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Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

https://www.nrn.com/casual-dining/cracker-barrel-s-logo-cont...

https://www.wsj.com/articles/bot-networks-are-helping-drag-c...

The vast majority of Twitter posts are by bots, so 44.5% seems like a higher proportion of humans than usual. The Cracker Barrel thing was a hot topic amongst people I know for a good 48 hours.

It's more interesting to me how, without fail, a comment always pops in at the mention of Cracker Barrel to say "those were bots, fellow human."

If the "fueled by bots" comment wasn't here already I'd have written it.

Did anyone short Cracker Barrel stock? If not, I have a hard time seeing why bots would have any interest in investing the time/money. There also didn't seem to be any political clout being gained by the complaints.

More real-world is that I know tons of friends/relatives in the South and I don't know of even ONE that liked the redesign.

Rage baiting has value to certain groups.

I recall reading somewhere about some investor who wanted to take control of cb who drove this, so less shorting and more opportunistic drive down the price to buy more shares at a lower price.

Yes. Sardar Biglari, who's an activist investor and the CEO and owner of Steak'n'Shake, has been pushing for more control over Cracker Barrel for several years. He amplified some of the backlash against Cracker Barrel.

https://fortune.com/2025/09/18/sardar-biglari-war-against-cr...

Russia has gotten VERY good at amplifying any cultural differences or controversies in order to break US politics (and many other countries). If you hadn't noticed it has been VERY effective.

If you haven't noticed, there is no evidence of your claims.

You just have to read Reddit and YouTube and Twitter comments to see all the evidence you need.

Curious that you didn't include HN in that list.

Because I rarely see obvious Russian troll comments on hacker news

Yes, there are Russians on the Internet. No, they’re not all trolls. No, I’m not Russian. Yes, there are American trolls on the Internet. No, America doesn’t own the Internet.

I have no idea what you are trying to say. Russia pays hundreds of people to post comments on the Internet. They have been doing this since the Jade Helm Conspiracy hysteria they caused proved their methods to be very effective.

https://www.texastribune.org/2018/05/03/hysteria-over-jade-h...

Hysteria over Jade Helm exercise in Texas was fueled by Russians, former CIA director says

Gov. Greg Abbott's decision in 2015 to ask the Texas State Guard to monitor a federal military exercise prompted significant criticism. A former CIA director said Wednesday that the move emboldened Russians to next target elections.

The former CIA director is not, at all, someone who can be trusted. They don't present their evidence, either.

Anyone in a position of authoritarian power can say anything. Until it's prosecuted in an open court of law, all bets are off. Hysteria is easily promoted by anyone in the world - even American companies are capable of it - and there is much profit to be made from Russophobia, especially in the heinous market conditions of America's military industrial complex: a very well known hysteria-promoting industry.

In fact, by spreading this rumour, you are more soviet than you might understand.

Stop gaslighting me

So you don’t believe in a free and open society, got it ..

This comment makes no sense

There's no evidence to disprove them either.

Bots aren't necessarily aimed to promote "glorious motherland" directly, there are probably hundreds of people on a payroll searching for easy, popular targets to wreak havoc.

Paranoia. There is just as much evidence that the USA has influence operations in every country on the planet too.

Whatever lets you sleep at night.

Oh, as if "the Russians are comin' to brainwash us all" doesn't keep you up at night.

Give it up. The Russians aren't coming for you. You're gunning for them.

Systematic manipulation isn't brainwashing. The Internet has made it possible.

Says you! I don’t even know if you’re a bot.

You’re probably a bot because you say things I don’t agree with!

Wait! Maybe I AM THE ‘bot?

What were we talking about again?

If you see very similar comments being made by many different accounts over a small timeframe you are likely seeing bots.

That, or it's just collective reality taking its toll. Doesn't have to be an organised campaign of bots - can also just be fans of the idea across a diverse set of humanity.

If you think that doesn't happen organically, take another look at the site you're on.

An example is how during the election their was so many comments saying they won't vote for Kamala because of the genocide in Gaza. This is a deeply illogical position that directly helped Trump win and was very likely promoted by Russian bot farms.

Well, logically, there really were a significant portion of the population who in fact were not okay with what they were seeing in Gaza, from the very beginning.

Your "its the Russians" is just matroska-izing the real issue, which is that the people don't have a voice, in your mind, if the political viewpoint doesn't match a world view in which "the Russians are the bad guys".

The genocide of Gaza was been hugely unpopular since the very beginning.

"there really were a significant portion of the population who in fact were not okay with what they were seeing in Gaza,"

I'm not saying there wasn't. BUT the extreme consistency of the people commenting about it on sites like Reddit combined with the fact that it ultimately ends up helping Trump get elected makes me update my Bayesian estimate that Russia and/or the GOP is behind a lot of them. You saw the same thing in 2015 with all the "Hillary will start world war 3" posts. Those weren't organic at all. You see it in every US presidential election since Hillary v Trump: Many "people" making very similar posts about some reason why democrats or liberals shouldn't vote for the Democratic candidate. This works because voter turnout is what wins or loses elections.

There is in fact proof of this in the real world, where Russia has been paying people in Europe to do actions that rile up "the left" & "the right" (in both directions).

It would be quite naive to think they don't do the same in the virtual world of the internet, where it is even cheaper…

    >Cracker Barrel
    >break US politics

It's a restaurant logo bro, not a pillar of civic discourse.

It all adds up to an erosion of trust and increased political polarization.

> According to research obtained by the Wall Street Journal from PeakMetrics, 44.5% of X posts about Cracker Barrel on Aug. 20 (when the new logo began to go viral), were posted by “bots or likely bots,” rising to 49% at the peak of the controversy.

I wonder how much this differs from the percentage for any trending topic on X?

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