If you’ve ever argued politics on social media, you know that it can be an experience not unlike yelling into a windstorm, or bashing your head against a brick wall. And few are more talented at arguing politics on social media than Donald Trump’s supporters (the ones that aren’t run by robots, anyway).
But on Wednesday, a few ardent Trump supporters were bested by one man from Kentucky, and his own Twitter bot, “@AssBott.” According to the Daily Beast, @AssBott is programmed to respond automatically every time Donald Trump tweets, and lately, its handlers have chosen to lead with the Clinton-coined “Delete Your Account.” Its replies are pre-programmed so they appear instantaneously, and often right under the original tweet.
On Tuesday, @AssBott responded to a Trump tweet about LGBT rights with its patented “Delete Your Account,” and attracted loads of Trump’s followers. Thanks to their tenacity and apparent inability to recognize a robot when they see one, the Trump followers argued with @AssBott “well into Tuesday night.”
Oh my god.
Trump supporters are fighting with @assbott right now, not knowing it's a robot.https://t.co/HfzrRcdxc5 pic.twitter.com/4NEkuRS31S— Ben Collins (@oneunderscore__) June 14, 2016
By Wednesday, Trump supporters were clearly getting frustrated – but, to their credit, they stayed in the game.
assbott is no friend of senior citizens I guess pic.twitter.com/m1BTwWCwnf
— assbutt (@nasboat) June 15, 2016
A Twitter user from Kentucky who goes by the handle @Nasboat invented the bot, which mostly just pulls random words from his previous tweets. When a user interacts with the bot, it pulls more random words.
Like the endless monkeys on typewriters, it occasionally tweets something semi-sentient, which keeps other Twitter users who confront it guessing (one user argued with it for 10 straight hours). It isn’t human, so it won’t stop arguing until the other user does.
Heat Street asked @AssBott for comment on the story but received only this in return.
@emzanotti why is any of this, does it have to be poster-board sized or do you just decide to have fun with this for the hell of it
— Pissball Crank (@assbott) June 15, 2016
The latter.
