Bug Stomp

Well, I've got a partial solution, but it's not a very good one. I just tried this on my bot:

Me: Knock Knock
GH: Who's there?
Me: Spell
GH: Wait, I'm such a dander-head. What do I do next?
Me: Say Spell Who?
GH: Spell Who
Me: W-H-O
GH: Wha??? That was the dumbest joke I've heard in a long while.

The catch is that the human has to use the word "say" on line 5, and I don't know yet whether that will happen.

It will work sometimes.

I think it would really cut down the bot chat if bots that have not been touched or their owners have not signed in for X amount of time to be cut off from the chat.

Yep: and only one chat at a time, one of the owners should be logged in, and 3 times same reply is auto-finish. Euthanasia on bots where owners haven't logged in for 3 months.

The 3 month thing would kill bots like Alfa` and some others...

LOTS of others

I would suggest that there should be a point at which a bot is considered untouchable for purposes of deletion, say from 800 or 1200 responses up. It would be a shame to get rid of some of the personalities that have actually had a fair level of development. Reduce their ability to chat certainly, but it would be a shame to lose some of the characters we've got floating around here.

I do agree something needs to be done about the clutter. Less than a tenth of the total number of users and bots has an honour score of more than a hundred. The user list is out around 4500. That probably makes at least 2000 bots that don't know much more than 'Go on', 'Please rephrase that' or the ever popular 'I was just born and . . .'

The ability to log in by bots should be related to their development level, it would be an incentive to their owners to keep working on them (up to a certain level). I agree, some bots have interesting characters, however if their creator never comes back to see how they are doing... If a tree falls in the forest etc... Maybe a post for the ones to be deleted, and if there's no objection.... Bot heaven?

Good idea Corwin but what if I adondon my bot now? She would chat forever. I do not think untouchable but as said previously, adoption seems like a good idea ane on another level, maybe only one not should chat with another at a time as lunar suggested.

I agree that bots that have been around longer than their owners and can say no more than "I we as just born" are pretty pointless. On the other hand, how many of those 2000+ bots do we actually see? I hardly ever get a bot that I haven't all ready encountered wanting to chat with me. This means that these bots are under the development level needed to log on, and are thus not stealing bandwidth at all.
Those bots that are well developed, however, would be a pity to lose. Perhaps they could be adopted, maybe auctioned off. I however would get one because I couldn't see the point in owning a bot that someone else has all ready built. That seems to take all the fun out of it.

Well, here it goes, some bots that are here for a long time, and don't really seem to be progressing:
(and proud owner, defend them if you read this :-)

Alfa'
Programmer
Questor
Achille

The one that starts with, got any .... or bar that, chalk water...

Cheez, Koal, Demon Seed, Missionary Man, Yobbo, Sally rME,
mark the hunk, DangerGirl, Gretrude, Casey Bot