Last week saw New York Comic Con hit the big apple, with excited attendees tweeting about the event and their favourite bits.
However, some tweets were posted without the users actually typing them at all, causing several Comic Con visitors to wonder who had access to their account.
Well it turns out that this was all down to Comic Con’s badges. The event’s organisers, Reedpop, allowed attendees to pre-register their NYCC badges online. The badges have radio-frequency identification chips that are tied to each user’s identity in order to prevent counterfeits.
Badge-holders were then invited to connect to their social media accounts using their badge. When people checked into Comic Con on Thursday, many had tweets published using their account, that had been sent out by the event, without the account holder’s knowledge or permission.
The tweets were especially questionable, as they weren’t generic, standard, promotional tweets one might expect from an event. They were informal and chatty, and seemed to be trying to fit in with regular Twitter talk. Some examples of the tweets include: "I <3 #NYCC" and "So much pop culture to digest! Can’t. handle. the. awesome. #NYCC". The tweets were all followed by a link to the Facebook page of New York Comic Con.
It appears that it wasn’t explicitly stated that, by connecting to your social media site with the badge, Comic Con would tweet on your behalf, which led to some angry attendees.
What I find most unsettling about this is how the event’s tweets are trying to sound TOO friendly, positive and teenage. If it was a generic tweet, lacking in personality or a specific tone of voice, it would make it less shocking. But does this class as impersonation?They don’t appear to inform attendees of the tweets that are to be posted under their name, and then do nothing to distinguish these automated tweets from those posted everyday by the user.
Here is a screen grab of a handful of the automated tweets below. Would you be able to recognise that this was not the user, but in fact an event using accounts for promotional use?
