I used to work on a support team where a bot could solve simple cases: eg. if the user's software license had just expired, it would grant an immediate one-off 24 hour extension so the user could get their payments sorted.

The fun bit is that it would reply to the case using a female name, using the same kind of account as human support reps. The bot's customer satisfaction surveys were over the top effusive, including not a few people declaring that they were in love and asking us to promote "her" for being so fast, polite and effective. I don't think "she" was ever asked out on a date though!

>Obviously, this would be inappropriate behavior if it was happening to an actual human assistant, and I would deal with it.

Unless one person has some level of authority over the other, I don't see why this should be considered inappropriate. Not taking no for an answer, or any kind of retribution for being declined, are harassment and shouldn't be tolerated -- but just asking? I think that's something any man or woman should be able to ask any man or woman.

For avoidance of doubt: Asking someone out when you know very little about them isn't smooth. It won't impress many people. But I don't see it as morally repugnant.

You only have to look at LinkedIn to see the levels people go to when commenting on women's posts. Even those where these women post nothing but business - and if their posts have a photo, there's an even better chance these comments will be there.

On the other hand, you can see some posts are bait. And the guys replying take it and run. You see them because if any of your connections react to these posts, you might see them in your feed.

It's cringey. Coupled with the self-aggrandising posts, the self-help "wisdom" and other stuff, they make LinkedIn look like a Mos Eisley Cantina.

This isn't to excuse inappropriate behavior, but I do think that we should clearly label bots whenever possible to avoid embarrassments similar to this where one party knows it's a bot and the other doesn't.

This is bizarre. I get very annoyed with creepy behaviour in the workplace especially. But if this post is true, then I would absolutely be forwarding the email thread to the client and simply say: "Could you ask your employee to please stop filling the automated assistant inbox".

I have used female names for random one-off online accounts and the difference in the way I was treated was pretty fascinating and frankly a little saddening.

There's an obvious solution that doesn't involve moralizing about gender disputes. Set up another bot to schedule hoax dates, "Here's my personal email address" Continue to elaborate on the scheme with AI selfies, excuses for the no-show and whatever else you can come up with. You'll have more ideas as the project progresses.

The real comedy gold will be when the person involved asks about your assistant in real life.

>It gives a standard salutation and signs off with “Thank you, <bot name>.”

I thought this was a mistake implying the bot was thanking itself as a way of signing off, but finally I realized it's probably supposed be a format like the end of a letter similar to "best wishes, topherclay".

This seems like a great opportunity for LLMs. With ChatGPT's highly advanced flirty chat simulation, your business could keep those flirting-with-the-scheduling-bot email threads going for weeks!

I don’t think there’s anything morally wrong with it, but I’d still say men shouldn’t do it because it’s annoying.

We’ve been mixing up “morally wrong” with “come on, don’t be a dick” constantly when addressing feminist issues. The first relates to feminist issues, the latter is general advice for human beings. This is the latter: Don’t hit on people without any personal context. It’s weird, annoying, and a bit sad. Do we have to say these things out loud?

Imagine being an actual woman and having to deal with this bullshit all the fucking time. I have no idea how the hell they do it. Must be low-level torture.

Why is hitting on a woman inappropriate behavior?

I'm sorry, but this doesn't ping anyone else's Bullshit Detector?!

if some men did, it is not acceptable to write "men are hitting" because not all men are doing that. at minimum this is dishonest if not misandry.