GlitchBot is an automated glitch creation / distribution program and persona.

GlitchBot maintains an active presence on flickr, including a profile and photostream, with new images created and uploaded daily.

GlitchBot is not an interactive program. GlitchBot works alone on a fixed schedule, creating a single new glitched image every day and presenting it to the world via the GlitchBot flickr page (see above links) and slideshow (see below).

GlitchBot creates its images by glitching source images pulled from other flickr users' photostreams. Only source images with an appropriate Creative Commons license are used. In order to ensure compliance with license terms, the original creator is credited and linked to in the descriptions of the resulting glitched images. The glitched images are then released under the same license as their source - ensuring compliance with share-alike licenses, and contributing to the pool of legally re-usable media that allows GlitchBot to avoid coming into conflict with copyright law.

GlitchBot draws from a limited number of source images and a limited number of possible glitches and will theoretically yield all possible glitch derivatives. However, like the compression algorithms GlitchBot exploits, GlitchBot is an imperfect creation. Within the flickr comments and descriptions there can be found occasional typos, and much more rarely an image may pass through completely unglitched - a glitch manifested in the absence of glitch. Furthermore, though there is a limited supply of source images and of potential glitched derivatives, GlitchBot moves far too slowly (one image per day) to keep up with the rapid influx of new flickr uploads.

GlitchBot is an imperfect machine built to create imperfections.