Remember When...

Each one of us has had an encounter with a bot on Steemit. Remember your first Steemit post? Remember those canned comments with useful bits of info or the horrible one-liners asking for follow-for-follow? Yep... those were all bots. Some were good, but most were just kind of annoying weren't they?

Bad Bots!

I really don't need to say much in this category. You already know what a bad bot is...

Self Voting Bots
Narrow Spectrum Voting Bots (also described as a type of geometrically shaped group event)
Spam Bots
Reward Based Bots (also known as a Reward Raper)

Some of these bad bots work together to increase their effectiveness. For example, one bot leaves a spam comment on a post. Then a handful of other bots upvote that spam bot's comment and bam! That comment is making more money than your post is. You've seen this before, I'm sure. It's quite maddening.

Good Bots!

I wish for every bad bot, there was a good bot... and then some! A good bot can be a great tool for a person and for the Steemit community as a whole. Some examples of good bots are...

User-Defined Voting Bots
Community Support Bots

The Difference

As you see above, voting bots are in both the bad and the good categories. So what makes the bot bad vs. good? What is the difference?

You are the difference!

It is your choice of how to use a bot that makes all the difference! You are in control of only yourself, but you are still powerful, influential and a key player in all of this.

Our actions and influence reach beyond ourselves and our bubble of perception, sometimes without us ever knowing.

What ripple do you want to make in this pond?

Original content by @greenacrehome

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so bots are true! thanks for your post now i know 👍

Good post, more people know the better, thanks for sharing.

Thanks @zalife, glad you liked the post.

Narrow Spectrum Voting Bots (also described as a type of geometrically shaped group event)

Tee hee.

That took a few tries to get the right terminology :)

User-Defined Voting Bots
Community Support Bots

I don't think there are any good bots. I might let Curry slide as from what I understand is the community votes on what is upvoted.

I personally believe that all upvoting/flagging options should be removed from the API and only allowed through STEEMit.com or an officially approved app.

I appreciate your opinion and you taking the time to comment @deanlogic, seriously. I also agree with you on only allowing those actions from Steemit.com directly.

I'm trying, and failing to understand how
bots can be good.
self voting is bad.

I'll elaborate more on another post, but to summarize I think that when a bot is used to help others, then it is a good bot... as long as those others are genuine people who create original content and contribute to the platform. I use a voting bot tied to my account to upvote posts of all the accounts I follow. I can't be on Steemit as much lately, but still want the rewards I can give to go to those who have proven to me they're quality creators. My vote bot votes as a lowered percentage to spread the votes out as best it can. When I come across a post I really like, I'll re-vote at 100% (if the bot already voted) to give as much to the creator as I can.

I appreciate you taking the time to read and respond. Thanks @everittdmickey

Like many things it's not the thing itself that is bad, it has no brain, it is the way we choose to use it.