Daisy, an AI granny wasting scammers' time

This reminds me of “shadow banning” - instead of letting the misbehaving user know they’ve been banned, and let them find a way around it, you make them believe they’re not banned and let them waste their time interacting with the system (without actually interacting with others), this makes them spend less time on actual misuse and it makes the penalty for it more expensive. Good strategy. Cruel too.

So I don’t think that this is just entertaining PR, I can see why it’s better than simply banning the scammers. Still a question of cost though.

No doubt it has been misused at some point or another, but shadow banning in the context of online communities is generally a last-resort defense against the very worst and most prolific trolls. Not someone who accidentally breaks forum etiquette one time.

A person who is shadow banned generally continues their antisocial behavior in the face of multiple warnings and reprimands. I don't see it as cruel. I see it as defending the community against those who get pleasure out of trying to wreck it. It's effective because the bannee is generally too dim to realize what has happened to them until they get bored and go away.

The next step up is "heaven banning":

https://x.com/nearcyan/status/1532076277947330561

Is it effective at all though?

It's very easy to check if your posts are available by browsing them anonymously or under a second account.

You're completely right! Genius comment.

That makes no sense. Why would you spend more money and electricity to keep trolls around longer?

The longer they spend in heaven, the less they spend trolling. I’m not saying it’s worth the cost, but it’s something to consider.

It keeps the engagement metrics up without poisoning the discourse.

In regular communities, maybe, but that kind of abuse is rampant on platforms : I was shadowbanned on Reddit as a new user, and still regularly get shadowbanned in YouTube comments (seemingly if I dare to post more than one comment, or if I dare to add a link, including a timelink to the very video!)