CAPTCHAs and sign‑up quizzes annoy real people and barely slow down determined bots. As the fediverse grows, we need smarter, more humane defences, ones that don’t push away genuine newcomers. What creative, non‑intrusive ideas do you have? Trust‑based vouching, proof‑of‑humanity protocols, behavioural signals… what feels both effective and aligned with the open social web? I’m building a social media platform and I’d love to hear your thoughts on this topic.
Most low-cost and primitive bots. It costs nothing for ChatGPT to pretend to be a human in text. Are you sure they aren’t still there, lurking? Look up survivor bias.
I remember encountering my first request to write an essay in order to join an instance. I was flabbergasted and chose an instance without this madness and it appeared this instance was shadowbanned by major ones. Was close to giving up on Fediverse at this point.
They are still quite evident in the way they construct their messages, and of course any em-dash usage is a big giveaway.
Someday they’ll likely be able to answer those questions more convincingly, but right now it works for the most part.
Em dashes are the correct way to type—substituting them with hyphens is a typographical mistake.
Also, look up Human or Not game.