bot - Short for robot, a computer program that runs automatically.- source
Dont let the simple definition mislead you.If there is one under-rated area of application and research in our online lives,it is that of a bot.What you could say has resurfaaced off late as a useful feature of IRC servers and clients ,which allowed to script customand automatic responses to activites on the IRC channel.Nowadays we see bots from games,to messenger plugins,to virtual pets and personcal assistants ..so and so forth ,infact now there are a wide range of areas that have been slowly yet steadily beeing crept with man made bots.
spiders,wanderers, and worms. Cancelbots, Lazarus, Automoose. Chatterbots, softbots, userbots,taskbots, knowbots, mailbots. MrBot and MrsBot. Warbots, clonebots, floodbots, annoybots, hackbots, and Vladbots. Gaybots, gossipbots, gamebots. Skeleton bots, spybots, and sloth bots. Xbots, meta-bots.eggdrop bots - all just some of the various avtars imposed depending on the usage .
"The Web welcomes all bots. Chatterbots like Eliza and Julia have taken up residence on Web pages. IRCbots, frozen in suspended animation, are accessible in Web-based archives of code. Gamebots lurk, waiting to do battle, in online gaming networks interwoven with the Web. The Web, irresistibly connecting and binding together all the communities of cyberspace – MUDs and bulletin boards and chat rooms – is the reconvergent Pangaea, the mother continent where all bots someday will roam. "(Leonard, 1997, p.152).http://www.accesswave.ca/~hgunn/special/papers/bots/review.htmlhttp://www.accesswave.ca/~hgunn/special/papers/bots/review.html
Now Thers no point in contemplating as to when they're gonna take over the world,but heres some info that could really throw light onto the dark and often ignored world of bots.