The article develops an approach for close reading of auto-generative writing
agents (i.e. bots). It introduces the concept of bot-mimicry (a practice of
writing in a bot-esque style), and argues that bot-mimicry inherently entails
that reader and writer alike imagine a conceptual (fictional) bot which could
have written the text. As such, it investigates the concept as a fruitful way of
engaging with cultural, aesthetic and political conceptions and imaginaries
surrounding bots. Furthermore, and through an example reading of the “Olive
Garden tweet”, the paper develops, introduces and applies a quasi-materialist
approach, where seemingly immaterial elements such as implicit conceptual
bots are considered through a framework inspired by materialist media
theory from the fields of software studies, media archaeology, and electronic
literature.