Here comes our princess Mila, unlike these bots she has public profile, but appears along them.
Joined Sep 12, '18 just few days before the first group of bots. Though, in her own words, she “does not speak English very well” and “not from Memrise team”, but speaks almost fluently on this forum and all the time she explains how Memrise works.
I have never heard anything from anyone in the team about the creation of bots for the forums, and it certainly is not something that we would EVER countenance.
However a quick look at the profiles you post does look like it warrants investigation. I will check this out and we’ll get back to you.
I don’t know why you said I’m a bot. I only speak Brazilian Portuguese. And I learned some English at school. And I am only studying Japanese in Memrise.
I say I don’t speak English well, but I use google translator. I know Japanese courses well because I’ve been taking almost all of them and have read the forum comments in Japanese from the beginning.
As for discussions about Memrise news, it’s hard for me to comment, because I’ve only been there for 2 years and I don’t know what Memrise was like in the beginning. And many of the discussions, I don’t know. And it’s hard to always use the translator, because I have to stop studying Japanese courses.
I don’t know the Memrise Team either. But I do send discussions of issues I encounter on the Forum to top moderators like MemriseSupport and Ale_c, especially when I encounter bots on the Forum.
I thought it was unethical to raise suspicion that someone is a bot in public. Every time I suspected a person, I sent a private DM to MemriseSupport or Ale_c.
If you read them all, you will find the links I found, from old Japanese courses. I thought I was helping people by providing the links instead of telling her to read 1166 threads.
I would always DM to MemriseMatty about bots, and he would reply within 15 days at most. 3 month passed, and I saw a person commenting on the forum that the “leaders” are very uninformed, and don’t notice when a Memrise member leaves. And he named Lien and lastly MemriseMatty. Then I looked at his profile, and it had been many months since he entered the Forum. About Joshua, when I went to send a DM, I always send it through his profile, it was written on his profile and next to the icon.
This may be because I volunteer at a Japanese children’s school. I don’t know if you know that Brazil has the largest community of Japanese immigrants. And during the pandemic, my country released Wi-Fi to all people who are close to public buildings. I taught the children’s mothers about Memrise, but recommended that they leave the profile private to protect them. Some of these profiles may be from these kids. I just don’t know which profile would be which person, because I didn’t get a list of the profile names. If they’re the ones giving me the like, I think it’s cute
I read all the comments that are posted on the Forum. And over time, I’ve been reading all the old ones, from the beginning of the Forum. At first I was quite addicted to the Forum. It even hindered my Japanese studies, because I wasted a lot of time answering. I stopped responding a bit when I had surgery, but now I’m recovering and slowly coming back. Now I’m trying not to respond so much, but I keep reading everything…
I always look at the “about” page too. I don’t know if it’s up to date, but today the “about” page looks like this:
Deep knowledge is not necessary. Just enter the profile and click on preferences. I don’t know if they are all connected, but it’s possible that some are. I didn’t know that it was forbidden for teachers (voluntary) to promote Memrise in schools.
Milami is not a bot, I suppose she’s a person behind this sockpuppet farm (a princess of the bots). I can’t say this for sure, it’s my assumption.
By itself the fact that they like posts by other users does not prove or disprove anything. I’m talking about several facts, which are forming the whole picture. Their likes to others might be an imitation of real users.
My suspicions, among many things, are based on the fact that they don’t like critical posts about Memrise, even much liked by other users.
You could look into Android bugs thread and see that there’s no comments from them, but they like posts by Memrise staffers every time. It was one of the things which raised my suspicions.
funny you’d say that. The princess was one the reasons I’ve quit visiting the fora for some 3 years ago - which I suspect was the very purpose of her behaviour. She’s appeared not two years ago, i think she came a bit earlier, with the occasion of one of the previous big upsets around here. She started really snarling at users disagreeing with this and that, got to be a “forum leader” in a matter of days and started censoring and disciplining around, and sending me impolite PMs containing barely veiled insults and “menaces”, probably google translated … I was amazed at the level of aggressiveness and self-assurance of her behaviour and i was wondering myself if the memrise team took sort of measures against the non-compliant users.
Half an hour ago two of your bots appeared on the main page with deleted comments. You have admin’s privileges to unscreen them, so they disappeared from the page again. It’s too much for a teacher from Brazil.
I did not understand. As a leader I can delete posts that are wrong. I have already asked the official course teacher that I volunteer to ask her students to leave the forum. It may take a few days. But, I saw a post that came up because the person deleted it and I removed it from the list. The main proof that I don’t belong to the Memrise company is that I don’t know English very well. Memrise wouldn’t hire people who don’t speak correctly. I don’t know why you insist on saying that I work for Memrise. I’m a volunteer like many here.
Just because you’re upset with Memrise, you want to make an inquisition with me. I don’t know why you hate me so much. If I hurt you, please forgive me. I had no such intention.
As I mentioned above, I just wanted to help the Forum and I read and worked tirelessly, because I became addicted to the Forum. But it looks like I hurt some people. I apologize to these people.
I also mentioned that I had surgery and I’m recovering. I came back to the Forum very happy to help. But you made me cry all day because what saddens me the most are people who judge me and try to defame me.
I’m continuing to look in to this.to repeat what I said before: I have never heard of anyone at Memrise being involved in writing a bot for the forums. I am looking in to this.
If Milamy can shed any further light, it would be much appreciated!
… I was amazed at the level of aggressiveness and self-assurance of her behaviour and i was wondering myself if the memrise team took sort of measures against the non-compliant users.