Recently, a gaggle of World of Warcraft fans on Reddit successfully trolled the living daylights out of an AI bot that scrapes content and turns it into articles – that are obviously being scraped by an AI bot and turned into articles.
On the World of Warcraft subreddit, one user worded a post in a particular way, simply pleading for ‘some major bot-operated news websites to publish an article about this.’ It told the tale of the introduction of ‘Glorbo’, a character that has been hinted about in World of Warcraft lore ‘since 1994’. It was all a complete fallacy, of course – but the AI bot fell for it hook, line, and sinker.
Glorbo Is Coming, But You’ll Need The Klikclac!
On Reddit, the post was stuffed full of meaningless, nonsensical information and tidbits, referencing items and sentiments, and fleshing out Glorbo’s backstory. It took almost no time for that post to be picked up by an AI bot that soaked it all up at face value. It made for a fantastic article – provided you’re interested in having a chuckle at the expense of a poor, hapless bot.
I mean, the article (which was totally AI-generated) failed to spot the most barefaced jab:
Reddit user kaefer_kriegerin expresses their excitement, stating, ‘Honestly, this new feature makes me so happy! I just really want some major bot operated news websites to publish an article about this.’ This sentiment is echoed by many other players in the comments, who eagerly anticipate the changes Glorbo will bring to the game.
This hoax was picked up by the BBC, which was quick to point out that there’s no explicit confirmation that a bot was being used to generate the article, but the evidence is stacked in favour of that explanation. For instance, the ‘writer’ on the platform in question that typed up the article (which has now been deleted) apparently publishes dozens upon dozens of articles every day, and they’re all made up of the exact same structure and style.
It’s getting better – but it’s still flawed.
For more Insider Gaming news, check out our coverage of the tech YouTuber who got GTA 5 running on a Nintendo Switch
