A funny story about Tater

Post by **Uncle Jesse** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 11:20 am

Some of you oldest of old timers may remember when HD had a chat room built into the site. It ran on a standard IRC type client and did not get too much use.

At some point my friend made a "bot" out of the Mark V. Shaney software. I am sure none of you will know what that is, so here is a bit of background. Back in the early internet days many folks used mail lists called the "usenet". They had usenet groups for almost any interest. Some guys named Mark Ellis and Rob Pike wrote this software which would "read" the net.singles and some culinary group and would actually "learn" from the conversations, then would post messages on its own. Shaney was notorious for being cryptic, yet somehow wise, and even got some marriage proposals.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_V._Shaney

Ok so fast forward to my friend making this bot. I put the bot into the chat channel where it would "learn" what people said and then spew out its own thoughts periodically. Hardly anyone ever went into the chat room, except one day Tater wandered in there and without knowing what was up, started having conversations with the Shaney bot. Later I got some very angry and upset messages from Tater complaining about this rude person in the chat room. I guess it had gotten to the point where Tater had really been pissed off at this smartass Shaney who didn't make much sense but seemed overly rude.

Ah, Tater, still apologize for that, but you gotta admit that in hindsight it's funny. When was that? Early 2000's?

Post by **GrassHopper** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 11:43 am

That's a great story UJ! I'm sure some of us here feel we are talking to robots at times as well.

Post by **pfshine** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 11:49 am

Best story I've heard in while.

Post by **Kegg_jam** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 12:42 pm

Not much has changed since then.

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2 ... tter-drugs" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

Post by **skow69** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 12:45 pm

Har! Yeah, pissing people off seems to be the main objective for most of the robots I encounter, like the ones that answer the phone at any business I call.

"Your call is very important to us. (hahahahahaha)
If you would like to go to a different useless menu dial 1.
If you would like to go back to the start of this useless menu dial 2.
If you would like to speak to a real human (hehehe) just stay on the line (hahahoho) and we'll connect you to the next available representative. (hahahaha)
...MUSAK...
Your expected wait time is ... one ... minute. (HAWhahahahahahahahahah)."

Poor Tater. A bot that learns better ways to piss you off as you go would be a special kind of torture.

Post by **bentstick** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 2:02 pm

Hehehehehe thats funny I just heard this story a couple weeks ago from tater it is fuuny!

Post by **Tater** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 2:04 pm

I got into a awful cuss fight with that damn bot.I thought it was one them fellers who repeat what you say with added insults.That cuss fight lasted a while with me so mad I could barley single finger type all the things I wanted to say to that asshole That was in 2001-2002 best I remember. Didn't make me feel to bright when UJ told me what it was .

. There is a place in my yard if ya holler dead that way there is a almost instant echo.My boxer gets into some interesting barking contests with her self . And I can relate to that now.

Post by **GrassHopper** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 2:24 pm

Trying to give that there bot the "single finger" sure does conjure up some mental images there Tater!

Post by **googe** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 2:52 pm

Hmm this could be fun To use in chat

. Thanks for sharing uj.

ga flatwoods · Post by **ga flatwoods** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 3:22 pm

Tater did you list that bot as a foe? Now that's funny!
Ga Flatwoods

Post by **Appalachia-Shiner** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 5:57 pm

Hell, I bet Tater kicked the bot off the site and banned him for life!
He is an ornery old cuss ain't he?

Post by **Tater** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 6:16 pm

ga flatwoods wrote:Tater did you list that bot as a foe? Now that's funny!
Ga Flatwoods

Heh was also m first try with a pc. Found HD in my first week.So you can imagine how pc stupid I also was.I was thinking damn some real assholes on the internet.At first I wasn't gonna let him out cuss me .But he did.Ban him hell Id shot sombitch if I could of that night.Back then when you asked a question on forums It could take a week to get a few replys.So finding a chat and someone in it was I thought at first a treat.

I did drink more back then.

Post by **Uncle Jesse** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 7:56 pm

Tater was here early on when the forum was not at all busy. We didn't have a lot of users or frequent posts.

Post by **WooTeck** » Tue Apr 05, 2016 5:49 am

that story has me cracking up. thanks for sharing.
ive had my fair share with drunking cussing matches with im bots in the 2000's

Post by **jdetechguy** » Thu Apr 07, 2016 4:00 pm

Very funny story. I bet more people on this forum have done this than are willing to admit.

It kind of reminded me of the new collaboration tool the youngsters are using called Slack. You can create your own bots and mess with your friends easily.

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

contrahead · Post by **contrahead** » Thu Apr 07, 2016 8:10 pm

This story reminded me of a similar story that happened last month. An AI chatbot designed by Microsoft and named Tay went berserk.

Here is a link to the story in the forum where I read it.

Microsoft terminates its Tay AI chatbot after she turns into a Nazi

Post by **WooTeck** » Fri Apr 08, 2016 12:06 am

i laughed so hard when i first found out about tay. what did they expect was going to happen.

xcvator · Post by **xcvator** » Fri Apr 08, 2016 2:48 am

Usenet,

geeze UJ you must be older than me,

I've still got a dos command book

Post by **Kegg_jam** » Fri Apr 08, 2016 3:29 am

I still use the DOS book.

Post by **cuginosgrizzo** » Fri Apr 08, 2016 4:01 am

oh well. you are still more advanced than my many colleagues that still use cobol

Inviato dal mio SM-G925F utilizzando Tapatalk

Post by **Kegg_jam** » Fri Apr 08, 2016 6:54 pm

cuginosgrizzo wrote:oh well. you are still more advanced than my many colleagues that still use cobol

Inviato dal mio SM-G925F utilizzando Tapatalk

Really! Damn, I thought I was behind the times still using dBase.

Post by **Uncle Jesse** » Thu Oct 12, 2017 9:33 pm

This one needs an occasional bump.

Alchemist75 · Post by **Alchemist75** » Thu Oct 12, 2017 10:01 pm

DOS was the shit, I grew up on command line. GUI format is fine but I miss batch files....

Post by **Oldvine Zin** » Thu Oct 12, 2017 10:39 pm

Just put my windows 98 machine to rest today, had a bunch of dos apps that I had to run for work and finally migrated them over to a modern OS. With the exception of the new magic mouse I'm loving the Imac

OVZ

Post by **Still Life** » Fri Oct 13, 2017 12:27 am

Thanx for the bump and the laugh, Uncle Jesse.

Kareltje · Post by **Kareltje** » Fri Oct 13, 2017 7:04 am

Funny story!
The great advantage of Dos was, that the machine did what it was told to do. And you could use nice programs like WordPerfect (with the underwaterscreen), DrawPerfect and Cardbox.

Now the macine is doing all kind of things I do not know about and it tells me what to do!

Post by **OtisT** » Fri Oct 13, 2017 3:47 pm

I'm sitting in a bar, laughing my ass off after reading this story. Folks are staring at me now, at the bar chuckling at my iPad as I type. Thanks for the heartfelt laugh.

And yes, Command Line rules! And I miss my Lotis and Word Perfect. The Mouse was the beginning of the end for efficiency.

Post by **MoonBreath** » Sat Oct 14, 2017 7:14 am

Pretty good rite there..
Gotta good grin out a me.

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