DeepDrumpf Twitter bot remixes Donald Trump tweets using deep learning
An AI-powered Twitter-bot has scanned Donald Trump’s outlandish GOP speeches and is producing on-point tweets that could almost have come from the 2016 hopeful himself.
While the GOP frontrunner looks to use the platform to seize the presidency, a computer scientist has utilised a Twitter bot to remix Trump’s sentiments.
Picking up upon the momentum of the Week Tonight host John Oliver’s #MakeDonaldDrumpfAgain takedown, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) roboticist and AI researcher Brad Hayes created the bot last week.
The deep-learning “Neural Network trained on Donald Trump transcripts” creates tweets by utilising the sentence probabilities and structures previously posted by Trump to emulate his style – often to comic effect.
As described by Hayes, “The bot creates tweets one letter at a time. For example, if the bot randomly begins its Tweet with the letter 'M,' it is somewhat likely to be followed by an 'A,' and then a 'K,' and so on until the bot types out Trump’s campaign slogan, 'Make America Great Again'. It then starts over for the next sentence and repeats the process until it reaches the 140-character limit.”
The developer created the bot using deep-learning techniques to find patterns in Trump’s speeches.
Upon reports that Trump speaks at a fourth grade level Hayes concluded: “Trump’s language tends to be more simplistic, so I figured that, as a modeling problem, he would be the most manageable candidate to study.”
You can decide whether the bot is accurately mimicking Trump.
OK, it's amazing right now with ISIS, I tell you what? I don't want them to vote, the worst very social people. I love me.
— DeepDrumpf (@DeepDrumpf) March 3, 2016
Everybody can be amazing. They are because I'll bring back a hell of a big business. Don't forget you. Thank you.
— DeepDrumpf (@DeepDrumpf) March 6, 2016
I want to work, everybody. I like America, just for president. I'm running to honor it. We will save the process. Thank you very much.
— DeepDrumpf (@DeepDrumpf) March 6, 2016
[@FoxNews] That's when we become a country that's unsalvageable. They have losers. I'm against the lobbyists. I am very important right now.
— DeepDrumpf (@DeepDrumpf) March 6, 2016
Mark my words. We're going to beat ISIS. Come replace the big lie, Obamacare. Believe me.
— DeepDrumpf (@DeepDrumpf) March 5, 2016
Right now, think of this: We owe China $1.3 trillion. We owe Japan more than that. We have gun laws. I'll bring back our money.
— DeepDrumpf (@DeepDrumpf) March 5, 2016
Hayes has admitted that the bot appears to be becoming more aggressive of late as Trump’s rhetoric alters to impress the electorate.
Every time I add another debate transcript into @DeepDrumpf's training set, it seems to get more aggressive
— Brad Hayes (@hayesbh) March 5, 2016