Comment by llamageddon01 on 21/10/2021 at 14:23 UTC*

3 upvotes, 0 direct replies (showing 0)

View submission: The NewToReddit Encyclopaedia Redditica v2

Bots

Bots are scripts written by users and can be the boon or the bane of every Redditors’ life. Popping up unsummoned and often when you least expect it, Bots can be:

useful (e.g. u/Reddit-Book-Bot)
funny (e.g. u/phonebatterylevelbot)
clever (e.g. u/alphabet_order_bot)
very clever (e.g. u/Haikusbot)
analytical (e.g. u/same_post_bot)
downright annoying (e.g. u/I-Am-Dad-Bot in all its many reincarnations)
intentionally misleading (e.g. u/Not_RepostSleuthBot)
very informative (e.g. u/reply-guy-bot who reports on plagiarised comments[1] made by spambots trying to acquire karma)

All bots respond to specific words or phrases in a comment[2] and you should reply to any bot comment by saying either **Good Bot** or **Bad Bot** as u/GoodBot_BadBot/ collates the replies and ranks the bots accordingly.

1: https://www.reddit.com/user/reply-guy-bot/comments/n9fpva/faq/

2: https://www.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/66w1tu/how_do_reddit_bots_actually_work_and_how_do_i/

Subreddits aren’t totally at the mercy of Bots[3] as Mods will often ban them from their subs if they find them annoying, and r/BotDefense basically does what it says: defends against bots. Some subs also use r/BotTerminator as well.

3: https://www.reddit.com/r/ModSupport/comments/e183pt/announcing_an_improved_defender_of_subreddits/

Some Bots can be used by Redditors. These are known as Service Bots and will usually respond to user mentions for a specific purpose. Some examples which you can summon by mentioning their username in the comments of a post are:

u/risbot - If you see an image on Reddit that you’re sure you’ve seen before, this bot will perform a Google reverse image search in seconds. Essential for mobile app users.

u/goodreads-bot - You don’t need to call this one by name. In r/booksuggestions, this bot will give a brief description of a book by typing: {Book Title} or a longer one by this: {{Book Title}} which gives a short synopsis of the book[4]. You can also use the author name like this: {Book Title by Some Author} or {{Book Title by Some Author}}.

4: https://www.reddit.com/r/booksuggestions/comments/pyu2xo/comment/hf7d81b/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

u/RepostSleuthBot - This is a high performance repost detection bot you can summon if you see a post you think you’ve seen on Reddit before. r/RepostSleuthBot.

u/RemindMeBot - This bot lets you set a reminder for a certain amount of time via a comment or private message, and then sends you a reminder message at your targeted time. Use it if you want to check back on a post for updates, or remember to do something a week from now. You’ll need instructions but they are easy to follow[5]. More information at r/RemindMeBot.

5: https://www.reddit.com/r/RemindMeBot/comments/e1bko7/remindmebot_info_v21/

u/stabbot - This bot stabilizes videos, uploads the result and replies to your comment when summoned. If you want your result also to be cropped, mention /u/stabbot_crop instead. r/stabbot.

u/redditspeedbot - This is one for speeding up or slowing down videos, and to use it[6] just comment u/redditspeedbot <speed> on a post that has a video or GIF.

6: https://www.reddit.com/user/redditspeedbot/comments/eqdo8u/redditspeedbot_guide/

u/GifReversingBot - Look at things in reverse! This bot is fun[7].

7: https://www.reddit.com/user/GifReversingBot/comments/9gbzyu/how_to_use_gifreversingbot/

u/profanitycounter - Do you suspect someone of having a potty mouth? This is the bot to use to check[8]!

8: https://www.reddit.com/user/profanitycounter

u/user_simulator - another fun bot which will scan all of a user's available comments (up to 1000 or so) and build a new comment based on them. It can also simulate whole subreddits at once! r/User_Simulator.

u/InactiveUserDetector - this one looks for username mentions, and will point out if that user hasn’t been active on Reddit for some time.

There is no official list of Reddit bots, but r/redditbots and this old list[9] or even this link[10] will give you some idea of what’s lurking in wait. More than 61000+ Bots can be seen here https://botrank.pastimes.eu/[11] but not all of them will be currently active. There is no definitive list of Service bots on Reddit either, but questions and information can be found at r/botwatch.

9: https://reddit.com/r/autowikibot/w/redditbots

10: https://ada-young.com/pastebin/40ARHwr6

11: https://botrank.pastimes.eu/

We also have another type of bot that roams Reddit: the Spambot[12]. Unlike any of the benign bots mentioned above, these are bad news. They have their own entry in this encyclopaedia as you need to know how to spot them[13].

12: https://www.cloudflare.com/en-gb/learning/bots/what-is-a-spambot/

13: https://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/5fcz3m/there_is_so_much_spam_on_reddit_how_can_we/

Going back to the harmless but sometimes annoying bot variety, please forgive me but I just have to mention some bots that were very divisive and, some I believe now mercifully defunct. u/uwuwizard and u/uwutranslator, which did exactly that, and if that wasn’t bad enough, a bot that when you replied to a comment with !emojify[14] it sent a bot over that replied again but with all the words having an emoji attached to them. I mention these because defunct bots have a tendency to return. Don’t say I told you to try them and see because I’m not telling you that. At all.

14: https://www.reddit.com/r/memes/comments/jdru0x/reddits_current_state_of_mind_on_the_emoji_bot/

If any bot annoys you to the point you never wish to see them again, you can Block them just like any other user.

*Because there is a Subreddit for everything:**

r/BotsScrewingUp is a sub to document those times that although we have Bottiquette[15], bots sometimes get things very, very wrong.

15: https://www.reddit.com/wiki/bottiquette

*See Also:**

Automod[16]
Blocking[17]
r/Bottiquette (subreddit)
GPT Bots[18]
Reverse Image Searching[19]
Spambots[20]
UWU[21]

Comment by llamageddon01 on 21/10/2021 at 14:23 UTC*

Bots

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