Subject: Ackanomic Digest V1 #493
From: [email-masked] (Ackanomic Digest)
To: ackanomic-digest

Ackanomic Digest      Thursday, January 30 1997      Volume 01 : Number 493

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 16:43:29 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: RFC Timing

Bollinger, John C. wrote:

> that are not sent through an official mailing list and for which the
> Speaker is one of the designated recipients are deemed to have occured
> at the time that they are received by the Speaker's computer.

I would replace "computer" with "mail server".  Personally, I use POP3,
(which of course is basically is a download from my ISP's mail server,
and other speakers could use UUCP or other methods where the time it
is physically on their computer is way off from when it is "received"
on their server, where "received" is really meant to be construed as.

"mail server" isn't great either, how about "last mail relay host in the
chain", or "mail relay host".  Yuk.  You get the idea.  Or, better yet,
we get that coke money and acka buys the speaker a leased line to the
'net :).

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 15:48:29 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: RFC Timing

On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Bollinger, John C. wrote:

> {{ [ The Tabulator needs a break to avoid violating the rules
> involuntarilly. ] }}

The Promoter needs the same break to avoid an enumeration mess when 
closely-spaced proposals get reordered along the wire.  Saying that 
Proposals are distributed by the Promoter at the time of their inital 
timestamp or somesuch should do it.

Otherwise, it appears robust.

Guy Fawkes

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 15:54:58 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1698

Does this list ALL the acka-related lists in existence, or only the 
public fora?  More specifically, is acka-research going to be phased 
out?  Although it is seldom used, I do find it a good place to hold 
lengthy game-related discussions without clogging the main list with email 
not everyone might want to hear.  If this passes, I have an alternate 
heirarchy in mind that I will share when it becomes more fleshed out -- 
this provides an excellent framework, though, IMO.

Guy Fawkes

On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Jason Orendorff wrote:

> Proposal 1698
> Postal Code
> /dev/joe
> 
[big snip]
> 
>   ackanomic@wilma is the official mailing list.
>   ackanomic-digest@wilma is the digest version of this list.
>   acka-priv@wilma is an alternate form of ackanomic@wilma, suitable for
>   messages desiring a private reply.
> 
>   acka-games@wilma may only be used for actions pertaining to Games &
>   Contest games, treasure hunts, Grab-a-Donkey, and The Machine that
>   Goes *ping*.
>   acka-games-priv@wilma is an alternate form of acka-games@wilma, with the
>   same restrictions, but suitable for messages desiring a private reply.
>   ackanomic-digest@wilma is also the digest form of acka-games@wilma
> 
>   acka-chess@wilma may only be used for actions in Party Chess.
> 
>   acka-financial@wilma may only be used for trades or gifts of entities.
>   }}
> 

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 16:02:44 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: RFC Timing

On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Malenkai wrote:

> "mail server" isn't great either, how about "last mail relay host in the
> chain", or "mail relay host".  Yuk.  You get the idea.  Or, better yet,
> we get that coke money and acka buys the speaker a leased line to the
> 'net :).
> 
> Malenkai

Speaking of the coke money, it was once suggested that it should be used 
to buy a subscription to oed2.  Which makes me wonder...

It sounds only quasi-legal, if not completely illegal (it would 
definitely be illegal if anyone was going to profit off of it); anyone 
who knows for sure is invited to respond, but it might be possible to 
construct a bot at my email address that would put words emailed to it 
through uiuc's command-line oed2, and respond to the sender saying 
whether it was a word or not.  (It would also be illegal to have it send 
a definition or anything of that sort, copyright violation, but just the 
yes/no on its wordness might be acceptible.)

Any thoughts?

Guy Fawkes

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 17:16:24 -0500 (EST)
From: mr cwm <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Frinking

To:   Ackanomians
From: mr cwm, bartender

OK, the Festivities at the latest Public Gathering (I'm assuming it ended
when the Holiday ended?) worked out thusly: 

Big crisp PURPLE escargot seemed to be a munchie that would satisfy
everyone, so dig in.  (Having only one kind of munchie simplifies
clean-up.)

ThinMan ordered a single FrobozzCo Lemon-Lime, on the rocks.  There you
are, sir.  Our gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$1
tab.

breadbox ordered three coffee-and-Bailey's.  There you are, sir.  Our
gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$9 tab.  Uhhh ...
I'll call a taxi for you - would you prefer to pay for it or entertain us
with a Frinking Song? 

Strider ordered a God's Blessing.  There you are, sir.  Our gracious
President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$3 tab. 

Jammer ordered a caffine and cola fizz.  There you are, sir.  Our gracious
President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$1 tab.

snowgod ordered a Good Omen in a cantaloupe.  There you are, sir.  Our
gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$3 tab.

Swann ordered salt, a quartered lemon, and three shots of Tequila.  There
you are, sir.  Our gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your
A$6 tab.  Uhhh ... I'll call a taxi for you - would you prefer to pay for
it or entertain us with a Frinking Song? 

...

If anyone got more or less alcohol than expected, and, thus, has a tab
that's out of whack, just let me know and I'll be happy to make it right.
The Customer is King.  Or at least King-like.

- --------

Financier's info'

Niccolo Flychuck -23 : bar tab
mr cwm +12 : keeping bar
Treasury + 11 : Frobozz Ackanomic Beverage Account

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 16:22:22 -0600 (CST)
From: "Joseph W. DeVincentis" <devjoe>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1698

Guy Fawkes wrote:
> Does this list ALL the acka-related lists in existence, or only the 
> public fora?  

Only the public fora.

> More specifically, is acka-research going to be phased 
> out?  Although it is seldom used, I do find it a good place to hold 
> lengthy game-related discussions without clogging the main list with email 
> not everyone might want to hear. 

acka-research will remain, but it will not be considered a "public forum"
for any game action or official message.  It will be, as it always has
been, merely a discussion list.

> If this passes, I have an alternate heirarchy in mind that I will
> share when it becomes more fleshed out --  this provides an excellent
> framework, though, IMO.

This organization was merely meant to be a reasonable initial breakup
of the official "public" messages, and certainly not the final form.

/dev/joe

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 16:33:16 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Bond-harfing

If 1695 passes, I am more than willing to serve as bond-harfer; so unless 
you actually OPPOSE bonds, please vote to keep them around.

On a side note, are you (the citizenry of Acka) satisfied with the current 
mechanics of PFBonds, or would you prefer a model that encourages more 
trading?  I have an idea that the current model failed to simulate a 
stock market as intended because of the extremely small numbers of 
participants and bonds (as opposed to RL markets).  In Acka, some bonds 
are simply unavailable because their holders wish to keep all of their 
PF-derived income.  In RL, there is an essentially unlimited supply of 
stocks as long as you're willing to pay the price.  If there is interest, 
I'd be interested in developing a model to loosen up the market and 
encourage more trading.  Of course, if PF's are not important enough to 
the average player, I'll save the effort for else.

Guy Fawkes
wasting a lot of bandwidth today

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 16:36:46 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1698

On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Joseph W. DeVincentis wrote:

> acka-research will remain, but it will not be considered a "public forum"
> for any game action or official message.  It will be, as it always has
> been, merely a discussion list.

Would it be possible to set the reply-to address on proposals to 
acka-research (or create an acka-discussion list, if you prefer); thereby 
putting the official (the proposal) on the main list and not cluttering 
with the very interesting but still not absolutely-vital-to-all-those-
playing-the-game (the discussion thereof)?

Guy Fawkes

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 17:44:06 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Bond-harfing

Guy Fawkes wrote:
> 
> If 1695 passes, I am more than willing to serve as bond-harfer; so unless
> you actually OPPOSE bonds, please vote to keep them around.

Whether or not you oppose bonds, please vote yes for P 1695 (and the
grave-harfer one).  I purposely structured it so that it still takes
basically a 2/3 vote to repeal the bonds, but in either case the
work is redistributed/eliminated.  Also, if people are truly
disinterested in the bonds, as I am, I saw no reason to keep them
around and for *me* to harf them.  OTOH, it seems we have a volunteer :)

The reason I did not go with the assistant financier option is that
in order to comply with the rules, I still had to verify the
results, so it didn't help much.  I believe I shall propose the
repeal of the assistant financiers, as they have no official status
anyway, and can still help under the auspices of R 101.

And please, waste bandwidth :)

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 17:26:00 -0600
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Proposal 1701

Proposal 1701
Creation of a PartyChessPiece Sniper
Guy Fawkes

Create a new rule, a member of the Party Chess Rule Suite, with text as 
follows.

{{[If we're going to have a bunch of Pretty Powerful Party Pieces, we 
might as well have some Kinda Cool Creative Countermeasures, somewhat 
like the Marshall-Spy relationship in Stratego.]}}

1.  A Sniper is respresented by the ASCII character S.
2.  A Sniper can move exactly two squares in any horizontal or vertical 
direction, provided the intervening squre is unoccupied, or exactly one 
square in any diagonal direction.  It may capture using this move.
3.  Alternately, when capturing a piece of material value 9 or higher, it 
may move up to N spaces in any horizontal or vertical direction, jumping over 
any intervening pieces.  N for this purpose is defined as 2/3 the 
captured piece's material value, rounded to the nearest integer.
4.  A Sniper which makes a capture via the method defined in 3, above, 
may either remain a Sniper or promote to a Kamikaze.  If the controlling 
Swinger does not specify which option he wishes to take in the message 
which announced the capture, the Sniper does not promote.
5.  A Sniper's material value is 5.

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 17:25:58 -0600
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Proposal 1700

Proposal 1700
Prime Otzma
Niccolo Flychuck

This is A Modest proposal.
In R1240.1 delete section VI

Create a new rule entitled "Prime Otzma", as a member of the Otzma Card
Rule Suite which contains the following text:
"
Whenever a non-Null proposal whose proposal number is prime accepted, one
Otzma Card is created. The type of Card is selected with equal probability
from the legal Otzma Card type, the creation of which would not exceed any
limits set by the rules of this Rule Suite. It is the duty of the
RuneMaker to determine the type of Otzma Card, and Auction it in either a
public or private Auction."

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 17:28:34 -0600 (CST)
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Postal Code RFC

> > Do we really want to make that a hard-and-fast rule, punishable via
> > CFCJ? It might be better to simply designate each list to a particular
> > purpose, but allow incorrect posts to occasionally occur.
> I believe it was Mohammed who objected to that possibility that game
> actions that a player cared about could be missed due to being posted
> on an inappropriate public list which that player didn't subscribe to.
	It was.  I still hold that position and I'll vote for this 
proposal as is.

- --Mohammed

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 17:30:56 -0600 (CST)
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Evil Twins

> I hereby announce that I agree to be snowgod's Evil Twin, if he agrees
> to be mine.
	Ah, yes.

	I announce that I agree to be Calvin N Hobbes' Evil Twin, if he 
agrees to be mine.

- --Mohammed

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:05:52 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Expert

I wish the senate to vote on conferring expert status to me in
the areas of Internomic and Loophole Surfing (again).

In terms of Internomic, I have written 4 internomic props, maintain
the Internomic web pages, keep up with the game should I need to
fill in for the ambassador, and of course loophole surfed Acka to
winning the first game of Internomic (where is my Frobozz trinket :))

In terms of Loophole Surfing, think of it as expertese in descerning
differences between the way the rules and RFCs are written and the
way they are intended (and should) work, and strengthening the rules 
and RFCs by exploiting and fixing these differences.  Of course, Loophole
Surfing is a much cleaner way to put it.  The CFJ, AOJ, and proposal
archives should be ample evidence of this expertese, despite the fact
that I have reformed the exploitive end of it, for the most part :(.
As for it being too broad of a category (which was the reason it was
denied last time), it seems as if its closer to too narrow than too
broad, but it is a small dimension that covers a large scope, and
expertese in it is something nice to have in a nomic :-).

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 16:21:18 -0800 (PST)
From: Brian Raiter <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Frinking

> Big crisp PURPLE escargot seemed to be a munchie that would satisfy
> everyone, so dig in.  (Having only one kind of munchie simplifies
> clean-up.)

*Crisp* escargot? Oh, dear.

> breadbox ordered three coffee-and-Bailey's.  There you are, sir.
> Our gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$9 tab.
> Uhhh ...  I'll call a taxi for you - would you prefer to pay for it
> or entertain us with a Frinking Song?

What? I don't need a taxi! This is *Bailey's*. You couldn't intoxicate
a six-year-old with three shots of this! And anyway, I was planning on
walking home! Hey! Wait ... no, don't ... this is embarrass....

Oh, all right.

<ahem>

When my duties drag on, when work drags me down,
    And my spirits won't stop sinking,
I grab a flagon, and I hit the town,
    And find spirits fit for frinking.

[chorus: louder and faster]
    When all the spirits in my body are sinking,
That's when I seek spirits in bottles for frinking,
    That's when the spirits in bottles start sinking
And shrinking and clinking and thinking of frinking!

Now I've had a few, and a few munchies, too.
    The bartender's smiling and winking.
He hails a taxicab, and he faxes my tab,
    And the President pays for my frinking!

Can I go now?

b

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:34:45 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1695

Jason Orendorff wrote:
> 
> Proposal 1695
> Overworked II - Bond-Harfer
> Malenkai

In accordance with R 923, I am purchasing an amber banana from
Techno's banana tree.

Malenkai -10 amber banana
Techno +10 amber banana

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 16:47:34 -0800
From: Stephen McCulley <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Frinking

mr cwm wrote:
> 
> To:   Ackanomians
> From: mr cwm, bartender
> 
> OK, the Festivities at the latest Public Gathering (I'm assuming it ended
> when the Holiday ended?) worked out thusly:
> 
> Big crisp PURPLE escargot seemed to be a munchie that would satisfy
> everyone, so dig in.  (Having only one kind of munchie simplifies
> clean-up.)
> 
> ThinMan ordered a single FrobozzCo Lemon-Lime, on the rocks.  There you
> are, sir.  Our gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$1
> tab.
> 
> breadbox ordered three coffee-and-Bailey's.  There you are, sir.  Our
> gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$9 tab.  Uhhh ...
> I'll call a taxi for you - would you prefer to pay for it or entertain us
> with a Frinking Song?
> 
> Strider ordered a God's Blessing.  There you are, sir.  Our gracious
> President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$3 tab.
> 
> Jammer ordered a caffine and cola fizz.  There you are, sir.  Our gracious
> President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$1 tab.
> 
> snowgod ordered a Good Omen in a cantaloupe.  There you are, sir.  Our
> gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your A$3 tab.
> 
> Swann ordered salt, a quartered lemon, and three shots of Tequila.  There
> you are, sir.  Our gracious President Niccolo Flychuck will pick up your
> A$6 tab.  Uhhh ... I'll call a taxi for you - would you prefer to pay for
> it or entertain us with a Frinking Song?
> 
> ...
> 
> If anyone got more or less alcohol than expected, and, thus, has a tab
> that's out of whack, just let me know and I'll be happy to make it right.
> The Customer is King.  Or at least King-like.
> 
> --------
> 
> Financier's info'
> 
> Niccolo Flychuck -23 : bar tab
> mr cwm +12 : keeping bar
> Treasury + 11 : Frobozz Ackanomic Beverage Account
All hail the President, whose generosity knows no bounds!

- --Strider

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:48:27 -0500
From: Dan Knapp (A.K.A. TheWiz) <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1695 

> In accordance with R 923, I am purchasing an amber banana from
> Techno's banana tree.
>
> Malenkai -10 amber banana
> Techno +10 amber banana

  You know, I do believe you can't eat it, now, as R 923 says "upon
purchase ... is eating the amber banana".  The question now is whether you
can buy another one...

- -Red Barn

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:53:07 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1695

Dan Knapp (A.K.A. TheWiz) wrote:

>   You know, I do believe you can't eat it, now, as R 923 says "upon
> purchase ... is eating the amber banana".  The question now is whether you
> can buy another one...

I had no intention of eating it.  I wanted one for my collection.

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 16:00:37 -0900
From: Phil Ackley <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Frinking 

>All hail the President, whose generosity knows no bounds!
>
>
>--Strider

And the two term ex-president who brought Public Frinking at the prez's
expense to Ackanomic!

snowgod

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:01:08 -0600 (CST)
From: T Joffrain <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Evil Twins 

>I announce that I agree to be Calvin N Hobbes' Evil Twin, if he 
>agrees to be mine.
>
>--Mohammed

I do indeed!

CnH

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:17:19 -0600
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Proposal 1702

Proposal 1702
al Creation of a Party Chess Piece Transmogrifier
Guy Fawkes

1.  A Transmogrifier is represented by the ASCII character X.
2.  A Transmogrifier can move up to three squares in any single direction.
3.  Each extant Transmogrifier has its own Transmogrification Index, or 
TI.  When created, a Transmogrifier has a TI of 20.  Upon making a 
capture, a Transmogrifier may Transmogrify any one piece within N squares in 
any horizontal, vertical, or diagonal direction, where N is the material 
value of the just-captured piece.

When a piece is Transmogrified, it is destroyed, and a new piece is 
instantly created and placed on the square the just-Transmogrified piece 
occupied when it was destroyed.  The absolute value of the difference 
between the Transmogrified piece's material value and the new 
piece's material value is subtracted from the Transmogrifier's TI.  If 
this would result in a negative TI, the Trasmogrification cannot take place.

A Transmogrification takes place if and only if the Swinger controlling the 
Transmogrifying Transmogrifier unambiguously specifies a legal 
Transmogrification in the same post as he makes the capture which opens 
the possibility of Transmogrifcation.

Kings cannot be Transmogrified, nor can Kings be Created through 
Transmogrification.

4.  A Transmogrifier has a material value of 12.

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:17:20 -0600
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Proposal 1703

Proposal 1703
*pinging* the Machine
Malenkai

This is a Modest proposal.

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

Amend Rule 1209, "The Machine That Goes *ping*", to replace:

"
      VIII. If the Machine has gone *ping* thirty times during the
current Scholar's term, the Scholar must, within three days of the
30th *ping*, publically post the Machine's truth in its undisguised
form. 

      When the Scholar posts the undisguised truth, any active player
may, within the next three days, submit a CFCJ that the Scholar violated
the rules of his duties during the current Scholar's term. If no player
does so in that time, or if the returned verdict is FALSE, the Scholar
receives 50 A$ for his services, and the Machine randomly teleports
itself to another active player's Home. 
"

with:

"
      VIII. If the Machine has gone *ping* thirty times during the
current Scholar's term, the Scholar must, within three days of the
30th *ping*, publically post the Machine's truth in its undisguised
form. 

      When the Scholar posts the undisguised truth as directed by this
section, the Machine randomly teleports itself to another active
player's Home. 
"

{{[the CFCJ business is extraneous; the clause about the money appears
to scope beyond section VIII, which was not intended, I would guess.
Also, the scholar has most likely already received a boon, making this
subgame payoff structure well out of line with other subgames to
start with.  That's ok, but there is no reason to throw twice what
the web-harfer makes in a month on top of that :)]}}

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:17:21 -0600
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Proposal 1705

Proposal 1705
Keys and Mongeese
/dev/joe

The yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee mongoose is the official animal
of Ackanomic.

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:17:22 -0600
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Proposal 1706

Proposal 1706
Reducing the ruleset size by a factor of 0.0006137
Malenkai

This is a Modest proposal.

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

Amend Rule 412, "Financier and Free Market", to replace the following text:

"
      The Privileges of the Financier are: 

      a) To appoint up to 2 assistants, to help in gathering, 
maintaining, and publishing information pertaining to the above. These
assistants may resign. These assistants are not Officers. 

      b) To receive the usual salary for a Functional Officer. 
"

with:

"
{{the title of assistant to the financier is removed from anyone who
has it.  [deleting the clauses above does not change the way the
game is played in any way.]}}
"

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:17:21 -0600
From: Jason Orendorff <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka:  Proposal 1704

Proposal 1704
unSneeking the Active Player definition change
Malenkai

This is a Modest proposal.

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

Amend R 254, "Player States", to replace:

"
A Pending player becomes Active when it becomes publically knowable
that he has voted or made a proposal.
"

with:

"
A Pending player becomes Active when it becomes publically knowable
that he has voted on a proposal.
"

{{[first of all, this was snuck (?) into the player reorg despite acka's
opposition to the idea (qv P 1549), but the players reorg was worth it.
Remember, active player was defined the way it was because of the Quorum
Crisis, therefore voting is the appropriate criteria.  Also, voting
seems more of an indication that your feet are on the ground than 
submitting a proposal.  This also fixes the case where votes on other
things such as elections and subgames do not count.]}}

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 19:24:42 -0600 (CST)
From: "Joseph W. DeVincentis" <devjoe>
Subject: Acka: Result of my studies

I have waited 3 long days in the Monument to Futility.  My research here
has revealed to me this bit of insight:

I wish to bribe Tammany to vote silent on the proposal that contains
the words yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee and mongoose. (Proposal 1705)

/dev/joe

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 20:24:27 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1705

Jason Orendorff wrote:
> 
> Proposal 1705
> Keys and Mongeese
> /dev/joe
> 
> The yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee mongoose is the official animal
> of Ackanomic.

I am declaring this proposal Harfy.  /dev/joe as the Harfmeister?
Acka *has* been crazy lately ;)

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 20:48:18 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Result of my studies

Joseph W. DeVincentis wrote:

> I wish to bribe Tammany to vote silent on the proposal that contains
> the words yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee and mongoose. (Proposal 1705)

/dev/joe is *very* lucky.  To my knowledge, it is not publically knowable
that he had permission to go to the Monument of Futility, therefore
I believe he is not there, nor did he wait there three days.

However, the map to Treasure 103 had some gizz in it.  It simply read:

- ----
Publically announce that you wish to bribe Tammany to vote silent on
proposal <X>, where X is a proposal under consideration, and X contains
the words yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee and mongoose.  You need not
actually bribe tammany, but you must make the public announcement.
- ----

I have the derivation of the map, which I will post later, unless 
/dev/joe wishes to share, in detail, the solution process.  I find it
very interesting that he got the part of it he got without getting it
right; I am especially interested in how that happened, and how the
Limerick finally gave it away.  I thought it was a givaway with the
Tuba parade a while back, guess not.

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 20:33:29 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1695

I, too, shall buy an amber banana, as my proposal 1668 does add to 21.

Guy Fawkes -10 amber banana
Techno +10 amber banana

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 20:36:57 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1695

On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Malenkai wrote:

> I had no intention of eating it.  I wanted one for my collection.

Malenkai, is this your first amber banana ever?

Any player whose proposal number, when having its digits added together, 
equals exactly 21 [ex. prop 777], shall have the right to purchase one 
Amber Banana from Techno's Amber Banana Tree. 

One could argue that this rule does indeed say one rather than once per 
proposal which adds to 21.

CFJ, anyone?  (I already have my share in the queue.)

Guy Fawkes

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 21:42:57 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1695

Guy Fawkes wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Malenkai wrote:
> 
> > I had no intention of eating it.  I wanted one for my collection.
> 
> Malenkai, is this your first amber banana ever?

Its actually my third, I believe.  Game custom construes "one"
to be "one" at the time, as opposed to "two" at the time.

There was also a CFJ under similar circumstances with similar
language claiming only one vote per the life of ackanomic, which
strengthened that game custom.  I believe it was CFJ 220.

In any case, the language is not "clearly" in favor of your contruction,
therefore game custom and spirit of the game render it in favor of
the customary one.

Malenkai
been there :)

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 20:49:51 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1704

On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Jason Orendorff wrote:

> {{[first of all, this was snuck (?) into the player reorg despite acka's
> opposition to the idea (qv P 1549), but the players reorg was worth it.

"snuck" isn't exactly appropriate.  Players reorg was P1552, distributed 
exactly one minute after 1549 when the majority of Acka probably hadn't 
even received it, much less voted against it.  I put it in there because 
it sounded like a decent idea (especially with the slow Tabulation of the 
time where a player could be actively playing yet not active for nearly 
two weeks after joining the game.)  Experience has since proved 
otherwise, and I will vote for this, but please, don't call experiments 
with various mechanics sneaking.

Guy Fawkes 

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 20:53:33 -0600 (CST)
From: Guy Fawkes <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1702

> On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Malenkai wrote:
> 
> > Jason Orendorff wrote:
> > >
> > > Proposal 1702
> > > al Creation of a Party Chess Piece Transmogrifier
> > > Guy Fawkes
> >
> > This probably should be retracted and re-submitted to be
> > added to the PCRS.
> >
> > Malenkai

Thanks to my poor typing [submit propos al], it wouldn't be a valid PCPD
rule anyway.  :)
 
I retract P1702.
 
- -2 Guy Fawkes, retraction (again)

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 21:00:03 -0600 (CST)
From: "Joseph W. DeVincentis" <devjoe>
Subject: Re: Acka: Result of my studies

Malenkai wrote:
> /dev/joe is *very* lucky.  To my knowledge, it is not publically knowable
> that he had permission to go to the Monument of Futility, therefore
> I believe he is not there, nor did he wait there three days.

In my message three days ago, I quoted the message which initially
created the Monument to Futility, which granted public permission
to visit the Monument.

In Malenkai's prayer to the weather gods at the beginning of November
(re-used in January), the following sequence of numbers appeared:

3.13 749 106 594 5 1 93 6 11 322 51 322 3 13 8 590 39 372 -20 647 -92
93 35 50 18 960 -15 554 34 964 3 4 4 524 12 1038 23 651 17 818 52 896 -3
5 15 5 21 5 18 57 -1 1 -21 16 26 14 -2 14 -1 651 17 770 28 208 3 458 83
340 146 254 42 254 61 254 0 254 66 254 26 254 -27 254 27 254 -25 254 29
254 11 428 5 102 24 1063 29 57 -1 109 34 30 -9 ...

I stared at these numbers many times, trying to discern their meaning.
The large span of numbers (-92 to 1063), the preponderance of small
numbers, and the long alternating sequence of 254's and other numbers
toward the end of the message made it unlikely that this was ASCII
undergoing some transformation, as was true of several previous
treasures I have found.

At some point, I had an inspiration that the large numbers could
represent proposal numbers, and the smaller numbers represented
offsets into the proposal, with the negative numbers being offsets
from the end of the proposal instead of the beginning.  (My recent
experience in Python programming made this assumption a natural one;
it uses this convention except that the offsets from the beginning
start at 0 for the first item in a list, or first character in a
string.)

However, I wasn't sure if the offsets counted words, characters,
letters, or what.  Some of the offsets were too large to represent
words within some of the proposals, and I couldn't imagine what
message would alternate word 254 so many times with other words
(and P340 doesn't even have 254 words).  However, applying it to
letters, alpha-numeric characters, all non-whitespace characters,
and some other possibilities didn't make any reasonable message.

A few weeks ago I was discussing this with breadbox, who also had
tried to apply this sort of code to Malenkai's numbers and didn't
come up with anything.

Still, it seemed more natural for such a code to work with words,
so when I requested a Duel with Malenkai, I posted a message in
the first code I tried, one where large numbers represent proposal
numbers and smaller numbers represent words within the proposal.

I wrote: 573 18  1199 -9  308 9  1086 17 18  654 7      701 -9
Meaning: I       know     it     depends on  proposals  somehow

And Malenkai responded:
Perhaps you meant to say 573 18 1199 -9 308 9 1086 17 561 33 654 7 701 -9.
(561 33 is another possible "on" in the same code.)

The fact that Malenkai rejected having two different offsets after
one proposal number led me to rethink my ideas about the encoding
scheme.  I initial rejected the idea that the numbers were in
pairs of proposal number followed by offset because some of the
numbers that would be proposal numbers would be too small.  Forced
to reconsider this possibility, an idea that came to mind was that
all the proposal numbers had 300 subtracted from them (i.e., for the
purposes of the code, they were numbered starting with 1 instead of
301).  This also solved the problem of the 254's.  I quickly checked
the date on proposal 1363 (the largest proposal number which would be
involved in the code by this method) and I found it to have been
posted before the code was first posted, so the method stood a chance
of being correct, so I started decoding.

I quickly found that the 3.13 at the beginning (which I had mostly
ignored as dressing, as the numbers were posted as an approximation
to pi) actually was the first pair of numbers.  The message decoded
as follows:

3.13 749 106 594 5 1 93 6 11 322 51 322 3 13 8 590 39   372 -20  
a    simple  map   to   a    key    to    a    valuable treasure
647 -92 93 35  50 18 960 -15    554 34 964 3 4 4 524 12  1038 23
simply  follow these directions go     to    the tallest tower  
651 17     818 52 896 -3  5 15 5 21 5 18 57 -1 
publically say    quietly vote for  the  yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee
1 -21    16 26 14 -2 14 -1 651 17     770 28   208 3 458 83 340 146
mongoose wait  3     days  publically announce that  you    wish
254 42 254 61 254 0 254 66 254 26 254 -27 254 27 254 -25 254 29   254 11
to     bribe  ***** to     vote   silent  on     the     proposal that
428 5    102 24 1063 29 57 -1                         109 34 30 -9 ...
contains the    words   yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee and    mongoose

The "254 0" doesn't fit in with this code exactly, but the context makes
it clear that 0 means to use the proposal's title, "Tammany".

I wasn't sure if this meant Malenkai would make the proposal after seeing
the first message, or if I was supposed to do it, but when the 3-day
mark was coming around, having not seen the specified proposal, I
made it myself.

/dev/joe

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 22:51:34 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka:  Proposal 1704

Guy Fawkes wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Jason Orendorff wrote:
> 
> > {{[first of all, this was snuck (?) into the player reorg despite acka's
> > opposition to the idea (qv P 1549), but the players reorg was worth it.
> 
> "snuck" isn't exactly appropriate.

"snuck" should be construed as "sneaking" (sorry) a functional change
of the way the game is played in with a reorg, and not construed
offensively.  I generally try to decouple those two acts, as I believe
I have discussed at length in the RFC stage of reorg III regarding
changing the functionality of "The Size of Things".  The reason
for that is that I do not wish to bully anyone into a functional change
because I know they will vote for the reorg, or give people a reason to
vote no for needed work, or make people feel unconfortable about voting
for bug fixes that will benefit the game.  Please do not construe this
as me believing you had this intent, it is how *I* feel :)

To me, that is "sneaky", and was how I use the word "snuck", and I
apologize if it offended anyone.  It happens in politics and government
all the time, and they use forms of "to sneak", at least in the press,
to describe it ("party X snuck a rider about highway funds into the
Tax Act Technical Corrections Bill").  I almost voted no on the proposal
because of it, but voted yes and felt bullied.  Again, do not construe
that I believe you were bullying :)
  
>  Players reorg was P1552

To set the record straigt, the rule change I aim to reverse was
generated by proposal 1577 (or rule 1577, which I believe was generated
by proposal 1577), if that matters to anyone.

Again, I apologize for any offense, and will keep my language as
neutral as I am capable of in the future, if that is what you would
feel most confortable with :)

Malenkai

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

Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1997 23:44:49 -0500
From: Malenkai <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Result of my studies

Joseph W. DeVincentis wrote:

> In my message three days ago, I quoted the message which initially
> created the Monument to Futility, which granted public permission
> to visit the Monument.

Granted public permission to *enter* it.  I guess I misconstrued that.

> In Malenkai's prayer to the weather gods at the beginning of November
> (re-used in January), the following sequence of numbers appeared:

I'm curious if you started thinking about this after the November
post, or January post.

> I wrote: 573 18  1199 -9  308 9  1086 17 18  654 7      701 -9
> Meaning: I       know     it     depends on  proposals  somehow

This is what I was referring to.  I was suprised that you figured this
out, but did not have the code.  I thought it would be too obvious if
I did not subtract the 300.

The numbers translated to:  

A simple map to a key to a valuable treasure.  Simply follow these
directions.  Go to the tallest tower.  Say quietly vote for
the yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee mongoose.  Wait 3 days.  Publically
announce that you wish to bribe Tammany to vote silent on the proposal
that contains the words yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee and mongoose.

Only the last line was actually needed.

I threw the gizz in for two reasons, to make the message longer, and
to simulate a treasure hunt more, where the actions of a player may
indicate they are approaching the treasure, to give more information
to others.  I thought the yeenewkleorrrrmeeesseilllllee would give it
away to anyone who ever read the proposal archives, and was trying to
figure it out as well.  I couldn't believe when breadbox re-submitted
the proposal with that word in it.  I figured if anyone else figured it
out while /dev/joe was waiting, they would see the wait 3 days as well,
anyway.  I just wanted to give more than one person a chance at 
figuring it out, based on the actions of someone who had.

BTW, did anything in the parades help, such as "254 votes", or anything
else.

BBTW, when are you going to find the other 2 treasures of Jara :)

Malenkai

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

End of Ackanomic Digest V1 #493
*******************************