Comments on: AIM Coho, Salmon & Trout Bots

By: Duong

Duong — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:28:26 +0000

I actually had a pretty interesting experience.. Ice only talked with person once but haven’t seen the person online againsince then. Is there a way to change the coho name to their actual screennames?

By: Guide to World Domination — Useful Content Wins on Google Search

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By: michael

michael — Sun, 24 May 2009 21:25:25 +0000

cool. thanks for posting this. I was about to go insane. Had no clue who was contacting me. Thanks for the headsup! Great post!

By: enterthewumpus

enterthewumpus — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 07:34:41 +0000

Just happened across this. Thanks for the optout command!

By: Twinge

Twinge — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 20:16:24 +0000

Agreed. Half of the fun of my first conversation was figuring out what the heck was going on =)

By: JustusThane

JustusThane — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 22:49:06 +0000

I disagree. I think that having an explanation message at the beginning of the conversation takes all the fun out of it. I think that would make it more awkward than anything…"Hm. So. We've been randomly paired together. Now what?" Whereas if it's totally unexplained, sure, it leads to some confusion, but if you get past the initial stages, you're in a partnership together, trying to figure out what's going on. Way more fun that way.

By: leanneheller

leanneheller — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 14:08:18 +0000

Thanks for your clarification. It is difficult to contain any viral internet phenomenon, and less friendly imitations are bound to crop up. I think people are reacting less to the idea (which has potential) than to the surprise and confusion a coho message can generate. Possibly the first message should contain an explanation, like "You have been connected with another LiveJournal user via Project Upstream," with a link and a brief explanation of the service. Then it should offer the chance to opt out, "If you would like to opt out of this service, please type.." The main thing would be to explain what is going on, and why you've been contacted by someone you don't know, who believes that you have initiated the conversation.

By: Twinge

Twinge — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 08:52:19 +0000

Note 1) Messages are often filtered. Shoe means screen name. Other common things like 'LiveJournal' are occasionally filtered too.

Note 2) Dobernala is the name for a more hostile series of bots. They were recently impersonating the fish bots – if they started with an especially offensive message and you couldn't opt out, chances are it was Dobernala.

Note 3) I'm a bit disappointed in the excitement over the opt out possibility, but I suppose the people opting out wouldn't be the fun ones to talk with anyway =)

By: jimmie

jimmie — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 20:30:30 +0000

oh this was great. at first i responded nicely to the person but then they were rude back. but then when i looked it up i realized what happened and told the person and they thought it was funny also. i IMed the person of the same name as me and they apparently knew about it as well. this is great! if they came up with a better intial IM from the bot to spark something interesting i could imagine to be something more positive.

By: Guide to World Domination — Thank You For Commenting

Guide to World Domination — Thank You For Commenting — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 11:30:48 +0000

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