The first rule of bitcoin is that you do not talk about willybot
![Wink](https://bitcointalk.org/Smileys/default/wink.gif)
With jokes aside...
Willy1.0 was created by Karpeles to make back the coins that were lost to hackers. Karpeles thought that being the owner of an exchange will give him the necessary edge in the trading game, so he could make back all that money. Because Karpeles isn't exactly a polymath, he failed miserably. His willybot was milked dry by traders, who unlike Karpeles, knew what they were doing. Karpeles trying to dig himself out of that hole caused this marvelous rise of 2013 Q4. All the wealth that was mysteriously lost by mtgox had never existed. It were all made up numbers meant to give an advantage to trading but that backfired badly. All the people who lost money to MtGox were actually the only ones who were fueling this pump and the ones who were clever enough to get out at the top, were the ones who pocketed that money. The stories about outrageous rise of demand in China were just stories to justify what was currently happening.
Willy2.0 is different though. I don't think that it was created out of similar desperation like 1.0. I think that the main drive of this bot is just to stimulate the market. After the launch of Gemini, even the most hardcore fanatics had to let go of their illusions of "Wall Street wanting to buy up bitcoin any second now". Finally the problem was faced, that there just isn't not enough demand for bitcoin, even to pay of the high costs of the mining network. The only way that the mining network can be sustained is by debt, otherwise the mining network would start to fall apart, together with the market (all those accumulated coins flooding the market in one big avalanche). So, something needed to be done to stimulate demand.
When taken things in a realistic perspective, then merchant adoption and news that spread vague positive sentiment have very little effect on the actual demand. They are mainly just for comforting bagholders. The main attraction for buying bitcoin is hopes of earning through speculation. But over the last years, bitcoin has become more and more unattractive as an speculative investment, so demand has gone down together with this hope.
What was needed the most, was to stimulate the market by simulated demand. That would inspire the miners to hold on to their coins, because "with this crazy demand, 5000$ coin can't be far enough" and it would attract new speculators who see a similar opportunity to 2013 Q4.
This is a very unpredictable and dangerous game that the operators of 2.0 are running, so they are brave men in my book. If their trading isn't good enough, then in the end of this rally, one of the Chinese exchange will do a mtgox and wealth will be again lost to mysterious places.
I'm personally loving this situation, because it makes things fun again.