Time to start a Twitter war of the bots?
Most Twitter users try to ignore messages from robot accounts. But maybe we should be putting bots to work for a more noble cause—democracy, writes the University of Washington’s Philip N. Howard
“One estimate holds that 75 percent of all Twitter traffic is generated by the most active users—about 5 percent of Twitter accounts.One-third of those active users are believed to be machine bots tweeting more than 150 times a day,” he writes for Slate: Most of these crafty bots generate inane commentary and try to sell stuff, but some are given political tasks. For example, pro-Chinese bots have clogged Twitter conversations about the conflict in Tibet. In Mexico’s recent presidential election, the political parties played with campaign bots on Twitter. … Furthermore, the Chinese, Iranian, Russian, and Venezuelan governments employ their own social media experts and pay small amounts of money to large numbers of people (“50 cent armies”) to generate pro-government messages, if inefficiently.
During the Cold War, Western diplomats smuggled fax machines to the democracy advocates behind the Iron Curtain. For a while now, we’ve been sending satellite phones to activists who need help organizing supporters. But we aren’t yet taking advantage of Twitter robots. Let’s put those tools to work promoting democratic values, expanding the news diets of people in other countries, and critiquing tough dictators.
[ed note:translation ..he wants to use twitter bots to target governments who dont succum to zionist control and dominion..instead of using real people and real tweets,he prefers using machine bots to spread lies,disinfo,against anti imperialist countries...hasbara bot armies to spread pro democracy propaganda anyone?
Inevitably, this will result in some sort of Twitter war of the robots, some promoting democracy, some decrying it. I suppose anti-democracy robots can target their own citizens at home or abroad, but they would probably have little impact on the people living in democracies. Sure, maybe this will clog up Twitter a bit. But we need a strategic response to 50-cent armies and the existing authoritarian bots.

[ed notes:there is no such thing as 50 cent bot armies employed by gov's he mentions,its all b.s. !only 50 cent bot armies around,are the ones from us state dept,zionist organizations,and of course israhell!!!In case you though he wasnt a fraud.this should convince you immediatly...he promotes the us state dept (controlled by zionists)subversive ''democratization techniques''...  The State Department has had an impressive overhaul since 2008, bringing in talent with fresh credentials and a new literacy for how statecraft needs to be conducted in a digital world. The State Department has a nascent strategy to encourage democratic movements by actively supporting civil society and for actively engaging social networks through digital media. This has been a forward thinking, innovative approach to statecraft.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/philip-n-howard/state-department-arab-spring_b_820458.html

[ed notes:so while giving impression he stands for freedom of expression thru internet,the reality is, hes actually an advocate for the zionist subversion of mena region thru the new propaganda channels at the disposal of the neocolonial agencies he favours and their agendas..his book is selected reading material on cia front national endowment for democracy btw.. http://www.ned.org/node/1551

Philip N. Howard
Professor and Director of Project on Information Technology and Political Islam

RTWT Philip N. Howard is professor of communication, information, and international studies at the University of Washington. Currently, he is a fellow at Princeton University’s Center for Information Technology Policy. He tweets from @pnhoward.
[ed note:and if that doesnt convince you above,this next should ...the pro war ''us institute of peace(WAR)''has given him a nice little grant!!! 
Recent Grant Program Award Recipients. UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON, Seattle, WA (Project Director(s): Philip N. Howard): This project will construct the first large-N event database of incidents in which digital media has been used for civic engagement, non-violent conflict, and political activism. A successful pilot was undertaken last year, and the current focus of work is to complete the coding and build online analysis and visualization tools. In the final phase, the project team will launch a public release of both raw data and key findings for use by foreign policy analysts, journalists, and the interested public. This initiative seeks to raise the level of foreign policy expertise in the evolving dynamics of international relations in a digital era. Specifically, this work will address the need for broad perspective and cross-case comparison of how digital media has had an impact on non-violent outcomes. $82,442
[ed note;who is the us institute of peace(WAR)?lol  MUST READ!!! REGIME CHANGE INC. (FROM PLAN B TO C)ZIONIST,NEOCONS,GLOBALISTS AT ''U.S.I.P.'' DICUSS ''SYRIA THE DAY AFTER'' (REGIME CHANGE) http://thenakedfacts.blogspot.com/2012/10/regime-change-inc.html
THE NAKED FACTS REPORT- “US-Mideast Diplomac... Older Post - THENAKEDFACTS   Report on the US Institute of Peace  "Peace Spooks"  Operation Peace Institute