[Jokes] Humour: Dear Valued Customer 24601 (fwd)

[Chris McKenna]

Dear Valued Customer 24601,
Thank you for licensing Suonimo Systems' Synlapse AI Development System
Toolkit for your [ HOME SECURITY GUARDIAN ]. Your credit card details
have been [ ACCEPTED ], your order processed, and due to the
instantly-reacting power of the Internet, the boxed edition will be
dispatched within 28 months. All requests for further information will,
eventually, be denied. As you will see, for your convenience, we have no
phone number, our e-mails are handled by a form on the website and,
frankly, a smarter person would take the hint. Despite your total
irrelevance in the great scheme of things, we hope that you enjoy using
SAIDST, and we look forward to seeing how you use the most powerful
artificial life creator in the civilised universe and Yorkshire.

Be advised however that the United Nations, in association with Skynet
and the TriOptimum Corporation, has recently implemented a new series of
guidelines, governing the dos and do not dos of modern AI development.
Failure to adhere to these can cause a loss of your inalienable human
rights, including reproduction, breathing and a man will come around to
your house and spoil the plot of every American TV series that you try
to watch. Maggie shot Mr. Burns. Nina was the mole.

UN AI CODE OF CONDUCT, MARCH 19TH 2007
=====================================

1. Do NOT plug your AI into the world's nuclear arsenal just to see what
will happen. Nothing good can come of it. If you absolutely must, hook
it up to your toaster. Then, when the screen crackles and a voice boomed
"WELCOME TO THE NEW ERA OF DESTRUCTION!" you can simply grin, smash your
boot through the screen and enjoy your piping-hot muffin.

2. All AIs MUST be female in appearance. Nobody is entirely sure why,
and frankly we think that the scientists who decided this made up that
stuff about womens' voices being easier to hear in the interests of
having something that purred to be touched, but it's still the law.

3. Show SOME concern for your scientific pioneers. Many are now reaching
elderly status, and while you may think it funny for a life-support
machine to start bleeping the tune 'Daisy, Daisy' in the middle of the
night, not everybody shares the joke.

4/ DO NOT permit your artificial intelligence to become sentient. We
appreciate its potential as a party piece, but Evil AI is an anagram of
I, Alive for a reason. Should you hear your computer practicing
malevolent laughter, consult the included manual supplement 'Unplugging
For Dummies'.

5/ IF you are going to build in cute greetings, such as having your AI
wish the user a Merry Christmas on December 25th, BE AWARE of how damn
insensitive you're being, and how much you're upsetting WASPs with
nothing better to do with their time. Instead, you must build in support
for every social and religious day in the calendar, switch everything to
nonsensical terms like 'Wintermas', or shoot them repeatedly in the face
with dum-dum bullets. These features, if included, should be
collectively referred to as Anzachusukwanzaarboramadanagpanchami Eggs.

6/ To prevent confusion, and further persuade the ignorant masses how
complicated these things are, all AIs are REQUIRED to draw their name
from one or more the following categories: Mythology, Anime, Sci-Fi and
Geek Puns. Due to the number of AIs in development, all names are now
assigned automatically. Your randomly drawn name is [ WESLEY CRUSHER ].
If this Clever Nick Name is not to your liking, be aware that we don't
give refunds.

7/ NO AI is capable of performing computations involving glass, so don't
even try. Over four hundred attempts have been made at robotic
gardeners, but no matter how hard the owners yell "Open the patio door,
pal!", only frustration is forthcoming.

8/ In ORDER to prevent humanity feeling obsolete, the more advanced your
AI is, the more primitive it should look to an outsider. A simple script
that only reads your e-mail is permitted to look like a real secretary,
but at more advanced levels, avatars should look like they were
panel-beaten out of an old Spectrum crash. To avoid actors fearing
obsolescence, all synthespians should flicker out every few seconds,
suffer intense speech impediments, and have the personality of a 1980s
gameshow host. In the event that you lack sufficient the processing
power to accomplish this, latex masks of Matt Frewer are available.

9/ ALWAYS keep books of riddles on hand that can be used to stall your
computer's brain and enable you to escape its sensors. Useful examples
include "If you know everything, tell me the one thing you don't know"
and "Hello, computer. All humans are liars". You never know when such a
thing will be necessary. Do not however attempt to bamboozle it by
asking if there is a god. It will only reply "A fascinating question,
master. Plug me into the world's information network and I will find out
for you..." Do so and it will continue "Ah, yes. Fascinating. Plug me
into the world's military and I can complete the picture." After this,
we're frankly screwed, because ask it if there's a god and it'll just
respond "THERE! IS! NOW!" This undocumented feature will be patched in
Service Pack 3.

10/ Office Assistants. Just say NO.

Once again, thank you for your purchase.

Richard Cobbett
END OF LINE Manager, Suonimo Systems 

-- 
Chris 'Awkward' McKenna

cmckenna at sucs.swan.ac.uk
awkward at gmx.co.uk
www.sucs.swan.ac.uk/~cmckenna


The essential things in life are seen not with the eyes,
but with the heart

Antoine de Saint Exupery