They Say / I Blog

Bots that fluff: danah boyd on bot-hating and Twitter

Some Twitter users have hundreds of thousands of followers. Wow, they must be really important celebrities. Or maybe they have interesting and influential ideas. Or maybe they’ve just paid for a few thousand follow bots to puff themselves up. Isn’t that . . . cheating? Not according to technology researcher danah boyd, and she explains why not in this February 2018 essay on the blog NewCo Shift.

boyd, “The reality of Twitter puffery. Or why does everyone now hate bots?”

Bots that care: Arielle Pardes on personal support chatbots

Today, robots and AI-enabled devices can vacuum your carpets, remind you to water your plants, or give you a weather forecast for next week’s trip to Disneyland. But can a robot commiserate with you at the end of a hard day or applaud you for a personal triumph? Well, maybe not yet, but soon, for sure. Wired writer and editor Arielle Pardes tells us all about it in this January 2018 article.

Pardes, “The emotional chatbots are here to probe our feelings”