« I think everybody should like everybody » − Andy Warhol
The [loveMachine] is a program (or as I prefer to call it, a bot) that will automatically log into my Facebook account and repetitively click the “like” buttons on every possible content shown in the home stream.
The “like” feature is what we know Facebook for. It’s a symbol of it. It might be what describes it the most. It is its own metaphor. It is also used by everyone and everybody likes to have a “like” on their post. There is no “dislike”.
A “like” is not a comment (in the Facebook terminology). Though it can have different meanings, such as: “I read”, “I saw”, “I agree”, “I’m watching you”, “I’m here”, “I wish”, “I buy”, “thank you”,…
Facebook uses this feature to profile their users and have them engage with advertisers or any kind of merchants.
Because I have so many fb_friends I want to please and so little time, I’ve decided to automate the action of “liking”. So Facebook will have to deal with it (whatever that means) and my fb_friends will be comforted that what they do is right. And I couldn’t wish them better.
The [loveMachine] has gone through multiple rewrites and maintenance, constantly fighting its way aigainst Facebook’s anti-abuse tools. The final code was in Javascript using CasperJs. The code is free software and shared on Github.
The [loveMachine] is a piece of software art that performs on social networks
This project was inspired by (and a response to) moddr_, the creators of Web2.0 suicide machine.
The project was initiated around 2012 and ran constantly for a whole year between 2014 and 2015.
Publications, observations and derived objects are posted on the blog: p.xuv.be and a dedicated website: http://lovemachine.cc
