6 ms·

Horse_ebooks Is Human After All

100 points by dominicgs 13y ago

caprock 13y ago
For those interested, here's some background on the pronunciation book side of the story: http://77days.wikia.com/wiki/Pronunciation_Book_Conspiracy_Wiki http://77days.wikia.com/wiki/Pronunciation_Book_Conspiracy_W...
- 650REDHAIR 13y ago
  Thank you, this was an interesting read. These guys are good and definitely know their audience.
kylelibra 13y ago
To be totally honest, it wasn't until I saw the pronunciation guide that I realized it might be called "horsey books" instead.
- seiji 13y ago
  I used to work with people who called it horsey books. I thought they were morons for doing that. Turns out they were morons for completely different reasons now?
StavrosK 13y ago
So this was an account that posted random Tweets, and it somehow has 200,000 followers? Why? What am I missing?
- seiji 13y ago
  Internet novelty fad syndrome growth by exponential ego expansion? "I've found this thing I think is cool! I want other people to like me, so I'll tell them about it. If they like it, they'll thank me for showing it to them and my life will have meaning!"
- untog 13y ago
  Because it was funny, and it was interesting to see what an entirely random algorithm would turn up. Of course, it wasn't an algorithm but it's not like the people following knew that.
  - eli 13y ago
    According to Gawker, the current owners purchased the account from a Russian spammer in 2011. Before that it presumably was indeed an algorithm for promoting crappy ebooks and not an art project.
    - untog 13y ago
      Yes, I think it's been known for some time that it "changed" in 2011 (it stopped being posted "from web", IIRC). Still, an interesting story.
  - spinchange 13y ago
    Agreed. Another interesting thing I've seen some creative users do is RT various selected @horse_ebooks tweets in succession to make complete statements or sort-of "@horse_ebooks poems" When you saw one done well, it was pretty clever/funny. I think a lot of people always suspected it was a person(s), but it was still interesting in the sense of wondering and imagining a person emulating a bot emulating a person.
- steveklabnik 13y ago
  My favorite tweet: > Unfortunately, as you already know, people. You might also just not get it. Everyone's tastes are different.
seiji 13y ago
Gawker has a writeup of the event at http://gawker.com/horse_ebooks-has-been-a-buzzfeed-employee-since-2011-1377183209 http://gawker.com/horse_ebooks-has-been-a-buzzfeed-employee-... The exhibit is three people sitting at a table answering phones (specifically not interacting with the gallery) along with formalistic artistic ambiance. Sidenote: You've got to give them credit. This has been their endgame for years.
abecedarius 13y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter was another case like that (apparently; I haven't followed horse_ebooks but I was gulled by Racter at the time: I found it hard to believe but I wasn't cynical enough to disbelieve it).
eli 13y ago
A gallery installation where you can watch the artists read tweets to callers on the phone seems like an odd and unimaginative way to end it, but maybe I just don't get it.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
sk5t 13y ago
Horse_ebooks, meet Pet Rock. Pet Rock, Horse_ebooks.
sambeau 13y ago
Am I alone in being slightly disappointed to discover that Horse_ebooks is not a robot? I've had to conduct a mini-self analysis on this news, as I find myself disappointed. Why? All I can come up with is that I found joy in the befuddlement caused by my brain trying to make sense of the non-sensicle almost-marketing speak. The fact that it was (supposedly) accidental somehow added to the joy. But I can't think of a good reason why. Was it that I thought some spammer was wasting clock-cycles making me laugh rather than selling me viagra? It reminded me of Steven Frank's "Spamusement!" (which I also found very funny back in the days of email.) http://spamusement.com http://spamusement.com And Panic's love of Horse_ebooks is where I first learned of it. EDIT: I've just been back to spamusement.com and, yes, it is still really funny. DO NOT start looking unless you have half an hour to waste!
- ritchiea 13y ago
  I'm relieved. It never occurred to me that horse_ebooks was a spam bot until I started reading other people stating with certainty that it is a spambot. It always struck me as a human posing as a spambot because it was too clever and poetic. It also surprises me that so many people think we're more likely to encounter a legitimately clever spam bot than a clever human impersonating a spambot.
  - prehkugler 13y ago
    I agree. The phrases consistently end in a way that is never completely resolved. See: "In less than three weeks you can be looking at things differently, more creatively, if you" "Why many people achieve very little despite spending most of their time" "The interviews can be shorter since you would have many"
  - sambeau 13y ago
    I only ever saw retweeted or starred tweets from it (as I quit direct twitter a while back, deciding instead to view it only through Stellar). I had assumed that what I saw was a tiny proportion of tweets — those that were funny and/or poetic. If I'd know they all were than I'm sure I would have never thought it was a bot.
  - 13y ago
bcjordan 13y ago
What I'm still wondering... was Horse_ebooks was linking to completely unaffiliated spammy content, or did they build an entire constellation of shitty websites? And, most importantly, who actually wrote this visitor-triggered cron job script[1][2]? [1] http://quotestatusjoke.com/twitter/tw.php http://quotestatusjoke.com/twitter/tw.php [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6171355 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6171355 EDIT: A ha! It appears they purchased Horse_ebooks from an actual Russian web developer in 2011 (who ostensibly actually built quotestatusjoke.com), and linked to legitimate crappy third party self-help ebook websites.
commanda 13y ago
@Horse_ebooks is (was?) an excellent piece of performance art. I think the modern audience still has a sense of wonderment when it comes to the computer-generated (as though it is the computer itself doing the generating and not really the programmer who wrote the algorithm). People were willing to believe that "computers" were at the point where they could create consistently hilarious phrases, and are disappointed (and even outraged) today when they find that we're not there yet. The artists have imparted the audience with a sense of disillusionment. Perhaps we'll see more art in this style in the future, although part of (or all of) the magic seems to be in the audience's belief that there was no human intelligence behind the content, so perhaps this isn't duplicatable. If only I could set this experience to a Kraftwerk soundtrack, and maybe play Bladerunner on a screen in the corner. I can't wait to see what this group comes up with next!
- guspe 13y ago
  The NY Times has been running an automated haiku experiment for some time now. I think it has a lot to do with your comment. Check this: haiku.nytimes.com
  - commanda 13y ago
    Ha! That's great, thanks! I had a feeling Jacob Harris was behind that, as he was also behind @nytimes_ebooks.
mccr8 13y ago
Horse_ebooks was the inspiration for other novelty Twitter accounts such as horse_js ( https://twitter.com/horse_js https://twitter.com/horse_js ) which is somebody taking quotes related to JS out of context, and horse_esdiscuss.
- prehkugler 13y ago
  As an iOS developer, I always enjoy @Horse_iOS.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
adelevie 13y ago
If anyone is interested in running an _ebooks account of their own, Jacob Harris of the New York Times wrote a Ruby library called iron_ebooks[1] which does just that. Using iron_ebooks, Harris has two accounts: @harrisj_ebooks, which uses his main twitter handle (@harrisj) as an input, and @harrisj_ebooks2 which uses @harrisj_ebooks as its input. The generated tweets have actually been pretty funny and well done. Also, iron_ebooks uses Iron.io, so you get all the fun of an _ebooks account with all the "serverless" greatness of IronWorker. [1] https://github.com/harrisj/iron_ebooks https://github.com/harrisj/iron_ebooks
api 13y ago
My favorite mystery blog: http://moneyistheway.blogspot.com/ http://moneyistheway.blogspot.com/ He's the world's foremost financial shaman. The blog ranges from the bizarre to the illucid. Another awesome one along a slightly different genre line: http://www.johntitor.com/ http://www.johntitor.com/
- unimpressive 13y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4697400 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4697400 You're in for a treat.
nemo1618 13y ago
Be sure to drink your Ovaltine!

100 points by dominicgs 13y ago

For those interested, here's some background on the pronunciation book side of the story: http://77days.wikia.com/wiki/Pronunciation_Book_Conspiracy_Wiki http://77days.wikia.com/wiki/Pronunciation_Book_Conspiracy_W...

650REDHAIR 13y ago
Thank you, this was an interesting read. These guys are good and definitely know their audience.

kylelibra 13y ago

To be totally honest, it wasn't until I saw the pronunciation guide that I realized it might be called "horsey books" instead.

seiji 13y ago
I used to work with people who called it horsey books. I thought they were morons for doing that. Turns out they were morons for completely different reasons now?

StavrosK 13y ago

So this was an account that posted random Tweets, and it somehow has 200,000 followers? Why? What am I missing?

seiji 13y ago
Internet novelty fad syndrome growth by exponential ego expansion? "I've found this thing I think is cool! I want other people to like me, so I'll tell them about it. If they like it, they'll thank me for showing it to them and my life will have meaning!"
untog 13y ago
Because it was funny, and it was interesting to see what an entirely random algorithm would turn up. Of course, it wasn't an algorithm but it's not like the people following knew that.
- eli 13y ago
  According to Gawker, the current owners purchased the account from a Russian spammer in 2011. Before that it presumably was indeed an algorithm for promoting crappy ebooks and not an art project.
  - untog 13y ago
    Yes, I think it's been known for some time that it "changed" in 2011 (it stopped being posted "from web", IIRC). Still, an interesting story.
- spinchange 13y ago
  Agreed. Another interesting thing I've seen some creative users do is RT various selected @horse_ebooks tweets in succession to make complete statements or sort-of "@horse_ebooks poems" When you saw one done well, it was pretty clever/funny. I think a lot of people always suspected it was a person(s), but it was still interesting in the sense of wondering and imagining a person emulating a bot emulating a person.
steveklabnik 13y ago
My favorite tweet: > Unfortunately, as you already know, people. You might also just not get it. Everyone's tastes are different.

seiji 13y ago

Gawker has a writeup of the event at http://gawker.com/horse_ebooks-has-been-a-buzzfeed-employee-since-2011-1377183209 http://gawker.com/horse_ebooks-has-been-a-buzzfeed-employee-... The exhibit is three people sitting at a table answering phones (specifically not interacting with the gallery) along with formalistic artistic ambiance. Sidenote: You've got to give them credit. This has been their endgame for years.

abecedarius 13y ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter was another case like that (apparently; I haven't followed horse_ebooks but I was gulled by Racter at the time: I found it hard to believe but I wasn't cynical enough to disbelieve it).

eli 13y ago

A gallery installation where you can watch the artists read tweets to callers on the phone seems like an odd and unimaginative way to end it, but maybe I just don't get it.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

sk5t 13y ago

Horse_ebooks, meet Pet Rock. Pet Rock, Horse_ebooks.

sambeau 13y ago

Am I alone in being slightly disappointed to discover that Horse_ebooks is not a robot? I've had to conduct a mini-self analysis on this news, as I find myself disappointed. Why? All I can come up with is that I found joy in the befuddlement caused by my brain trying to make sense of the non-sensicle almost-marketing speak. The fact that it was (supposedly) accidental somehow added to the joy. But I can't think of a good reason why. Was it that I thought some spammer was wasting clock-cycles making me laugh rather than selling me viagra? It reminded me of Steven Frank's "Spamusement!" (which I also found very funny back in the days of email.) http://spamusement.com http://spamusement.com And Panic's love of Horse_ebooks is where I first learned of it. EDIT: I've just been back to spamusement.com and, yes, it is still really funny. DO NOT start looking unless you have half an hour to waste!

ritchiea 13y ago
I'm relieved. It never occurred to me that horse_ebooks was a spam bot until I started reading other people stating with certainty that it is a spambot. It always struck me as a human posing as a spambot because it was too clever and poetic. It also surprises me that so many people think we're more likely to encounter a legitimately clever spam bot than a clever human impersonating a spambot.
- prehkugler 13y ago
  I agree. The phrases consistently end in a way that is never completely resolved. See: "In less than three weeks you can be looking at things differently, more creatively, if you" "Why many people achieve very little despite spending most of their time" "The interviews can be shorter since you would have many"
- sambeau 13y ago
  I only ever saw retweeted or starred tweets from it (as I quit direct twitter a while back, deciding instead to view it only through Stellar). I had assumed that what I saw was a tiny proportion of tweets — those that were funny and/or poetic. If I'd know they all were than I'm sure I would have never thought it was a bot.
- 13y ago

bcjordan 13y ago

What I'm still wondering... was Horse_ebooks was linking to completely unaffiliated spammy content, or did they build an entire constellation of shitty websites? And, most importantly, who actually wrote this visitor-triggered cron job script[1][2]? [1] http://quotestatusjoke.com/twitter/tw.php http://quotestatusjoke.com/twitter/tw.php [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6171355 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6171355 EDIT: A ha! It appears they purchased Horse_ebooks from an actual Russian web developer in 2011 (who ostensibly actually built quotestatusjoke.com), and linked to legitimate crappy third party self-help ebook websites.

commanda 13y ago

@Horse_ebooks is (was?) an excellent piece of performance art. I think the modern audience still has a sense of wonderment when it comes to the computer-generated (as though it is the computer itself doing the generating and not really the programmer who wrote the algorithm). People were willing to believe that "computers" were at the point where they could create consistently hilarious phrases, and are disappointed (and even outraged) today when they find that we're not there yet. The artists have imparted the audience with a sense of disillusionment. Perhaps we'll see more art in this style in the future, although part of (or all of) the magic seems to be in the audience's belief that there was no human intelligence behind the content, so perhaps this isn't duplicatable. If only I could set this experience to a Kraftwerk soundtrack, and maybe play Bladerunner on a screen in the corner. I can't wait to see what this group comes up with next!

guspe 13y ago
The NY Times has been running an automated haiku experiment for some time now. I think it has a lot to do with your comment. Check this: haiku.nytimes.com
- commanda 13y ago
  Ha! That's great, thanks! I had a feeling Jacob Harris was behind that, as he was also behind @nytimes_ebooks.

mccr8 13y ago

Horse_ebooks was the inspiration for other novelty Twitter accounts such as horse_js ( https://twitter.com/horse_js https://twitter.com/horse_js ) which is somebody taking quotes related to JS out of context, and horse_esdiscuss.

prehkugler 13y ago
As an iOS developer, I always enjoy @Horse_iOS.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

adelevie 13y ago

If anyone is interested in running an _ebooks account of their own, Jacob Harris of the New York Times wrote a Ruby library called iron_ebooks[1] which does just that. Using iron_ebooks, Harris has two accounts: @harrisj_ebooks, which uses his main twitter handle (@harrisj) as an input, and @harrisj_ebooks2 which uses @harrisj_ebooks as its input. The generated tweets have actually been pretty funny and well done. Also, iron_ebooks uses Iron.io, so you get all the fun of an _ebooks account with all the "serverless" greatness of IronWorker. [1] https://github.com/harrisj/iron_ebooks https://github.com/harrisj/iron_ebooks

api 13y ago

My favorite mystery blog: http://moneyistheway.blogspot.com/ http://moneyistheway.blogspot.com/ He's the world's foremost financial shaman. The blog ranges from the bizarre to the illucid. Another awesome one along a slightly different genre line: http://www.johntitor.com/ http://www.johntitor.com/

unimpressive 13y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4697400 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4697400 You're in for a treat.

nemo1618 13y ago

Be sure to drink your Ovaltine!