Skype Group Topic Positivity :-)

A bot to automatically change Skype group topics back to a random positive message for subconsciously making people happier. :-)

What?

All this does is change the Skype topic back to a random positive message whenever it is changed. It can also be used to keep the group topic from being changed to anything other than a predefined message. For example, to have a MotD that others users can't interfere with. Another use is cycling between a number of messages. Note: it only reacts to changing the topic, it doesn't simply change in a fixed period.

Why?

Depression is widely considered the common cold of mental health. Even those without clinical problems or recorded issues seem to not be very happy. From those who dread going to school to those who dread going to work, we don't seem to be very happy. The Internet and social media amplifies this problem because we see only the best of others and fail to realize they have problems of their own.

In my personal experience, simply being kind to someone is interpreted as affection for them. Are we so unhappy that simply being nice to someone means you want something more from them? On the other hand, when someone is being nice to us, we often think there is a more devious and sinister plot lurking beneath the surface, or they're trying to butter us up. Why is paying it forward and random acts of kindness considered the exception instead of the norm?

tl;dr: I want to make people happier. We need more positivity in the world.

How?

I believe that the human subconscious is an incredibly powerful thing. Doing things like repeating to yourself "I'm beautiful", seeing someone smile (perhaps on a billboard every day on your way to work), etc will affect you without you realizing it. This is abused by marketers, subliminal messaging, TV, etc constantly. The best marketing doesn't feel like marketing. Why do stock photos always have smiling people? It's because it makes you associate being happy with their product or service.

As much as I dislike Skype, I have it on my cellphone. When I get a message from a group, the status bar at the top of my Android phone briefly shows the topic of the Skype group, and a snippet from the beginning of the received message. I got the idea to use the topic as a way to send positive subliminal messages. I strongly believe that every time a positive message appears on your screen, whether you realize that you see it or not, it subconsciously makes you that much happier. This is a way to get positive messages on your screen more often.

tl;dr: Positive subliminal messaging.

How to use?

The group chat must be a cloud chat, not a P2P chat. From the readme of Skype4J:

"It does not support P2P chats. You can tell whether you're in a P2P chat or not based on the output of the /help command. If it contains commands such as /kickban, you're in a P2P chat and should switch to cloud chats immediately (try using /fork)"

This is a command line program. Simply run it and pass only two parameters: username and password of the Skype account it run should on. WARNING: the password is stored in memory, use common sense.

The bot is enabled by default. To make the bot start or stop listening for topic changes in a specific group: open that group while the bot is running and type ./togglegroup. Only bot masters may use that command. A bot master is someone authorized to control the bot. By default, only the account that the bot is running from is allowed to control it. You'll have to log into that account and use the ./addbotmaster command in any chat.

Go in a group chat and use these commands. Some such as ./help, ./start, and ./ping may also be used in private chats. If the usage cell is empty, the command takes no parameters. For example, to add echo123 as a bot master: send ./addbotmaster echo123 in a group chat that the bot is currently running in.

Command	Usage	Description	Requires Bot Master?
./toggleall		Toggles the bot on or off for ALL groups	Yes
./showall		Says whether the bot is enabled for ALL groups	No
./togglegroup		Toggles the bot on or off for this group	Yes
./showgroup		Shows whether the bot is enabled for this group	No
./addbotmaster	username	Add a user as a bot master	Yes
./removebotmaster	username	Demote a bot master	Yes
./listbotmasters		Show a list of the bot masters Note: non bot masters can use this command if tell bot masters is enabled.	Yes
./tellbotmasters		Toggles the ability for regular users to see who the bot masters are	Yes
./istellingbotmasters		Show whether regular users can see who the bot masters are by using ./listbotmasters	Yes
./addtopic	topic	Add a topic to the set of possible positive topics, the topic must be less than the number of characters shown by the ./status command	Yes
./removetopic	topic	Remove the given topic from the set of possible positive topics	Yes
./listtopics		Lists all the (hopefully positive) topics that might be randomly selected	Yes
./change		Changes the group topic to a random positive topic	Yes
./ping		Responds with a 'pong' as a quick and easy way to see if the bot is running	No
./status		Responds with the status of the bot and current settings	No
./help		Responds with approximately this message	No

Roadmap

• Get people to use Discord instead and drop Skype.
• Add support for other chat services such as Discord, IRC, Telegram, Slack, etc.

Did this make you happy?

I'm pleased to hear that! You're very welcome. :-)

Although money doesn't buy happiness, I greatly appreciate all donations. My Bitcoin address is 1H3nuby12kEkHyFAKyRa1k6fCTFA7ykoAD.

Want to make the world a better place?

Hire me to help you! :-) The local part of my e-mail address is bitsigned and domain is gmail.com.