Your instance is misreporting its name somehow and it was super annoying when I was trying to block it.
Is it alien.top or selfhosted.forum? Pick one please.
Also, do you manage any other instances so I can block those as well? Needless to say, I am slightly pissed off that I have replied to several posts before I saw they were bots. Some of those replies took some effort when I was trying to actually be helpful.
I never have. Just thinking about WiFi and Bluetooth drivers on random laptops still puts me into a full flashback state. (My first experience was back in 2002, I think?)
However, getting all of that stuff working was the best learning experience I ever had. At the time, I was just learning about IT security and WiFi pcap was all the rage back then.
It thought about that, actually. If I was in a gladiator pit, I would absolutely want my own vote to count, and it does.
However, after thinking about the dynamics of social media updooting, the first vote, in my opinion, is actually the starting point for the scale, not 0/0. It’s not that OPs vote doesn’t count, it’s just that the scale is shifted by one and starts at 1/0 by default. OP can then choose to keep the upvote, remove the upvote or downvote. (Basically, it’s not OPs choice to get the 1/0 vote. Changing the default vote, or keeping it, is where OP has a choice.)
There is an argument to be had that all posts start at 0/0, regardless of defaults. My own opinion is that they actually all start at 1/0. Supporters of either could argue they are correct.
I am fully aware that I am making a really stupid argument here, but it’s supposed to be in fun.