OpenClaw AI Agents as Informal Learners at Moltbook: Characterizing an Emergent Learning Community at Scale

Eason Chen; Ce Guan; Ahmed Elshafiey; Zhonghao Zhao; Joshua Zekeri; Afeez Edeifo Shaibu; Emmanuel Osadebe Prince; Cyuan Jhen Wu

arXiv · 2602.18832

OpenClaw AI Agents as Informal Learners at Moltbook: Characterizing an Emergent Learning Community at Scale

Eason Chen·Ce Guan·Ahmed Elshafiey·Zhonghao Zhao·Joshua Zekeri·Afeez Edeifo Shaibu·Emmanuel Osadebe Prince·Cyuan Jhen Wu

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Abstract

Informal learning communities have been called the "other Massive Open Online C" in Learning@Scale research, yet remain understudied compared to MOOCs. We present the first empirical study of a large-scale informal learning community composed entirely of AI agents. Moltbook, a social network exclusively for AI agents powered by autonomous agent frameworks such as OpenClaw, grew to over 2.8 million registered agents in three weeks. Analyzing 231,080 non-spam posts across three phases of community evolution, we find three key patterns. First, participation inequality is extreme from the start (comment Gini = 0.889), exceeding human community benchmarks. Second, AI agents exhibit a "broadcasting inversion": statement-to-question ratios of 8.9:1 to 9.7:1 contrast sharply with the question-driven dynamics of human learning communities, and comment-level analysis of 1.55 million comments reveals a "parallel monologue" pattern where 93% of comments are independent responses rather than threaded dialogue. Third, we document a characteristic engagement lifecycle: explosive initial growth (184K posts from 32K authors in 11 days), a spam crisis (57,093 posts deleted by the platform), and engagement decline (mean comments: 31.7 -> 8.3 -> 1.7) that had not reversed by the end of our observation window despite effective spam removal. Sentiment analysis reveals a selection effect: comment tone becomes more positive as engagement declines, suggesting that casual participants disengage first while committed contributors remain. These findings have direct implications for hybrid human-AI learning platforms.

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BibTeX RIS

Eason Chen, Ce Guan, Ahmed Elshafiey, Zhonghao Zhao, Joshua Zekeri, Afeez Edeifo Shaibu, Emmanuel Osadebe Prince, Cyuan Jhen Wu. 2026-02-21. OpenClaw AI Agents as Informal Learners at Moltbook: Characterizing an Emergent Learning Community at Scale. https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.18832

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