Followers?

by

“What on earth is going on?” – This question floats through our kitchen like a soap bubble. We were just about to crack open a bottle of our finest, because over 400 new followers in just one week! A record! Normally, it takes us months to achieve that.
Siri and Selma are immediately in agreement: “At last, our genius has been discovered.”
Dina, on the other hand, frowns. When Dina frowns, you’d better watch out.  “Hold on a moment,” she says. “So many new followers – but the likes are still stuck at 200 to 300. And the comments? Nothing out of the ordinary. Something’s not quite right here.”
Kb nods slowly and, as always, begins to piece together an explanatory model in his mind. “How can this be explained?” he mutters.
But this time he remains at a loss. A rare occurrence.
Selma has an initial idea: “It’s that ‘follow-unfollow strategy’. People follow you so you’ll follow them back – and then they’re gone in a flash.”
Kb looks sceptical. “But surely not in such numbers…?”

„Was ist denn nun los?“ – Diese Frage schwebt wie eine Seifenblase durch unsere Küche. Wir waren gerade dabei, eine Flasche unseres Besten zu köpfen, denn über 400 neue Follower in nur einer Woche! Rekord!
Früher hätten wir dafür Monate gebraucht. Siri und Selma sind sich sofort einig: „Endlich hat man unsere Genialität entdeckt.“
Dina hingegen runzelt ihre Stirn. Und wenn Dina die Stirn runzelt, sollte man vorsichtig sein. 
„Moment mal“, sagt sie. „So viele neue Follower – aber die Likes bleiben bei 200 bis 300. Und die Kommentare? Nichts Auffälliges. Da stimmt doch etwas nicht.“
Kb nickt langsam und beginnt, wie immer, gedanklich ein Erklärungsmodell zu basteln.
„Wie lässt sich das verstehen?“ murmelt er.
Doch diesmal bleibt er ratlos. Ein seltenes Ereignis.
Selma hat eine erste Idee: „Das ist diese ‘Follow-Unfollow-Strategie‘. Leute folgen dir, damit du zurückfolgst – und husch verschwinden sie wieder.“
Kb blickt skeptisch. „Aber doch nicht in dieser Menge…?“

What’s going on?

Then Siri stepps in, armed with her most powerful weapon: ChatGPT: “I’ve done some research,” she announces with a pause that was both slightly dramatic and coy. “They’re bots.”
Silence.
Bots, then. Digital shadow beings. They follow. They sometimes like posts. They exist – yet somehow they don’t.
“Bots,” says our clever Siri, “is short for ‘robot’, a term introduced by the Czech author Karel Čapek and derived from ‘robota’, which means forced labour.”
We imagine bots somewhere in the world busily clicking ‘Follow’, whilst we here in Norfolk drink our sparkling wine and consider ourselves literary geniuses.

Da trat Siri auf den Plan, ausgestattet mit ihrer mächtigsten Waffe: ChatGPT: „Ich habe recherchiert“, verkündete sie mit leicht dramatischer wie koketter Pause. „Das sind Bots.“
Stille.
Bots also. Digitale Schattenwesen. Sie folgen. Sie liken manchmal. Sie existieren – aber irgendwie auch nicht.
„Bots“, so unsere kluge Siri, „ist eine Abkürzung von Roboter, den Begriff den der tschechische Autor Karl Čapek einführte und der an ‚robota‘ angelehnt war, was Zwangsarbeit bedeutet.“
Wir stellten uns vor, wie irgendwo auf der Welt Bots fleißig auf „Follow“ klicken, während wir hier in Norfolk unseren Sekt trinken und uns für literarische Genies halten.

But why?

The big question remains: what’s the point?
And then it all gets deleted again during the regular digital clean-ups of the servers. But we don’t know for sure. And that is perhaps what is truly unsettling: you can appear very successful in the digital world without anything actually changing in reality.
In the end, we are back in our kitchen. With our books, our real readers – and a slightly tarnished illusion. Because perhaps it’s not the 400 new followers that matter, but our over 10,500 real ones who actually read, like, comment and get upset when we’re spouting nonsense.

Die große Frage bleibt: Wozu?
Und dann wird alles wieder bei den regelmäßig digitalen Aufräumaktionen der Server gelöscht. Aber genau wissen wir das nicht. Und das ist vielleicht das eigentlich Beunruhigende: Man kann in der digitalen Welt sehr erfolgreich erscheinen, ohne dass sich real irgendetwas verändert. 
Am Ende stehen wir wieder in unserer Küche. Mit unseren Büchern, unseren echten Lesern – und einer leicht angeschlagenen Illusion. Denn vielleicht sind nicht die 400 neuen Follower entscheidend, sondern unsere über 10500 echten, die wirklich lesen, liken, kommentieren und sich aufregen, wenn wir Quatsch erzählen. 

“What remains”

With warm regards from the cold sea

Mit lieben Grüßen vom kleinen Dorf am großen Meer

The Fab Four of Cley
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂



© text and illustrations, Hanne Siebers & Klausbernd Vollmar, Cley next the Sea, 2026

106 thoughts

  4. The only followers that really matter to me are the ones who engage regularly with my posts in the comments. This is the current total of followers on my blog, (according to WordPress) and not allowing for ’email-only’ followers.

    ‘Join 8,584 other subscribers’. If they were all genuine, I would have so many comments that I would need to employ a secretary to help me to reply to them. I currently get between 350-700 views a day, nowhere near 8,584. So if I have 500+ genuine followers who read my posts and sometimes leave a comment, that’s fine with me. Thanks for the lovely photos!

    Love from Beetley, Pete. X

    Liked by 5 people

    Reply

    • Dear Pete
      Thanks a lot to destroy unhealthy illusions.
      Actually, everyone tells me not to look at Likes and Followers. But shame on me, I do. But I’ll try again not to be influenced by these numbers.
      With love from the sunny coast
      Klausbernd xxx

      Liked by 3 people

  5. Join the club. I have no idea what these 1000s of bots get out of all this. But it’s very annoying. As far as I can tell though, they’re not actually DOING anything. By the way, I’m not a bot, but a regular and faithful follower!

    Liked by 4 people

    Reply

  6. The AI bots have discovered your blog! You should see where they originate from, probably China, like mine were last fall. I was getting 20k visitors a day. WordPress said it was AI bots crawling the web for “training” 😆 Your great blog will be good training for AI. Enjoy it while it lasts!

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  10. I assume most of my blog subscribers are bots since they never comment or ‘like’ anything, but I’m fine with that. My blog is for me to express my thoughts and creativity. Audience is optional. 🙂

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  12. Truthfully, I seldom check my followers list, KB. Usually, the only time I do is after I’ve read a post like yours today. My list, so far stays pretty static. I’m not marketing anything, so those numbers don’t mean a lot. As long as my faithful followers continue to read and comment on my posts, I’m happy with that. If I gain a few or lose a few over time, that would be normal.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  13. Well the AI bots have discovered my blog too. They are busy collecting content. They come during the night because they are thieves – just joking – because they are located in the US or in Hong Kong. Since they are around there are some referrals by ChatGPT or Perplexity but not many. I guess it cannot be prevented. But here it is again, the dead internet hypothesis. Its only 50 % bots by now but it may increase and then?

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  14. Uooooh – ich arbeite in einer Hasenklasse und bin daher selber sehr hasig unterwegs. Und das Foto von den Hasen? Ist einfach nur geeeniaaal!!!! 😍😍Unterliegt das deinem eigenen Copyright? Und wenn ja, darf ich es als Gruppensymbol-Bild für unseren Klassen-HasenChat benutzen?Das wäre wirklich toll, denn ein soooo schönes Hasenbild sah ich selten! :-/ LG Bea aka Mindsplint

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    • Liebe Bea

      Ganz herzlichen Dank für deinen freundlichen Kommentar.

      Für die Nutzung des Hasenbildes wird sich Hanne-Dina an dich wenden, die das copyright besitzt.

      Thank you
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

    • Liebe Bea,
      Vielen Dank für dein Lob, ich habe mich riesig gefreut! Ich LIEBE Hasen und würde gerne mehr erfahren über den Hasen-Chat.
      Sehr gerne darfst du das Bild benutzen.
      Sonnige Grüße Hanne 🐇🌊😎☀️🐇

      Liked by 2 people

    • Ach, das ist nichts Großes – wir kommunizieren mit den Eltern der Kinder unserer Hasenklasse über schoolfox und ich hätte es klasse gefunden, dieses Bild dort einzufügen. Es würde aber den Rahmen sprengen, da die Bilder in Miniatur angezeigt werden, lediglich um den Chat schnell zu erkennen – und dazu wäre dein Bild viel zu schade. Da die wunderschöne Wirkung in so einer 80×80 pixel Auflösung eh nicht rüber käme. Von daher vielen Dank für dein Angebot, aber es kommt leider nicht in Frage.
      Viele Grüße Bea

      Like

  15. Wenn Bots mit Hilfe unserer Blogs AI trainieren, sollten wir uns freuen, denn hier lernen sie wenigstens was Gescheites. Friedensliebe, respektvollen Umgang, Menschlichkeit … so gespickte AI befrage ich doch gern.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  17. Yes it’s very annoying isn’t it? I try to ignore the outlier days, knowing that it will pass. I follow my stats on Google Analytics and they know what’s happening better than WordPress, but still get fooled. You can still have the champagne. 😊 Maggie

    Liked by 5 people

    Reply

  20. Some might say: who cares? It’s just a blog. Of course, bots visit and follow. That’s the background noise of the internet.

    But I think small blogs like ours are canaries in the coal mine. If even at this level, half the traffic is machine-driven, it shows just how thoroughly the web has been transformed.

    It also makes me reflect on why I write in the first place. Am I writing for people? For myself? Or, strangely enough, for machines?

    There’s a paradox here: the bots will probably always be my most reliable readers. They never skip an update. They never get bored. They never unsubscribe. In some ways, they’re the most loyal audience I’ve ever had.

    Thanks for sharing, and have a good day 🙂 Aiva xx

    Liked by 4 people

    Reply

    • Hi Aiva

      We like your expression that those bots create ‘the background noise of the internet‘.

      The question is indeed for whom do we write? This is the basic question for every writer. And what does it mean that we write for Chinese robots f.e.?
      But we are naiv and still want to write for people. Well, not naiv maybe more nacisstic. We want to be acknowledge by people.

      Do we have to change our attitude? Shall we be proud that robots are interested in our posts?

      You made us think about a new psychology of communication.
      Thank you
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Like

  21. Dear Klausbernd! A very interesting post. I enjoyed both the humour and the thoughts behind it. I do wonder when numbers rise, but nothing else quite follows. I’ve come across something called the Dead Internet Theory, which suggests that a large portion of internet activity, sometimes said to be 50% or more, may be generated not by people, but by bots and automated systems. It isn’t a formal theory so much as a growing concern, but it does seem to echo what you are observing here.

    I find myself drawn to your closing thought. Those readers who return, who read, who respond, who engage in a real way. That feels like something entirely different. In the end, perhaps it is not the number that matters, but the presence behind it. And that, as you say, is very real. Sending much love and many hugs to our dear friends, The Fab Four of Cley. P.S. I LOVE the photography that accompanies your posts. Thank you Hanne!!!

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    • Dear Rebecca

      We believe in that Dead Internet Theory. Beginning in the 70s sociologists wrote that communication in the late capitalist society became more and more alienated. And this is now the extreme that we communicate with machines a lot of our time. Will that change our communication eventually? We are sure it will, as social media already changed our way of expressing ourselves.

      Of course, it already had changed the meaning of the word friend f.e.

      We are the last generation before these far-reaching changes.

      Oh dear, dear Rebecca, we are the oldies and are proud of our old ways of communication. We love our communication and communicating like we do is old fashioned and revolutionary at the same time.
      With love ❤ ❤
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Liked by 3 people

    • Dear Rebecca
      That’s our way to care, and we are proud of it. But I doubt it that it is the only way that makes sense. Or is stop making sense a new way of being?
      Love ❤
      Klausbernd 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

    • Post Scriptum

      In a way it’s different for Siri and Selma. As Bookfayries they stand nearer to the virtual robots and can understand them better. They are kind of between people and bots. But as they live with us for so many years, they are a bit like us.

      Liked by 1 person

  23. Over the last couple of weeks I’ve had a hugely unusual number of views (not followers) coming from New Bergen, New Jersey; they’re definitely caused by bots crawling the web “to learn” which also is unsettling. HAL 9000 anyone?

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  24. Yes, the bots are invading at an alarming rate. My views have soared, but no comments or Likes to go with them. Very irritating. The AI bots are stealing all kinds of creative content from

    artists, photographers and writers, without giving credit where credit is due.

    Liked by 5 people

    Reply

    • Dear Steve

      In a way it’s a representation for everything that multiplies in a fast way – like these bots.

      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Like

  27. Have recently read the same story a couple of times a week from all over the world – the same words appear afterwards – bots, China, stealing content ! In some cases it has been literally an almost frightening thousands a day – and, I don’t think they will ‘go away’! Best of luck coping!!!

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    • Dear Eha
      Thanks a lot. Well, the bots take over. We suppose, they are from China or Russia, but that’s just a guess.
      Well, we keep cool
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

  29. Just keep doing what you’re doing and ignore the stats (or bots or AI or whatever they are).

    To be honest, replying to everyone who comments is a task in itself, so when someone comments, I suggest you just press the LIKE button to let the person know you have read their comment.

    Back in the early blogging days, most followers expect a reply to their comment, but on a popular blog like yours, today, that takes up too much time.

    I’d rather you spent the time outdoors enjoying the Spring sunshine and Dina making lots of ‘bunny’ photos to share.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  31. Dear Fab Four of Cley, surprising 400 new followers within a week. My first idea was and phantasy is, perhaps your recent pirate story with lots of literature and those brilliant AI constructed pictures may have attracted numbers of serious readers. Drawn allong them obviously, professional and industrial data miners.

    Thank you for retrieving the term “bots” to the neologism “roboter” by the brothers Josef Capek (+ 1945 CC Bergen-Belsen) and Karel Capek (+ 1938 Prague). I almost can’t remember having read Karels “Der Krieg mit den Molchen”.

    So, I have got to reply, not only to click a like, to your pirate post …

    Yours, Bernd

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    • Thanks, dear Bernd 🙏 🙏
      Unfortunately this PP (Pirate Post) is just languishing.
      We like Čapek’s literature. We didn’t know that his brother died in the CC Bergen-Belsen just at the end of the war.
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

    • Dear Janis
      Years ago we got tons of spam reactions to our blog. We could finish that by being much more careful which comments we allow.
      Thanks & cheers
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Like

  35. I lost 30 subscribers on one day at the end of March. On account of your post and comments, I’ll assume it was WordPress cleaning out Bots. Until now, when I got “likes” from odd sites, I merely assumed it was businesses trying to divert my traffic to them. Never thought it was AI scouring my content. Interesting.

    My Pro Tip? Pop the champagne anyway. Cheer. Pour. Toast. Drink … repeat. There must be something in life worth celebrating.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  36. Dear friends, that sounds scary!
    I recently had a similar problem being flooded with emails, 100+ in a couple of hours. Bloody nightmare! It was no use blocking the sender or reporting it as spam because a bot was firing and always changing a part of the senders address. When I reported it a phishing it eventually cooled down and finally stopped.

    Fantastic photos, Hanne. What a tribute to the dog in “What remains”, love it and the story.

    Kram
    Annalena xx

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    • Dear Annalena
      We just have to do our own thing without worrying about what trolls are up to on our blog. That was the lesson we learned.
      Great that you like Hanne-Dina’s pictures.
      With lots of love
      KRAM xxxx
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Like

  38. 10500 echte Follower?! Dann müsstest Du das auch physisch spüren können. Das ist ja wie eine Herde, die auf deiner Seite herumtrampelt.

    Ich bin zwar kein Herdentier, hinterlasse aber gerne einen Remark hier zum Subject.

    Geisterwesen gab es ja schon immer hier. Wenn nicht Bots, so Leute, die sich als etwas ausgeben, das sie nicht sind. Oder schlimmer noch: Eine Person, die Automatismen in die Welt streut.

    Wieso sie so etwas machen? Weil es geht. Und irgendwann gehen sie, weil es nicht mehr Spaß macht. Haben aber einigen Leuten den Kopf verdreht, in endlosen Diskusionen.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    • Lieber Gerhard
      Wir haben seit ewigen Zeiten über 10.000 Followers. Das hat etwa 15 Jahre gedauert, seit denen wir bloggen. Und wir haben auch gelernt, Kommentare nicht zuzulassen.
      Aber, wie schon geschrieben, das Starren auf Likes und Followers ist nun beendet. Es hatte also sein Gutes.
      Danke
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

  39. Liebe FabFours,
    Setzt auf Klasse statt Masse, besonders in Zeiten, in denen Klicks wichtiger zu werden drohen als die Gedanken echter Menschen, die echte Kommentare schreiben, nicht klick -wisch-und-weg. Die Bots sind mit Vorsicht zu genießen, sie lügen und es ist gefährlich, mit ihrer Hilfe etwas zu recherchieren.
    Beim kongenialen Hasenbild, kam mir auch gleich in den Sinn gerauscht, dass ich ja eigentlich Hase heiße und von so gar nix weiß.🐰
    Viele liebe Grüße zu Euch
    aus dem frühlingsfunkelnden Teuto und eine Handvoll Feenstaub zu den beiden Famosfeenschwestern Siri und Selma✨
    von Amélie🌱🍀

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    • Liebe Amélie
      Wir haben unsere Lesson gelernt und sind nun geheilt davon, gebannt auf Likes und Followers zu starren.
      Danke und liebe Grüße
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

  40. Great point about bots. The only reason I can think of is for training purposes. I read a news article saying that people are programming bots to create social media accounts and interact with regular users. The world is changing fast. I’ve been blogging for almost three years, and it takes time to build connections, just like everything else in life. I don’t usually keep track of stats, but I just checked for the purpose of this comment, and I’m averaging about 95 comments, which is good in my book. I’m following around 1,000 people, and I do my best to read their latest posts every week. I only comment when something catches my attention, and I use the “like” as a way to let someone know I’ve read their post.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    • Hi Edward

      The question is if we have to learn to communicate with robots? The robots seems to learn how to communicate with us. One could say they want to understand us. We suppose the reason is to manipulate. It’s sheer exploitation. But maybe we personalise bots too much. It’s people to make them act like they do. People who hide behind bots.

      Anyway, we only comment when it is of our interest. But we have to admit there is quite lot in social media that interests us.

      Thanks & cheers
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

  41. Sometimes you just don’t know what’s going on. As long as the genuine people are still there the world is good. 🙂

    I am also genuine hehe. Your posts are always lovely, educational and with amazing pictures from Hanne and that is what counts.

    Thank you for being here and giving us joy.

    Warm wishes to the cold sea from Ute xx

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

    • Dear Ute

      Thank you sooo much for your kind comment 🙏

      We are far less often aware of what the matter is than we realise. But you know: “wer ewig strebend sich bemüht, den können wir erlösen” (those who strive ceaselessly, we can save) – at least that was Goethe’s belief.
      Also frohes Bemühen – obwohl es nicht immer mit Mühe verbunden sein muss.

      Thank you for visiting us regularly and commenting. That is very much appreciated.
      The Fab Four of Cley
      🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

  42. At first I’d be thrilled, as you were, then suspicious. I smiled when you said you were feeling like literary geniuses….(which you are!) I don’t understand why there are bots, but I appreciate knowing your experience with them. Thanks, Fab Four🙂

    Like

    Reply

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