Posted by Hunter [12.255.181.7 - 12-255-181-7.client.attbi.com] on 02 September 2002 at 20.54.52 ZuluTime:

In Reply to: Fast is an idiot posted by Morphia on 01 September 2002 at 23.23.20 ZuluTime:

I'm going to be even more of a devil's advocate than Baron was.

I've, personally, spent a great deal of time talking to fastillion. I don't know that much about him, but I know him well enough to know that he rarely ever talks about something he doesn't know about, or something that isn't simply his strong opinion.

I watched this entire thing start -- seemlingly -- after fbisearchbot came into the room. FBI searchbot is this guy who's building a bot for something...whatever it is, it's far too complex for me to understand. It's something for testing and analysing things in a hive-mind situation. So he's testing it in a chatroom.

This thing scores people on their diction, spelling, and so on. Based on a modified Windows 2000 dictionary/grammar/scoring method. Everyone became obsessed with this thing, and their score, for some reason.

Fastillion repeatedly scored high -- almost always among the top five or so in the room. Everyone instantly assumed that the bot was a fake, and that fastillion was actually fbisearchbot.

Beyond that, I don't know what's going on, and I don't care. All I really know is that I, personally, have no problem with fastillion, and cannot really abide by anyone just terming him an 'idiot', because I've seen a great deal of evidence otherwise.

Frankly: if plays on names and criticisng grammar, spelling, and punctuation are considered childish, then you may not want to hang out in that room at all, because that's a major part of things. It's considered childish to NOT know how to spell things, or how to punctuate. Most of the [I hesitate to use the term] 'high ranking' regulars REGULARLY criticise spelling errors and lacking in punctuation.

Not that I've seen you in the room that often....