Subject: ackanomic Digest V4 #261
From: [email-masked]
To: ackanomic digest users <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 1999 00:00:01 -0400 (EDT)

ackanomic Digest	Monday, September 27 1999	Volume: 04  Issue: 261

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Subject: Acka: Vacation
From: Joseph DeVincentis <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 00:41:57 -0400 (EDT)

In all threads of Ackanomic in which Vacation is defined, I go on vacation
with an expected return date of October 2, and name JT as my acting officer
for Tabulator and Promoter.

/dev/joe

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

From: JT <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Vacation
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 01:36:33 -0400 (EDT)

On Mon, 27 Sep 1999, Joseph DeVincentis wrote:
> In all threads of Ackanomic in which Vacation is defined, I go on vacation
> with an expected return date of October 2, and name JT as my acting officer
> for Tabulator and Promoter.

In all threads which I am named acting Tabulator and Promoter, I accept
these acting officerships.

--JT

-- 
[-------------------------------------------------------------------------]
[ Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.                  ]
[ It's hard to seize the day when you must first grapple with the morning ]
[-------------------------------------------------------------------------]

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From: Graeme Jefferis <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: CFJ in thread 2.
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 09:23:50 -0400 (EDT)

> In the invalid (kernel) thread, I submit a CFJ which
> 
> *agrees that there is only one rule, the rule created by Malenkai's Kernel.

I vote TRUE.

 -Grimace. I'm missing a spindle.

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

From: Mueller <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Thread Split
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 12:53:41 -0400 (EDT)

K 2 wrote:
>Mueller wrote:
>> 
>> So we are in a thread split where 4371 was or was not a null proposal.
>> 
>> In the Null-Thread we currently have no CFJ on the issue but should one be
>> made, it will be assigned to EA!P!^H^H^H^H^H  
>
>...assigned by the speaker of the other thread to reduce the possiblity
>of self invalidating threads.
>
>Given the interest in Ackanomic Lite I'd say that game exists now
>regardles of weather Ackanomic Pro bought it into existance or not, so
>any CFJ in the Lite version regarding its existance should return true.
>All that remains is to determine if the Ackanomic Pro game state
>has/will merge with the Lite version....

So... A crisis in Acka is spawning a new game?  Just out of curiosity, are
any of the players in the new game "nomic platonists"?

>Presonally given how The Proposal is worded it, it is clear that a rule
>should have been created and indeed what text was to compse the new rule
>all that it lacks are the words which make it so. 
          ^^^^^^^^     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I am stupified.  I thought that THE RULES defined the gamestate and hence
the form of the rules mattered.  

I always knew that Acka's most important ruleset was the unspoken custom
we'd developed and that the rules worked within this framework so Acka was
a little "looser" than some other nomics, but I always thought that blatant
violations of the text of the rules would at least be justified by
reference to CUSTOM.

In this case we have violations that occuring simply because we feel like it.

In what way is this a game of nomic if we change rules around but always
ignore them.  There are no tangled hierarchies, there is no clever
boostrapping in the interplay of game and players, all that's left is
people arguing over a bit of irrelevant literature (and poorly written
literature at that, if its function has become something other than its
strict meaning).

>                                                   I don't think the
>implicit creation was ambiguous...
>
>K 2
>in both threads.

Studge

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

From: [email-masked] (John Bollinger)
Subject: Acka: Proposal 4371 NULL.
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 12:56:22 -0400 (EDT)

I have to agree that P 4371 was, if not null, ineffective.  It is clear,
however, that the point is moot.  Fat-ackanomic is dead, whether because
of self destruction or by rebirth as kernel Ackanomic.  The reason matters
not, unless some few wish to try to continue fat-acka.  I wish luck to any
such, but I fear that the departure of so many central Ackan figures spells
doom for it.

I wave a sad goodbye to Alfvaen, and hope that something more interesting
will attract him back in a few months' time.

Alas, poor nomic!  I knew it, IdiotBoy: a game of infinite harf, of most
excellent fancy: it hath hung me from its underside by suction cups a
thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is.

I leave any nomic whose ruleset is greater than 50kB in size.

John "ThinMan" Bollinger

Good night, sweet prince, and flights of angels see thee to thy rest.
-- Shakespeare, Hamlet

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

From: "Bollinger, John Clayton" <[email-masked]>
Subject: RE: CFJ in thread 2.
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 13:28:06 -0400 (EDT)

Gabe Drummond-Cole wrote:

> In the invalid (kernel) thread, I submit a CFJ which 
> 
> *agrees that there is only one rule, the rule created by Malenkai's
> Kernel.
> 
> I vote FALSE on it.  
> 
> You all have 3 days (7 if you spread it out) to vote FALSE or TRUE,
> publicly.  If the consensus judgement holds this FALSE, I will cease
> harfing this thread's gamestate and consider it invalid.
> 
Well, I am playing a game called Ackanomic, in which this
appears to be a Call for Judgement, and in which the statement
is clearly TRUE.  I so vote on this CFJ.

Until very recently I was playing a completely different
game, very confusingly also named Ackanomic, in which the
statement was false, but that is irrelevant.

I wonder whether this is what happened to the Ancients?

John "ThinMan" Bollinger

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

From: [email-masked] (John Bollinger)
Subject: Re: Acka: Tendering my resignationsXy
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 13:32:40 -0400 (EDT)

David Scheidt wrote:

>On Sat, 25 Sep 1999, Emperor Ai Pedrito wrote:
>
>> At 03:04 PM 9/25/99 -0400, you wrote:
>> >At IdiotBoy's request, I resign:
>> 
>> I meant rufus. 
>
>I thik I am speaker in the rkernel thread, then.

I think you are not.  I refrain from saying whether or not I think there
_is_ a Speaker at the moment, but I refer all players to the rule.  The
Speaker and Succession section permits the Speaker to abdicate -- and I
accept "resign" as a synonym -- but ....  I dare not say more, for reasons
that should be apparent to anyone who reads that section of the rule.
(My second statement above provides a clue for those who find themselves
without one.)

Since I don't believe David is or has ever been the Speaker, I also don't
think there have been any proposals yet.  This can be cleared up fairly
easilly, but I urge David to take the necessary step before anyone tries
to call for judgement on the matter.

As a corollary, I don't think that the Official Mailing List has been
chamnged from [email-masked].

John "ThinMan" Bollinger

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

From: David Scheidt <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Re: Tendering my resignationsXy
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 13:57:10 -0400 (EDT)

On Mon, 27 Sep 1999, John Bollinger wrote:

> 
> David Scheidt wrote:
> 
> >On Sat, 25 Sep 1999, Emperor Ai Pedrito wrote:
> >
> >> At 03:04 PM 9/25/99 -0400, you wrote:
> >> >At IdiotBoy's request, I resign:
> >> 
> >> I meant rufus. 
> >
> >I thik I am speaker in the rkernel thread, then.
> 
> I think you are not.  I refrain from saying whether or not I think there
> _is_ a Speaker at the moment, but I refer all players to the rule.  The

If there is no speaker, I am speaker.  

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

From: [email-masked] (John Bollinger)
Subject: Re:  Acka: Re: Tendering my resignationsXy
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 14:43:11 -0400 (EDT)

IB wrote:
>On Mon, 27 Sep 1999, David Scheidt wrote:
>
>> > >I thik I am speaker in the rkernel thread, then.
>
>Maybe I'm looney, but i took this to mean, there is no Speaker, I am
>taking the job.

According to the rule, if there is no Speaker then the player who points
it out becomes Speaker.  Such an observation has _still_ not been made.
(Whether or not it would be correct.)  I am only willing to go with a
certain amount of "Fast & Loose"-brand nomic lubrication.  What's the
point of playing nomic if we gloss over the details?  The details are
where the interesting parts of a generic nomic like this one are found.

As for the "that is clearly what I meant" argument:

(1) It was not clear.  In particular, it was not clear whether David thought
    that he was assigned the Speakership under the successorship clause, by
    virtue of Gabe naming him as the player who asked him to resign.  Nor
    was it clear, for that matter, that David did not think that he had
    become Speaker via some other, non-rule-defined means.

(2) Whether or not David's intent was clear is irrelevant anyway.  The rule
    is not concerned with intent, it is concerned with event.  No event has
    yet occurred to cause David to be Speaker.

Please don't take this the wrong way, but if this version of Acka is going
be run so loosely then I have no interest in it.  I realize that this little
hiccup sets things back a bit, but if we are going to build a new Acka then
we had best start on a firm foundation.  I am reminded of CFJ 113 of the
old Acka -- early in the game it set what I and several others believe to
have been a bad precedent, and that precedent had reverberations across all
the rest of Ackan history.  This game is on shaky enough ground with most
players' version of its genesis; let's right the ship.

After some more players have had a chance to weigh in on this issue, if
there is a Speaker and if he disagrees with my view then I will go ahead
with a CFJ.

John "ThinMan" Bollinger

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

From: [email-masked] (John Bollinger)
Subject: Re:  Acka:  The gamestate
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 17:32:28 -0400 (EDT)

David Scheidt wrote:

>I believe these thing about the game state:
>
>I am speaker.
>[email-masked] is the mailing list for ackanomic.

I agree that he is Speaker, but I disagree about the Official Mailing List.
I hold that although David is Speaker now, he only became so this afternoon,
and since doing so he has not changed the Official Mailing List from the
default value.  The only previous Speaker also did not change the OML,
therefore it is still [email-masked].

The central question is when David became Speaker.  If he was not Speaker
before then he bacame Speaker this afternoon when he pointed out that there
was no Speaker.  (If he was already Speaker then the statement was false but
had no effect.)  He did not previously make any such observation in a public
message.  He did, in response to Gabe's abdication as Speaker, write "I thik
[sic] that makes me Speaker."  [from memory]  Was this effective in making
him Speaker?

According to section V of the rule:
      Whenever any Player who is not the Speaker correctly
      points out in a Public Message that no Player is the
      Speaker, or that the Speaker has not sent a Public
      Message within the past 7 days, or that the Speaker
      has broken (or attempted to break) the Rules, then
      the notifying Player becomes the Speaker.  Alternatively,
      the Speaker loses eir Speakership by either abdicating
      or by appointing a successor in a Public Message.

The rule does not otherwise describe how any player (or non-player) becomes
Speaker, therefore (by section II) there is no other means by which any one
does so.  Can David's message be interpreted as pointing out that there was
no Speaker?  I don't see how.  Indeed, what it actually said (incorrectly)
was that _he_ was Speaker, not that there was no Speaker.  The message may
have been written with the assumption that it was clear that there was no
Speaker, but that is irrelevant.  To become speaker he was required to
point out that there was no Speaker.

Related to this matter are some other details of the game state about which
I think I disagree with the Speaker.  In particular, I don't believe that
there are any proposals in the queue at the time of this writing.  If any
proposals were submitted to Gabe then he does not appear to have distributed
them prior to his abdication, and all current supposed proposals were
submitted to David before he became Speaker.  Moreover, none but proposal 1
were distributed to the OML.  Furthermore, chances are that few, if any, of
the attempts by new players to join Ackanomic have been successful --
non-Speakerness and non-OMLness have interfered.  There is also no 'bot.
Effectively, David has made no changes to the Game State in the brief time
he has been Speaker.

John Bollinger
Thin is in.

P.S.: This message sent also to [email-masked] only in case anyone is
not still listening to [email-masked].  JCB

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

From: David Scheidt <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Re: The gamestate
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 17:43:18 -0400 (EDT)

On Mon, 27 Sep 1999, John Bollinger wrote:

> 
> David Scheidt wrote:
> 
> >I believe these thing about the game state:
> >
> >I am speaker.
> >[email-masked] is the mailing list for ackanomic.
> 
> I agree that he is Speaker, but I disagree about the Official Mailing List.
> I hold that although David is Speaker now, he only became so this afternoon,

I make acka@ackanomic the offical mailing list of Ackanomic.  I am afraid
that I agree with thinman's points.  Sigh.  I think that I can make the
people who joined while I was only acting like speaker players.  I don't
think I can distribute any props as having been written by anyone other than
me.  You can make the bot give you a copy of your prop to resend it by
sending a #send n command, where n is your props number.

I make [email-masked] my designated bot.

David

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

From: Eric Plumb <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Lives!
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 18:16:44 -0400 (EDT)

It seems clear that, whether or not P4371 was null, there is a large 
faction of players who prefer to believe that it was not, and are (perhaps
correctly, perhaps under delusions) acting upon that belief.  To no one's
surprise, I am not one of those players.  I'm interested in playing Acka
Lite, but not at the expense of old Acka.

Acka Lite is a fact; not even incontrovertible proof of the nullness of
4371 will change that.  However, I believe that the original Acka is too.
Emperor Ai! Pedrito!, Studge, Quoth, Alfvaen, Cthulhu and K 2 at least
have expressed an interest in continued play; I am certainly with them.
Both Ackanomics seem to be uninterested in admitting that the state of
Proposal 4371 can preclude their existence.  Perhaps, rather than dying or
being reborn, we should consider Acka to have calved.  I, too, would
appreciate it if Acka Lite would take a different name, but they probably
feel the same way about the original Ackanomic. :-)

If anyone besides those in the above list is still interested in playing
original Acka, please speak up.  We'll need replacements for the critical
Offices held by /dev/joe, IdiotBoy, and JT; I can take any that don't
requrire too much in the way of computer power or complexity.  And -- to
all prospective members of original Acka as well as devoted Acka Lite
diehards -- remember:  it's *we* that still have the War rules. :-)

-Hubert

Barney: what happens when you feed a Smurf after midnight. 

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

From: JT <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Lives!
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 19:59:25 -0400 (EDT)

On Mon, 27 Sep 1999, Eric Plumb wrote:
> If anyone besides those in the above list is still interested in playing
> original Acka, please speak up.  We'll need replacements for the critical
> Offices held by /dev/joe, IdiotBoy, and JT; I can take any that don't
> requrire too much in the way of computer power or complexity.  And -- to
> all prospective members of original Acka as well as devoted Acka Lite
> diehards -- remember:  it's *we* that still have the War rules. :-)

As a very small note, neither /dev/joe nor I have done anything of note
regarding leaving what we have been terming 'fat-Acka'.  In fact, should
the nullity of 4371 be proven, I would probably remain a player of both
nomics while continuing to try and reunite them.  IE, I believe we are in
a thread split and while I have my belief that one or the other nomic is
not valid (IE, only one side of the thread split is true), I am not
forcing such a choice.

--JT

-- 
[-------------------------------------------------------------------------]
[ Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.                  ]
[ It's hard to seize the day when you must first grapple with the morning ]
[-------------------------------------------------------------------------]

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

From: "Tyrethali Ansrath" <[email-masked]>
Subject: 
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 20:41:27 -0400 (EDT)

#current

______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

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

From: "Elio M. Garcia, Jr." <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Lives!
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 21:09:13 -0400 (EDT)

Eric Plumb wrote:

> If anyone besides those in the above list is still interested in playing
> original Acka, please speak up.  We'll need replacements for the critical
> Offices held by /dev/joe, IdiotBoy, and JT; I can take any that don't
> requrire too much in the way of computer power or complexity.  And -- to
> all prospective members of original Acka as well as devoted Acka Lite
> diehards -- remember:  it's *we* that still have the War rules. :-)

	Well, I'm one who is, at the moment, more interested in original Acka
to Acka Lite. Once some meat is put onto Acka Lite's ruleset, I'll
hopefully manage to get involved. The big, harfy ruleset of the original
game is what attracted me to the game.

	Reductio

--
[Upon a Dzurlord learning of the murder of a critic by a painter]
"And it was well done, too. I'd have done the same, only-"
"Yes?"
"I don't paint."            (Steven Brust, _The Phoenix Guards_)	

Elio M. García, Jr. ([email-masked])

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

End of ackanomic Digest V4 #261
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