Within the study of disinformation and media manipulation, bots typically refer to social media accounts that are automated, sometimes deployed for deceptive purposes, such as to artificially amplify a message, game a trending or recommendation algorithm, or inflate an account's engagement metrics. These accounts are typically centrally controlled or in coordination with each other. The term 'bot' is also used as a pejorative to discredit political opponents online. Bots are a Casebook value under the "Tactics" variable in the code book.
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The Technology and Social Change Project was active from 2019-2023. The Media Manipulation Casebook was a major publication of the TaSC project, and will remain fully accessible at this URL going forward, but will no longer be actively updated.
