that doesn’t work for everybody. But the beauty here is that each individual can curate their own feed.
Edit: I misspoke, I’m not someone who actively uses of promotes bot use. I just remember people talking about this discussion previously and this was a justification used. OP asked a question, I provided an answer. It’s not MY answer, but it’s still one. Don’t shoot the messenger.
That’s entirely understandable. That’s the thing, though. It’s hard to have a community grow on its own, organically, in these times. A large majority of users are rather passive, they don’t actively contribute by posting or commenting so much. If they don’t get enough content on a topic/community, they’ll forget it exists.
So, to build a community, you get a bot to “seed” it with content until enough people know it exists and contribute stuff themselves.
It’s weird and fucked and, unfortunately, it’s the world we live in now.
I disagree, it just leads to spam and people blocking the bots, and therefore the communities. I think things will grow organically at whatever speed. People have to realise this isn’t Reddit, and likely won’t ever be as big, and that it’s good that it won’t be.
We’re trying to build communities. A good way to do it is to have bots post content, so there’s stuff to see on our feeds.
It’s always a balancing act that doesn’t work for everybody. But the beauty here is that each individual can curate their own feed.
Edit: I misspoke, I’m not someone who actively uses of promotes bot use. I just remember people talking about this discussion previously and this was a justification used. OP asked a question, I provided an answer. It’s not MY answer, but it’s still one. Don’t shoot the messenger.
It rubs me the wrong way tbh, because it doesn’t feel authentic at all
That’s entirely understandable. That’s the thing, though. It’s hard to have a community grow on its own, organically, in these times. A large majority of users are rather passive, they don’t actively contribute by posting or commenting so much. If they don’t get enough content on a topic/community, they’ll forget it exists.
So, to build a community, you get a bot to “seed” it with content until enough people know it exists and contribute stuff themselves.
It’s weird and fucked and, unfortunately, it’s the world we live in now.
I disagree, it just leads to spam and people blocking the bots, and therefore the communities. I think things will grow organically at whatever speed. People have to realise this isn’t Reddit, and likely won’t ever be as big, and that it’s good that it won’t be.