An interface for Telegram bots to send AI-generated memes from imgflip.

You can check out @AiMemesBot on Telegram.

Please note that I didn't get permission from imgflip for this. I am using an undocumented API that is being called when you generate a meme on their website. I have no idea how to implement an AI like this - I am just a web developer who knows how to communicate with REST interfaces and wanted to create something funny and wasted two days on it.

Setup

1. Prerequisites

• node.js
• firebase-tools

2. Setting up a Telegram bot

See https://core.telegram.org/bots#6-botfather.

3. Toggles to set with @BotFather

/setinline
/setinlinefeedback  Enabled
/setcommands  /empty
/setjoingroups Disable

4. config.js

Copy functions/src/config.json.template to functions/src/config.json and set the properties to the following:

• telegramBotToken is your bot's token which was provided by the BotFather when you set up the bot.
• imgflipUsername username of any imgflip account (set one up here)
• imgflipPassword the account's password - in unencoded text
• maintainer your telegram handle/username without the leading @
• selfUrl the url the functions will be available at

5. Setup/Maintenance via chat

Message the bot you created in a private message a /start.

After that it will remember this chat as the maintainer chat and report errors in this chat.

You need to set/maintain two properties via this chat.

• The imgFlip token - this is where it gets dodgy.

  Open https://imgflip.com/ai-meme in your browser (preferably a private tab), open the DevTools and go the the Network tab.

  Now click on one of the memes. You'll see a POST to ajax_ai_meme. In the Form Data there'll be a __tok. Copy the value and set it as your imgflipToken

  The token might be getting invalidated every so often, so if you get an error via the maintainer chat, try getting a fresh token and setting it.

• The imgflip Cookie

  from the same request, the cookie iflipsess

  i.e. in the Headers there will be a cookie string like __cfduid=abcdef; iflipsess=XXX; rootkey=abcdef - copy the XXX

To set these simply send in two separate messages:

• token <token>, e.g. token aBcDeFgHijKlMnOpQrStUvbWjabBq2NK292NfUsZHEc=

• cookie <cookie>, e.g. cookie abcdef9ghni1klmioi12msdbaj

6. bot-utils.js

bot-utils.js in the project root is a small commandline-tool for one-time setup with Telegram and health-checking after deployment.

Execute with node bot-utils.js and see usage with node bot-utils.js --help

Documentation

Imgflip AI Meme API

Endpoint

POST https://imgflip.com/ajax_ai_meme

Necessary Headers

accept: application/json, text/javascript, */*; q=0.01
content-type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded; charset=UTF-8
cookie: iflipsess=hqs89rnb8bgdnovpe6frmu6baj

Form data

meme_id

• More memes than shown on https://imgflip.com/ai-meme do work

  e.g. 28251713 ("Oprah Giveaway") returns

  {
    "texts": [
      "you get an email! you get an email!",
      "everyone gets an email!!!"
    ],
    "final_text": "you get an email! you get an email!|everyone gets an email!!!|"
  }

• List of meme popular meme ids

• Some memes from this list don't work

  e.g. 29617627 ("Look at Me") returns

  {
    "error": "Whoops, that meme failed to generate, try again in a minute"
  }