• Tinder users who ‘swiped right’ to meet ‘Ava’ soon realised she’s the main character in upcoming film Ex Machina and that they were chatting to a bot as part of a marketing campaign.
• A company promoting the sci-fi movie created the fake account with a photo of the star of the movie.
• Those who ‘spoke’ with Ava were asked questions such as “what makes you human?” and “have you ever been in love?” before being directed to an Instagram page alerting them Ava’s ‘true intentions’.
• Those behind the campaign state that prizes (such as tickets to the premiere) were given to those who matched Ava.
• Although such ‘guerilla marketing’ exercises have been run before, some argue that its presence on Tinder is problematic given that the dating platform relies on the presumption that everyone is, at the very least, human. 

Read more:

http://www.indiewire.com/article/dont-get-your-heart-tinder-ized-at-sxsw-20150315

http://techcrunch.com/2015/03/15/marketers-tricked-sxsw-tinder-users-with-a-chatbot/

http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/digital-life-news/swipe-right-for-robots-tinder-users-duped-at-sxsw-festival-by-films-marketing-stunt-20150316-1m02vv.html

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