Subject: acka-research-digest V3 #211
From: [email-masked] (acka-research-digest)
To: [email-masked]

acka-research-digest     Sunday, September 6 1998     Volume 03 : Number 211

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 08:24:35 -0400 (EDT)
From: Kelly Hubert Kelly <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Prez & Accounted

Hya All,
Geez I go bush for a couple of days and you go and crash the game?
Typical!
Looking at whats happened I'm not sure that a CRD is absolutly nessacary
when an appropriate CSR could implement the intent of the affected
rules; thats what they're for after all. In the mean time, since it may
be impossible to vote, a holiday could be appropriate - unless there are
any object I'll declare a three day holiday in about 6 hours...

K 2

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 08:25:47 -0400 (EDT)
From: Kelly Hubert Kelly <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Prez & Accounted

Hya All,
Geez I go bush for a couple of days and you go and crash the game?
Typical!
Looking at whats happened I'm not sure that a CRD is absolutly nessacary
when an appropriate CSR could implement the intent of the affected
rules; thats what they're for after all. In the mean time, since it may
be impossible to vote, a holiday could be appropriate - unless there are
any object I'll declare a three day holiday in about 6 hours...

K 2

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 09:41:23 -0400 (EDT)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Prez & Accounted

> Looking at whats happened I'm not sure that a CRD is absolutly
> nessacary when an appropriate CSR could implement the intent of the
> affected rules; thats what they're for after all. In the mean time,
> since it may be impossible to vote, a holiday could be appropriate -
> unless there are any object I'll declare a three day holiday in
> about 6 hours...

I personally would prefer not to have a holiday, since it complicates
tracking all the deadlines. If others feel it is necessary, though, I
will of course bow to the will of the people.

breadbox

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 10:48:41 -0400 (EDT)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3501 accepted

> Results of Proposal 3501
> 
> 22/26 votes: Quorum achieved
> 12/15 YES votes: Proposal accepted

Okay - any ideas what the heck this proposal actually does?

>> Amend Rule 1250.22, "Bacon", by replacing the following text(delimited by
>> WAYNE):
>> 
>> WAYNE
>> The game consists of a series of rounds. At the start of each round, each
>> [...]
>> the name of another actron to the referee), otherwise play proceeds.
>> WAYNE
>> 
>> {{[ A lot rests on the referee here, but e can certainly use the Movie
>> Database to determine how many movies an actron has been in, if nothing
>> else. Or ask for information privately from the player who suggested em.
>> ]}}
>> 
>> Replace the text "After the actrons have been named for a round" with
>> "After the actrons are accepted".
>> 
>> Replace the text "from the time the naming period ends" with "from the time
>> the actrons are accepted".
>> 
>> Replace the text "The winner of a round receives a Gamepoint" with "The
>> winner of a round receives 2 Gamepoints".
>> 
>> Replace the text "first player to obtain 5 Gamepoints" with "first player
>> to obtain 10 Gamepoints".

The first effect names the text to replace, but makes no mention of
what to replace it with.

After reading it over a second time, it occurred to me that perhaps
what was meant was that the changes listed at the bottom were to be
applied to the quoted text, and the result of that would be the
replacement. In other words, the first sentence would be interpreted
as saying "Amend Rule 1250.22 by making the listed changes to the
part quoted here". I wasn't sure how much of a stretch that was, but
it seemed the most reasonable interpretation of the proposal as a
whole, especially given that the changes listed at the bottom don't
give a location of the text they alter.

However, when I went to try this out, I discovered that the quoted
text was not actually present in Rule 1250.22 at all.

It is thus my opinion that Proposal 3501 is a Null Proposal.

breadbox

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 11:05:47 -0400 (EDT)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3549

> Proposal 3549
> Illuminati
> Weishaupt (Gabriel Drummond-Cole)
> 
> [...]
> 
> "The history of the world is the history of the warfare between secret
> societies. --Ishmael Reed, Mumbo Jumbo" [Robert Anton Wilson, Opening
> quote, Book 1, Verwirrung, Part 1, The Eye in the Pyramid, the Illuminatus
> Trilogy]

Okay, I really must protest. This is getting out of hand.

The whole point of the literature rule is to challenge people to try
to work bits of literary text into the actual ruleset, not to reward
players for composing epigraphs.

Putting a sentence in quote marks doesn't prevent it from being part
of the rules. It still must be obeyed. (Inasmuch as it is possible to
obey a sentence like the above, of course ... presumably its effect is
somewhat akin to "The world is cubical.")

breadbox

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 11:08:39 -0400 (EDT)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3554

> Proposal 3554
> Nabla Cross Mu-Nought Times E
> Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)
> 
> [...]
> 
> II. Whenever a trigonometric function is to be applied to a number, and
> no unit of angle measurement is specified, then the unit shall be taken
> to be grads.  (100 grads = 90 degrees = pi/2 radians.)

Booo! Hiss! Radians or nothing!!

breadbox

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 11:10:56 -0400 (EDT)
From: David Scheidt <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3554

nOn Sun, 6 Sep 1998, nomicbot wrote:

> II. Whenever a trigonometric function is to be applied to a number, and
> no unit of angle measurement is specified, then the unit shall be taken
> to be grads.  (100 grads = 90 degrees = pi/2 radians.)
> DIV

I was told there would be no math.

rufus

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 13:33:32 -0400 (EDT)
From: [email-masked] (Aaron V. Humphrey)
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3554

> > Proposal 3554
> > Nabla Cross Mu-Nought Times E
> > Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

> > [...]

> > II. Whenever a trigonometric function is to be applied to a number, and
> > no unit of angle measurement is specified, then the unit shall be taken
> > to be grads.  (100 grads = 90 degrees = pi/2 radians.)

> Booo! Hiss! Radians or nothing!!

Okay, _you_ try to figure out the remainder of a googleplex divided by
2 pi...

- --
- --Alfvaen(Web page: http://www.connect.ab.ca/~alfvaen/ )
Current Album--Genesis:From Genesis To Revelation
Current Book--Stephen King:The Shining
Careful with that silver hammer, Maxwell.

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 13:36:03 -0400 (EDT)
From: [email-masked] (Aaron V. Humphrey)
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3501 accepted

> > Results of Proposal 3501

> > 22/26 votes: Quorum achieved
> > 12/15 YES votes: Proposal accepted

> Okay - any ideas what the heck this proposal actually does?

Foo.  I give A$7 to the Twits, and A$1 to the Church of the Justified
Ancients of Mummu.

- --
- --Alfvaen(Web page: http://www.connect.ab.ca/~alfvaen/ )
Current Album--Genesis:From Genesis To Revelation
Current Book--Stephen King:The Shining
Honey, when you go to the store, pick up some glue traps.  We've got turtles.

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 17:26:14 -0400 (EDT)
From: John Frederic Mc Coy <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3557

On Sun, 6 Sep 1998, nomicbot wrote:

> Proposal 3557
> All Our Dooms
> Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)
> 
> This is a Modest proposal.
> 
> Amend Rule 1250.3, "General Equipment", by replacing the following
> text(delimited by MARL):
> 
> MARL
> a) The Official Scrabble Player's Dictionary (OSPD), as defined by the
> URL: telnet://eel.st.usm.edu:7777
> MARL
> 
> with the following(delimited by WAK):
> 
> WAK
> a) The Enchanted North American Benchmark Lexicon(ENABLE), available
> in compressed form at the URL:
> http://personal.riverusers.com/~thegrendel/enable10.zip
> (Note: the above Zip archive may contain files other than the wordlist,
> but it should be clear what is the actual wordlist itself.)
> WAK

Why are you getting rid of MarlDoom?  Personally, I would very much like
to see it kept.  I have been known to play Acka from any number of
different computers, and MarlDoom is far easier to access and use in a
hurry than all these zipped up lists we use.  I can't keep copies of those
files on any computer I might be using to check my email, but I can be
pretty sure there'll be a telnet client.

> 
> {{[ While I'm at it...]
> 
> Add the following words to the Ackanomic Lexicon: "ack", "acked",
> "acks", "acking".
> }}
> 

That reminds me.  Where is the Lexicon these days?  I went looking for a
copy a few days ago, and I couldn't seem to find it anywhere.

Vynd

[email-masked]

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 17:28:22 -0400 (EDT)
From: John Frederic Mc Coy <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3554

On Sun, 6 Sep 1998, David Scheidt wrote:

> nOn Sun, 6 Sep 1998, nomicbot wrote:
> 
> > II. Whenever a trigonometric function is to be applied to a number, and
> > no unit of angle measurement is specified, then the unit shall be taken
> > to be grads.  (100 grads = 90 degrees = pi/2 radians.)
> > DIV
> 
> I was told there would be no math.
> 
> rufus
> 

Yeah, what gives.  If we try to solve all the quirky little
inconsistencies in mathematics in the rules, they're going to make the set
we have now look downright small...

Vynd

[email-masked]

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 17:54:57 -0400 (EDT)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 3557

> Why are you getting rid of MarlDoom?  Personally, I would very much
> like to see it kept.  I have been known to play Acka from any number
> of different computers, and MarlDoom is far easier to access and use
> in a hurry than all these zipped up lists we use.

I agree with this myself. Also, hopefully it will make people think
twice before trying to pull another "hydriae" stunt on the OiCoRT.

> That reminds me.  Where is the Lexicon these days?  I went looking
> for a copy a few days ago, and I couldn't seem to find it anywhere.

Erm. I am remiss in actually putting up a link for it. I'll put this
task in a prominent position on my to-do list.

breadbox

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Date: Sun, 06 Sep 1998 18:04:10 -0400 (EDT)
From: John Frederic Mc Coy <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Important stuff?

The latest Infrequent (which I rarely read all the way through, sorry
Slakko, but its SOOOO long :) reminded me of my question to the world at
large three weeks ago about what is really important in Acka.

I needed some reminding.  The results were less than memorable, most
people seem to put answering idle questions smack on their list of
unimportant things. :)  So anyway, three people answered me privately, I
won't say who, on the extremely unlikely chance that they don't want folks
to know their opinions.

No one disagreed with the idea that Rules 0-399 were pretty much required,
by the way, so I'll just call them the "early rules" from here on out.

Player One thought that we shuldn't really get rid of any substantial
portion of the rules.  But then he went on to say that the only rules that
we absolutely needed were the early rules plus the 400s, and also the
cycle ending rules.

Player Two thought that the Criminal Justices rules, in particular the
pragmatism clause, were vital  He also thought that the Ackadollar was too
important to dump entirely, and at least the basic rules behind its
definition should be kept.

Player Three thought the game would be too boring without Party Chess and
Organizations.  He also thought that the rules we could most easily lose
were the Location rules and Gadgets.

Then there is me.  I think that we definitely need the early rules, and I
can't imagine how I overlooked the 400s either, although certainly there
are a few in there that could go.  I agree that we need to keep criminal
justice.  In fact, I think that the pragmatism clause is now the single
most important rule (or part of a rule, anyway) in the game.  If it were
to disappear, the game would immediately colapse under the weight of the
mistakes made in the approximately two years since it was adopted (I can
actually remember that proposal, kinda scary :).  And from our history
lessons, we know that weneed to keep some kind of Cycle ending rule
around.

The rest I am not as sure about.  I think Player Two is on to something
with Ackadollars.  I don't know if we necessarily need Ackadollars
specifically, but we would probably wnat to hang on to the rules defining
entities, at the very least.  Without them, we're back to Rule 104 (or
whatever the permissibility of the unprohibited was way back when)
entities.

Player Three is probably right that dropping Organizations and (to
generalize a little) Subgames, wouldn't be the greatest idea.  Personally,
I think that we can't really claim that they are essential to play.  But
without them, there would be far, far less to do.

So there you are.  Anyone interested in reducing the size of the ruleset
(which seemed to be a hot topic when I asked this question, then dropped
off the horizon again), feel free to chip in your ideas.  I'm not
personally on a crusade to rewrite the rules, mind you.  But I am getting
a little tired of people trying to enact one type of major change after
another and seeing them *all* fail. :)  So I consider this my contribution
to the process, for now.

Vynd

[email-masked]

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End of acka-research-digest V3 #211
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