Subject: Ackanomic Digest V1 #413
From: [email-masked] (Ackanomic Digest)
To: ackanomic-digest

Ackanomic Digest       Friday, December 20 1996       Volume 01 : Number 413

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 14:01:59 -0600 (CST)
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: vacation

> I have distributed all the proposals I have.  Until I return, send them 
> to the Acting Tabulator, whoever volunteers for that.
	I volunteer for this.

> That done, I am placing myself on Vacation, expected duration, 30 days.
> Guy Fawkes
	Hurry back.

- --Mohammed

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 14:45:25 -0600 (CST)
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Interpol Nightstick Treasure

Due to a grevious bug in interpol, this will be either impossible or very
difficult.  To wit:  the comparison operators don't work correctly for
strings.  I found the mistake in the code, and it was a very stupid
mistake.  If you don't feel like debugging my code yourself (and I don't
blame you) you'll be able to pick up a new copy of interpol at

http://www.cbu.edu/~jorendor/acka/interpol2.tar.gz.uu

as soon as I get the new version wrapped up.  i might take a moment to go
find another bug that breadbox pointed out, too.  My apologies for the
inconvenience, if any! 

- --Mohammed

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 15:25:31 -0600 (CST)
From: T Joffrain <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Bomb Shelter Donation 

>Actually the Bomb Shelter has already been built.
>But since this is a donation, and there are a couple of Priests giving
>blessings for a small fee now I am transferring A$30 to Guy Fawkes and ask
>that e bless 3 houses of eir choices, and transferring A$20 to CnH and
>asking that e bless 4 houses of eir choice (I believe these are you
>current rates)  These are also  worthwhile causes in light of the coming
>Tornado.
>
>Niccolo Flychuck -20
>Calvin N Hobbes +20 blessin 4 houses

I do not believe this is necessary, but you are president... I ack the transfer.
So I will bless the houses of Jammer (you asked, and now get it for free),
Wayne, Robert Sevin and Mohammed in one industrial strength blessing (/w
eight words of at least six syllables)

- ------------gods: please cut blessing here-------------

Adaptation from Sonnet by John Keats
Found on a Blank Page in Shakespear's Poems,
Facing "A Lover's Complaint"

Bright star, antidogmatical as thou art--
  Not antipragmatically hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
  Like nature's antiliturgical Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
  Of pure ablution round antipatriotic shores,
Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask
  Of snow upon antirealistic moors--
No! -- yet still antinihilistic, still unchangeable,
  Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
  Antidemocratic in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so-- anticlimactically swoon to death.

Great Weather Gods, Bless the Noble Houses of
Jammer, Wayne, Robert Sevin and Mohammed
Who Deserve Not Your Mighty Pusnishment.

- ------------gods: please cut blessing here-------------

<1>Antidogmatical
<2>Antipragmatically
<3>Antiliturgical
<4>Antipatriotic
<5>Antirealistic
<6>Antinihilistic
<7>Antidemocratic
<8>Anticlimactically

Calvin "phew" Hobbes

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 15:30:52 -0600 (CST)
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Bomb Shelter Donation

> Bright star, antidogmatical as thou art--
>   Not antipragmatically hung aloft the night
> And watching, with eternal lids apart,
>   Like nature's antiliturgical Eremite,
> The moving waters at their priestlike task
>   Of pure ablution round antipatriotic shores,
> Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask
>   Of snow upon antirealistic moors--
> No! -- yet still antinihilistic, still unchangeable,
>   Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
> To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
>   Antidemocratic in a sweet unrest,
> Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
> And so-- anticlimactically swoon to death.
> 
> Great Weather Gods, Bless the Noble Houses of
> Jammer, Wayne, Robert Sevin and Mohammed
> Who Deserve Not Your Mighty Pusnishment.
	Thank you, priest most kind.

- --Mohammed
(the Markovians are being awfully eloquent this morning)

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 15:35:08 -0600 (CST)
From: T Joffrain <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Bomb Shelter Donation 

>--Mohammed
>(the Markovians are being awfully eloquent this morning)

I knew I was forgotting something in the church dogma...   :)

CnH

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 15:39:48 -0600 (CST)
From: T Joffrain <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Bomb Shelter Donation 

>I knew I was forgotting something in the church dogma...   :)

forgEEEEEtting
It's already been established I can't spell

CnH
wasting bandwidth: electrons always move, might as well move for me

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 23:58:52 +0200 (EET)
From: Uri Bruck <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 1584

(This is not a Summary)

I dislike this one for a couple of reasons

On Thu, 19 Dec 1996, Guy Fawkes wrote:

> 
> Proposal 1584 -- Thu 19 Dec 12:49 CST 1996
> Creation of a PartyChessPiece DiscoBall
> Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)
> 
> 1.  A DiscoBall is represented by the ASCII letter D.
> 2.  A DiscoBall may move from one to five squares in any horizontal or 
> vertical direction, providing the destination square and all intervening 
> squares are unoccupied.  A DiscoBall may not capture.
> 3.  Where R and C are the row and column, respectively, of a DiscoBall, 
> and R0 and C0 are the row and column, respectively, of any
> PartyChessPiece, any piece where |R-R0|<6 /OR/ |C-C0|<6 is said to be in 
> that DiscoBall's "sphere of influence."

The result of the /OR/ is that so called "sphere of influence" is actually
more akin to a cross. It defines one vertical band and one horizontal,
both of which go from one of the board to another, and can potentially
have the width of half the board. 
A DiscoBall standing near the center of the board effectively nullifies
the possibily of capturing for approx. 75% of the squares.

> 4.  A piece within a DiscoBall's sphere of influence may not capture 
> another piece within the same DiscoBall's sphere of influnce.  They are 
> too busy doing a strange dance called "greased lightning" to do so.

One result of this is that the DiscoBall can never be captures because it
is always within its own sphere of influence.

> 5.  A DiscoBall has a material value of 6.

Even though this piece has more defensive than offensive value, I think 6
it too low a material value.

I'd support something like this if the following changes were made:
replace the /OR/ with /AND/
reduce the distance to half what it is now.
Increase the material value.

It does bring to mind the option of recalibrating all material values.

Niccolo Flychuck
> 

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

Date: Fri, 20 Dec 1996 00:01:24 +0200 (EET)
From: Uri Bruck <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 1586

On Thu, 19 Dec 1996, Guy Fawkes wrote:

> 
> Proposal 1586 -- Thu 19 Dec 12:50 CST 1996
> Birdhouse in your Soul
> G. Peefalt (Aaron Morris)
> 
> This proposal creates a unique, non-named, tradeable entity called the
> Birdhose in Your Soul.
> 
> The current owner of the birdhouse must respond to any reference to a They
> Might Be Giants song with, "Ack! Not TMBG!"  This may be done a separate

I think this rule is discriminating. I wouldn't know a TMGB refference if
it leaped out at me from the monitor right now screaming and flailing its
hands and had TMBG tattoed all over its forehead.

Niccolo Flychuck

> message or inside a message containing other business.  It must be done within
> a week of the reference, or the owner suffers a 3 point penalty.  The owner 
> receives 5 points for each reference acked.  References include but are not
> limited to:  trips to Istanbul, but not Constantinople, Prosthetic Foreheads,
> and Rocks to Tie a String Around.
> 
> This rule does not apply retroactively.
> 
> G. Peefalt will be the initial owner of the Birdhouse.
> 
> -- G. Peefalt
> 
> 

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

Date: Fri, 20 Dec 1996 00:08:22 +0200 (EET)
From: Uri Bruck <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Bomb Shelter Donation

On Thu, 19 Dec 1996, T Joffrain wrote:

> 
> I do not believe this is necessary, but you are president... I ack the transfer.
> So I will bless the houses of Jammer (you asked, and now get it for free),
> Wayne, Robert Sevin and Mohammed in one industrial strength blessing (/w
> eight words of at least six syllables)
> 

This has to do with the proper management of funds. To keep them would
have been highly inappropriate. To return them, might have been offensive.
And I like reading all that poetry.

Niccolo Flychuck
A crisis a day President

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 13:32:10 -0900
From: Phil Ackley <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Harfmeister 

I am declaring P1578 Harfy

snowgod

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 13:35:15 -0900
From: Phil Ackley <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Harfmeister 

I am declaring P1586 Harfy and wondering whether G. Peefalt should be
burned as a heretic for denouncing the musical genius of They Might Be
Giants.

snowgod

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 13:38:16 -0900
From: Phil Ackley <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Treasure 

>> > Means nothing to me!This looks like it might be a bit of code, but it is
>> > too garbled up for me to translate!  Wanna give me a hint?
>> 	Got the documentation for uudecode?  Sure you do.  Look up the
>> -please option.  That should help.
>	I was just skimming through my sent-mail, and realized this was a
>rather rude thing to say!  I'm sorry, snowgod, it was all in jest.    :o.
>	I throw myself at the feet of whatever tower snowgod is on these
>days, and beg forgiveness.
>
>--Mohammed
>penitent
>(not a hint)
>parenthetical
>apologetical
>wasting bandwidth

Though I remain atop the Tower of bandwaidth, I grant forgivness to
Mohammed (who it should be noted has changed his current location to the
Tower).  I never took it for anything more than a jest in the first place :)

snowgod

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 13:32:59 -0900
From: Phil Ackley <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Harfmeister 

I am declaring P1579 Harfy.

snowgod

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 14:42:40 -0800 (PST)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Interpol Nightstick Treasure

> Due to a grevious bug in interpol, this will be either impossible or very
> difficult.  To wit:  the comparison operators don't work correctly for
> strings.  I found the mistake in the code, and it was a very stupid
> mistake.  If you don't feel like debugging my code yourself (and I don't
> blame you) you'll be able to pick up a new copy of interpol at

Actually, I think this will impossible or very difficult anyway,
without the ability to print scripts....

b

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 17:18:36 -0600 (CST)
From: T Joffrain <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Ackaphysicist: Report #3 

Report #3 is almost complete.

There will be accompanying pictures, which can't be included over email.
I'll send all the stuff to Malenkai, who maintains the ap page, so everyone
will be able to see the whole thing there. Hopefully everything will be done
before the weekend. Tonight if all goes well.

CnH
do you think I do this for free?... oh, I do?

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 18:34:15 EST 
From: [email-masked]
Subject: Acka: Auction

Habeous Corpus bids A$68 for the Monopole thingie.

HC

P.S.  Living in Oklahoma,  anyone who thinks I would intentionally call a
Tornado just to make a profit hasn't seen "Twister" yet.  (I haven't and
don't intend to,  living through the real thing was quite enough,  thank
you.)

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 18:43:22 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: vacation

Guy Fawkes wrote:
> 
> I have distributed all the proposals I have.  Until I return, send them
> to the Acting Tabulator, whoever volunteers for that.

Its actually acting Promoter, and I volunteer.  I note as of this moment
that Niccolo is the acting Promoter, so he should make a definitive 
statement as to whether he is appointing any (if there are any other)
volunteers, or keeping the job himself, etc.  He should also provide
an e-mail address for anyone who does not have the ropes of the game
yet, once a decision is made.

Guy did not distribute all of my proposals, but I will wait.

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 18:56:45 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Auction

[email-masked] wrote:

> P.S.  Living in Oklahoma,  anyone who thinks I would intentionally call a
> Tornado just to make a profit hasn't seen "Twister" yet.  (I haven't and
> don't intend to,  living through the real thing was quite enough,  thank
> you.)

I live in Pennsylvania, and we don't get many tornadoes.  However,
I wrote "Tornado" the night a tornado ripped through my neighorhood,
and although it was probably not up to par with midwestern tornadoes,
it was a pretty stunning experience.  I've never seen 200 year old trees
*swirl* like that before, and they make such an awful KABOOM! when they
come down, hopefully not on your house :)

Malenkai
has been through one tornado and one water spout

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 19:29:37 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 1586

Uri Bruck wrote:

> > Proposal 1586 -- Thu 19 Dec 12:50 CST 1996
> > Birdhouse in your Soul

> I think this rule is discriminating. I wouldn't know a TMGB refference if
> it leaped out at me from the monitor right now screaming and flailing its
> hands and had TMBG tattoed all over its forehead.

I would argue that it is not; it is more akin to Party Chess, The
Machine that Goes *ping*, or Games & Contests, inasmuch as it is
non-participatory if you do not have the interest, skill, or
knowledge required.

Only the player with the birdhouse suffers gain or loss, and you can
completely ignore it.  I would agree with you if the rules could 
somehow *force* a player to possess the birdhouse.

As far as giving away points to another player by inknowingly writing
a TMBG reference, I would think that would be so infrequent as to not
be a big deal, assuming "reference" had the right definition.

That brings me to my points about the proposal.  I think it is harfy, but
has the following potential problems:

1) reference is not well defined.  If I use the word "in", is that a 
reference to the song "Birdhouse *in* your Soul"?  What about words
like "Argonaut" or "night light" or "lighthouse"?

I would prefer if "reference" was better codified, or at least trivial
things were eliminated, and game custom could codify it over time.
Perhaps references to titles or "key lyricial elements" in excess of
4 words or something.

2) I would prefer that once a reference is acked, it no longer counts.
We use the phrase "Prosthetic Forehead" alot.  It seems like the owner
of the Birdhouse could post a message containing this phrase 51 times
and come pretty close to winning by acking their own post (I would also
prefer if the owner could only ack other players' posts).

It has the potential to be quite fun, but I would prefer it if it were
reworked to address some of these issues.

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 17:41:57 -0800 (PST)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Proposal 1586

> That brings me to my points about the proposal.  I think it is harfy, but
> has the following potential problems:
> 
> 1) reference is not well defined.  If I use the word "in", is that a 
> reference to the song "Birdhouse *in* your Soul"?  What about words
> like "Argonaut" or "night light" or "lighthouse"?
> 
> 2) I would prefer that once a reference is acked, it no longer counts.
> We use the phrase "Prosthetic Forehead" alot.  It seems like the owner
> of the Birdhouse could post a message containing this phrase 51 times
> and come pretty close to winning by acking their own post (I would also
> prefer if the owner could only ack other players' posts).

Or, the player could work a deal out with another player to feed em
references.

Rules that deal in points do need to be carefully scrutinized for any
potential for abuse.

b

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 22:24:23 -0600 (CST)
From: T Joffrain <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Auction 

>Habeous Corpus bids A$68 for the Monopole thingie.

CnH says A$69

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 20:46:00 -0800
From: [email-masked] (John Martin Lotz)
Subject: Acka:  What happened to Proposal 1519

As the author of 1519, "The size of things" I was curious to 
know when it was going to be posted as a Rule, or if I had
missed something somewhere.  I've searched Jammer, Size, 
and Thingee and cannot locate it
I've checked and there is a post dated 12-15-95 at 2:41 AM from 
Phil Ackley saying it passed, and I've seen later numbered proposals
posted in the Offical Rules?

Curiously
Jammer

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

Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 23:14:26 -0600 (CST)
From: T Joffrain <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  What happened to Proposal 1519 

Jammer

Your rule can be found on the web page. At least it was in my last weekly
download. And congratulations!

CnH

>Rule 1519/0 
>The Size of Things
>Jammer (John Lotz)
>
>     I wish to make a modest proposal. 
>
>     All Items in Acka have a size measured in thingees. 
>
>     Negligible 0 Thingees
>     Small 1 Thingees
>     Medium 2 Thingees
>     Large 4 Thingees
>     Huge 5 Thingees
>     Really Huge 6 Thingees
>
>     The significance of this is that all structures and land have a
capacity measured in Thingees as well;
>     a Space in a structure holds 10 Thingees
>     a Kaa of land holds 25 Thingeess
>     A Tower holds 6 Thingees 
>
>     Created by Proposal 1519, Dec 15 1996

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

End of Ackanomic Digest V1 #413
*******************************