Bot Infestion - Something needs to be done..

[KingVampilicious Rhapsody]

Hello!

I have been playing SL for years, and until recently in the last couple of years, noticed a heavy increase of traffic to different info hubs and welcome hubs across SL. Not the type of traffic you think. Bots. Bots. Bots. Many promoting their business on their profile, just standing. Sex bots promoting adult places on their profiles on Moderate land, and vice versa. These locations were meant to be used to welcome, and let newcomers explore SL for all it has to offer, as well as learn how to play... But now it's just a wasteland of bots. Can something be done about this? 

[PheebyKatz]

Everyone kicked them all off of their islands and homesteads, so I guess they had to go somewhere.

I just block them and make them invisible if I can't send them home.

They're still better than people who run up and shove newbies off of tall things just to be jerks.

Edited October 4, 2023 by PheebyKatz

[belindacarson]

Easily.

 

Find another place to go if they're bothering you.

[Alwin Alcott]

39 minutes ago, belindacarson said:

Easily.

 

Find another place to go if they're bothering you.

totally true .. but a but..
If this is what the new player finds after leaving the investment on the welcome islands, it will vaporise the thin layer of desire to stay in SL
The need to reduce the abuse of accounts for bothering activities grows every day.
Avatar/accounts are meant to be handled by a person. Create something else for bot use. A clear difference could be helpfull.
And a limitation where they can go. No random regions aymore or target places, free to use a recognizable bot.. but on own lands.

Edited October 4, 2023 by Alwin Alcott

[Istelathis]

Without the bots, most of these places would be empty regardless, then we would be complaining about how empty it all is and how the noobies would feel like they were in a dead world.  Perhaps we should just make bots more entertaining, rather than ban them entirely, give them a personality.  I'm just kidding around of course, because, someone will actually take my silly antics as being serious.  

Honestly though, I haven't a clue how many of them are bots.  A lot of people just stand around in place at the Welcome hub, myself usually included, I wonder if I am often considered a bot.  I hope so, bots are pretty cool.  Perhaps I should go around repeatedly typing beep boop, beep bop.

Really though, are they that much of a nuisance?  I go to the welcome hub fairly regularly and I don't really even notice them, I'm sure there are a bunch there, and that they at various times of the day come in at huge batches, but it seems LL does a pretty good job of handling them.  I just teleported to the Welcome HUB this moment, 16 avatars are present, this seem to be pretty typical.  I don't even bother to go around asking if most are bots, perhaps I should, just to weed out the avatars I have no real interest in conversing with.  

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by Istelathis

[Love Zhaoying]

In the spirit of @Istelathis' reply, Bots are a lot less annoying then actual user avatars, who want to talk and stuff. Who the heck needs that?

 

[Istelathis]

7 minutes ago, Love Zhaoying said:

In the spirit of @Istelathis' reply, Bots are a lot less annoying then actual user avatars, who want to talk and stuff. Who the heck needs that?

 

Damn right!  Them extroverts and their constant insistence on trying to socialize with me!  How dare they 😡  Don't they know I am just here to observe them in their virtual setting, and my ultimate goal is to replace them all with AI bots?

Edited October 4, 2023 by Istelathis

[belindacarson]

52 minutes ago, Alwin Alcott said:

totally true .. but a but..
If this is what the new player finds after leaving the investment on the welcome islands, it will vaporise the thin layer of desire to stay in SL
The need to reduce the abuse of accounts for bothering activities grows every day.
Avatar/accounts are meant to be handled by a person. Create something else for bot use. A clear difference could be helpfull.
And a limitation where they can go. No random regions aymore or target places, free to use a recognizable bot.. but on own lands.

Out of interest is the "no bots" setting enabled at the hubs, old or now?

 

@Abnor Mole

@Dyna Mole

@Quartz Mole

[Stephanie Misfit]

39 minutes ago, belindacarson said:

Out of interest is the "no bots" setting enabled at the hubs, old or now?

 

@Abnor Mole

@Dyna Mole

@Quartz Mole

Iris infohub is always full of bots, so either it isn't, or those accounts at Iris aren't registered as scripted agents.

[Helen Zenovka]

1 hour ago, Istelathis said:

Damn right!  Them extroverts and their constant insistence on trying to socialize with me!  How dare they 😡

The ones that annoy me the most are the ones that want to do more than socialise with me.  There's no shortage of them.........

[Zalificent Corvinus]

3 hours ago, KingVampilicious Rhapsody said:

a heavy increase of traffic to different info hubs and welcome hubs across SL. Not the type of traffic you think. Bots. Bots. Bots

For many year, I've noticed that info-hubs were filled with...

 

Spampire Lords, trying to recruit noobs into their HUD based pyramid scheme. Something should be done, before there's no room at the Hubs for lost bots and worthless day old trolls!

[pizza7]

lol haha at first i read bolts...

[Arduenn Schwartzman]

Maybe there should be special welcome areas for bots alone.

[Orwar]

1 hour ago, Zalificent Corvinus said:

For many year, I've noticed that info-hubs were filled with...

 

Spampire Lords, trying to recruit noobs into their HUD based pyramid scheme. Something should be done, before there's no room at the Hubs for lost bots and worthless day old trolls!

   Poor spampires, it's difficult enough to get a newbie to put a HUD on - I don't think it'll be easier to convince and instruct the bots!

[Istelathis]

Vampires feeding on bots is a real concern of mine, the bots have absolutely no say in the matter and with systems in place that allow this without the consent of bot owner is unacceptable.  LL needs to do something about this, and soon.  Next thing we know, we will have vampire bots, feeding on the masses without our knowledge, this is completely unacceptable.

 

Vampire bots, roaming regions, feeding on our residents and other bots.  All powered by the vampire AI virus, slowly converting our virtual world into their playground, leaving those few of us remaining huddling around in Bellisseria with garlic hanging from our doors. 

Laugh all you want, ridicule me, but you won't be laughing when they come for you!

Edited October 4, 2023 by Istelathis

[JeromFranzic]

I want more bots. Sue me. I usually do unspeakable things with them... no, not that! 😛

[Prokofy Neva]

2 hours ago, Stephanie Misfit said:

Iris infohub is always full of bots, so either it isn't, or those accounts at Iris aren't registered as scripted agents.

Yes, I know, I'm there as you know. And I occasionally AR them or ask the bot (what else!) in the customer service to reset the sim to shake them off (I don't tell it that last part). Because they are there because they've been shaken off OTHER sims.

 

[Prokofy Neva]

4 hours ago, KingVampilicious Rhapsody said:

Hello!

I have been playing SL for years, and until recently in the last couple of years, noticed a heavy increase of traffic to different info hubs and welcome hubs across SL. Not the type of traffic you think. Bots. Bots. Bots. Many promoting their business on their profile, just standing. Sex bots promoting adult places on their profiles on Moderate land, and vice versa. These locations were meant to be used to welcome, and let newcomers explore SL for all it has to offer, as well as learn how to play... But now it's just a wasteland of bots. Can something be done about this? 

Here's the script that the newbie Signal Linden put out a few months ago that detects bots -- at least of the registered kind whose owners have indicated they are scripted agents on their account page. It's annoying because if you put copy this into a blank script in inventory, then put it into a prim, then rez it out where you have bot infestations, it immediately starts spitting out lists of names of bots (if there are avatars) -- and you can't stop it because it isn't on/off (someone needs to make the script do that). It also doesn't catch unregistered bots. But it's a start I guess. 

Since that OTHER script that does catch them all supposedly is being held close.

default {
    state_entry() {
        // Detect agents within a 96m radius
        llSensorRepeat("", NULL_KEY, AGENT, 96.0, TWO_PI, 5.0);
    }
    
    sensor(integer count) {
        // Check if detected agent(s) are bots
        integer i;
        for (; i < count; i++) {
            key id = llDetectedKey(i);
            integer info = llGetAgentInfo(id);
            if (info & AGENT_AUTOMATED) {
                llOwnerSay(llDetectedName(i) + " is a bot.");
            }
        }                
    }
}

 

[Marigold Devin]

29 minutes ago, JeromFranzic said:

I want more bots. Sue me. I usually do unspeakable things with them... no, not that! 😛

YES! 

100% more bots - but please put them on sky platforms or make the boxes have phantom walls, so I can push them all to the ground, just for the fun of it 😜 

[PheebyKatz]

My favorite bot ever actually looked like a robot, had a profile declaring it to be a robot, and was very polite.

He got stranded on my homestead in the canal once, and I put a cute top hat on him and decorated all around him.

Really, if they look like robots and admit what they are, it does kinda help the gut reaction.

[rasterscan]

32 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

Here's the script that the newbie Signal Linden put out a few months ago that detects bots -- at least of the registered kind whose owners have indicated they are scripted agents on their account page. It's annoying because if you put copy this into a blank script in inventory, then put it into a prim, then rez it out where you have bot infestations, it immediately starts spitting out lists of names of bots (if there are avatars) -- and you can't stop it because it isn't on/off (someone needs to make the script do that). It also doesn't catch unregistered bots. But it's a start I guess. 

Since that OTHER script that does catch them all supposedly is being held close.

default {
    state_entry() {
        // Detect agents within a 96m radius
        llSensorRepeat("", NULL_KEY, AGENT, 96.0, TWO_PI, 5.0);
    }
    
    sensor(integer count) {
        // Check if detected agent(s) are bots
        integer i;
        for (; i < count; i++) {
            key id = llDetectedKey(i);
            integer info = llGetAgentInfo(id);
            if (info & AGENT_AUTOMATED) {
                llOwnerSay(llDetectedName(i) + " is a bot.");
            }
        }                
    }
}

 

llSensorRepeat("", NULL_KEY, AGENT, 96.0, TWO_PI, 5.0);

That 5.0 at the end is the repeat rate in seconds. 300 would scan once every 5 mins

Edited October 4, 2023 by rasterscan

[Love Zhaoying]

I saw a Linden post about new combat features (LSL scripting to Rez objects for combat, etc.) Maybe those new combat features will help us with Bots!

[Lord Pole]

There are indeed a lot of bots at the "safe" hubs. A lot of that can be put down to region restarts and the bots being relogged to a safe hub whilst the sim restarts. Many stay there due to bad coding.

These hubs used to be a great place to meet people - like about a decade ago.

The only time I visit a hub is when I am forced to due to a region restart. The people you see standing around such places should not be taken as a general indication of the people you meet in SL.

[Alwin Alcott]

5 hours ago, Istelathis said:

Without the bots, most of these places would be empty 

 

so what?... close half of them. 
Give SL back to the players instead of the harvesters of data.

[Love Zhaoying]

If Bots could be restricted to specific uses, such as NPC's, I would support that.

The "data gathering Bots" basically provide "cheats" in Second Life to limited industries:

- Gathering Land data for those who want to buy cheap land (I guess "mapping" Bots are not as evil).   SL "Land Barons" are already at the "top" of the SL hierarchy for profiting from SL.

- Gathering Avatar / Attachment data for those who sell Skins, Clothing, etc. Why should these creators get some advantage that non-clothing, non-attachment, non-body creators do not get (builders, scripters, etc.)?