Ask Ubuntu Chat Twitter Bot

Question

For those of you who don't already know, we have a realtime chat room over at http://chat.askubuntu.com — lots of us (including a couple of moderators) hang out there. We help new users with their questions, we discuss Ubuntu topics, and we talk about bacon.

Once in a while, someone will say something absolutely hilarious:

Maybe before I die, I will swallow a whole bag of popcorn kernels so that they get a surprise when they cremate my body! ;)
  — Terrance

Sir , your OS is a coward, I shall challenge thee to a duel of boots
  — Serg

GTK+ 6 will just be one big button.
  — RolandiXor

Sometimes wise words of wisdom are spoken:

When I hear 'if we can put a man on the moon we can do this' I'm hearing an analogy almost as if we're saying 'if we can put a man on the moon, well surely we can put a man on the sun'
  — Zacharee1

if you give someone a script, you will frustrate them for a day... if you teach them how to write a script, you will frustrate them for a lifetime...
  — Zanna

^{(Okay, maybe that last one was funny, but still sage advice.)}

So...

Someone (I think it was Seth?) had the brilliant idea to capture these moments and share them with everyone via Twitter. Yes, we have the starwall, but it's... a little overcrowded, to say the least. The messages that would be tweeted from this account would be hand-curated to ensure top quality.

That's when I stepped in and offered to write an app to...

More specifically, I wrote an app that scrapes the chat transcript and creates a list of messages that might be interesting. Then an actual human being goes through the list and chooses ones that are actually funny or really thought-provoking and queues them for tweeting.

Now I'm sure you all have questions, so...

FAQ

Where is this account?
Here it is: https://twitter.com/ChattyCapybaras

What is a capybara?
This is a capybara:

Why is it chatty?
Chat... chatty... get it?

Where is the app?
It is hosted here: https://tbot.quickmediasolutions.com/

Where do I register?
You don't. The tweets are selected by a chosen few.

Is this app open-source?
Yes: https://github.com/AskUbuntu/tbot

Why is it written in Go instead of [insert language here]?
Because Go is awesome.

Why is bacon awesome?
Because it is.

Are these really frequently asked questions?
They are now that you're reading them.

Answer 1

For the love of all that is holy, PLEASE remove the bacon trigger. If you want to know why, see here. Our mods' sanity is already stressed enough. They don't need to sort through a board of 8500 posts mentioning the word "bacon."

Otherwise, I'm very excited for our new robot overlords assistants in chat. Our highlights reel is gonna be fun!