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Chris Trottier

People ask, “How much of Mastodon’s growth is due to bots?”

It’s not the driving force of growth but it is a factor.

Much numerical growth comes from big servers like mastodon.social and mstdn.social.

The fastest growing servers tend to be flipboard.social, me.dm, and social.vivaldi.net.

But bot-driven spam servers like ai.wiki exist, and they grew by 907 accounts during the past month. Yes, ai.wiki should be put on #Fediblock.

Good thing we can quarantine and block that domain!

4 Apr 2023 at 1:43 | Open on mastodon.social
8 comments
ch0ccyra1n :she_her::neocat_floof_cute:

@atomicpoet

The fastest growing servers tend to be flipboard.social, me.dm, and social.vivaldi.net.

Sad

4 Apr 2023 at 1:47 | Open on emeraldsocial.org
Chris Trottier

To give an idea about why ai.wiki should be put on #Fediblock, take a look at their about page where they trumpet “benefits to businesses”.

ai.wiki/about

The so-called “business” they attract are spammers.

Take a look at their local feed, and you’ll quickly surmise that this server exists for spam.

ai.wiki/public/local

Bots and spammers are here. Thankfully, we have tools to combat them.
4 Apr 2023 at 1:49 | Open on mastodon.social
Comrade Weez

@atomicpoet thanks for the heads-up. Definite #fediblock candidate. I blocked the domain as a temp measure.

4 Apr 2023 at 1:55 | Open on mastodon.au
DELETED

@atomicpoet Thank you. I've gone ahead and blocked the entire domain so it will never show up in my feed. Here's hoping #Fediverse server admins all over do the same.

4 Apr 2023 at 1:56 | Open on dice.camp
Elias Mårtenson

@atomicpoet I'll probably block this myself if I see it in my feed. That said, the content on its own doesn't necessarily violate many policies to the point where it belongs on a global list.

Of course, if the accounts on the instance actually starts spamming then I'll immediately change my mind.

That said, I think you're eventually going to be right, since there is zero profit in posting on just the timeline of an instance that contains nothing but marketing. You need reach, which will drive these people to spam. However, that spam is what should get them on the lists, not the mere fact that they have a feed full of marketing.

@atomicpoet I'll probably block this myself if I see it in my feed. That said, the content on its own doesn't necessarily violate many policies to the point where it belongs on a global list.

Of course, if the accounts on the instance actually starts spamming then I'll immediately change my mind.

That said, I think you're eventually going to be right, since there is zero profit in posting on just the timeline of an instance that contains nothing but marketing. You need reach, which will drive these...

4 Apr 2023 at 1:58 | Open on functional.cafe
Eric M.
noodlejetski :verified_gay:
Bam

@atomicpoet Also worth noting that while spam bots are awful, bots are not necessarily bad! Some of us enjoy Birdsite mirror bots. Photo bots do a great job of some timeline zen. AITA bot is a nice way to get some Reddit highlights. Lots of great bots are out there to improve the Mastodon experience!

4 Apr 2023 at 1:51 | Open on sfba.social
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