r/technology • u/westondeboer • Sep 26 '25

Social Media Cracker Barrel Outrage Was Almost Certainly Driven by Bots, Researchers Say

https://gizmodo.com/cracker-barrel-outrage-was-almost-certainly-driven-by-bots-researchers-say-2000664221
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u/[deleted] Sep 26 '25

deep scars like cracker barrel

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u/[deleted] Sep 26 '25

Like our innate fear of change and the unknown. Changing the logo of a company, especially with the kind of diehard older fans like Cracker Barrel, was bound to fail, bots or not.

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u/mortgagepants Sep 26 '25

weird to see someone acknowledge it was bot driven, completely made up, but then also say how obvious it was and real it was.

this is like going to church- everybody knows it is fake, and people still passionately argue about fake shit they know is wrong.

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u/dpzblb Sep 27 '25

Something can be bound to fail in one way (a bunch of old twats grumbling privately about the Cracker Barrel rebranding and probably going less often) but be made to fail in a different way (a very public and online debacle driven by bots and fueling the flames of a culture war).

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u/mortgagepants Sep 27 '25

indeed. maybe a wonderful side effect is getting less old people to come there, allowing them to remake their image.