The Rules of Ackanomic

This is the final rule-set for Fat-Ackanomic (Ackanomic in the thread where P4371 accomplished nothing).
Rule 1/18
The Game of Ackanomic

Ackanomic is a self-modifying game of rules. All players must always abide by all the rules then in effect, in the form in which they are then in effect, and interpreted in accordance with current game custom. The term "rules", as used in the rules, means the rules of Ackanomic.

The rules and the game state may only be changed as described in the rules. Actions described in the rules may only be performed, and shall only have those effects, as specified by the rules. Whatever is not explicitly prohibited or regulated by the rules, however, is permitted and unregulated. Game custom, spirit of the game, and linguistic interpretation are external concepts and are not regulated or part of the game state.

The game consists of a sequence of "Cycles". Cycles end when specified by the Rules. At most one Cycle is in progress at any one time. Cycles of Ackanomic may only be won as described in the rules, and may only be won by voting players. A player may not win the Game of Ackanomic. A player always has the option to leave the Game of Ackanomic.

No rule may generate any effect that applies retroactively to a time before the generation of the effect, except when the illegality or impossibility of a publicly knowable change to the game state goes unreported for at least 14 days, in which case the change is deemed to have occurred retroactively to the time of the attempt. The preceding does not apply to the case of events which occur automatically, but whose occurrence is not (or erroneously) reported.

This rule has precedence over all other rules.

Rule 1-1/11
Resolving Conflicts

If two or more rules other than this one conflict about a particular issue, and if the rules other than this one (and not restricted to the conflicting rules) specify a single, coherent, unambiguous method for resolving the conflict then that method is applied to determine which rule or rules take precedence with regard to that issue. Otherwise, wherever the rules conflict on a particular issue, the rule with the lowest number among those rules which conflict on that issue shall guide play with regard to that issue.

If two statements in the same rule conflict with each other, and the rule doesn't define a way to resolve the conflict, then the statement which appears later in the rule takes precedence.

Rule 1-2/21
Conventions
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

The following conventions apply to all Ackanomic text, except where a specific type of text (e.g. rules), is specified.

I. The meaning of a word which is unambiguously misspelled will be the same as if the word had been spelled correctly.

II. Numbers shall be considered misspelled words for the purposes of the rules when it can be determined beyond reasonable doubt that a particular number is in error, and what the intended number is. The intended number is considered the correct spelling in this case.

III. When text is specified as delimited, the end of the document in question serves as an ending delimiter if an ending delimiter is otherwise missing. Delimiters do not nest, except when the double quote character is used as a delimiter. Text delimited by double quotes is known as a string.

IV. Except in Public Messages, text delimited by square brackets [e.g. this] is a note. Notes have no semantic meaning.

V. Text delimited by double curly braces, e.g. {{this}} is self-deleting text, except in this sentence. Self-deleting text is applied once, in the order it appear in the document, then it is deleted. Rules whose text section consists of nothing but self-deleting text, whitespace, and furniture are called "Self-Deleting Rules", and such rules are repealed after their self-deleting text is applied.

VI. Alphabetical ordering shall be determined by a word-by-word comparison, each word compared letter-by-letter. For these purposes: A word is considered to be delimited by whitespace; an initial word 'The' or 'the' is ignored; a single string of digits is considered equivalent to a letter; digital 'letters' precede alphabetical letters; and non-alphanumeric characters are ignored (excluding whitespace used for the purpose of delimiting words, which counts only for this purpose); and case is ignored. All else failing, two words that are otherwise equivalent shall be sorted in ASCII collation order.

VII. When any Rule requires a public message contain a fixed piece of text in order to satisfy some condition, then, that Rule notwithstanding, any piece of text in a public message which is unambiguously a close approximation to the text in question, such that the intent of the text in the message is unambiguously to satisfy the condition laid down in the Rule, shall be considered, for the purposes of that Rule, to be equivalent to the fixed piece of text.

VIII. The following pairs of words are considered to be both semantically and lexically equivalent: "grey", "gray"; "honour", "honor"

IX. Whenever an average is refereed to within Ackanomic then it shall be taken to mean the unweighted arithmetic mean. [i.e., the sum of all the things to be averaged divided by the number of the things.]

X. Whenever it is necessary to determine whether or not words rhyme in Ackanomicon, the words "month", "silver", "orange", and "penguin" are considered to rhyme with each other.

XI. Acka shall operate in the same time zone as New York City, USA [EDT(-0400)/EST(-0500)]. All dates and times will be assumed to be in that time zone, unless specified otherwise. When an event is specified to occur on a particular day, it shall occur at noon (12:00) on that day, unless specified otherwise. A "calendar week" starts at the beginning of a Sunday and lasts 7 days.

Rule 1-2-1/3
The Ackanomic Lexicon
Veal Fan (Aaron Humphrey)

There exists a document called the Ackanomic Lexicon, which contains a list of words which are considered to be in the Official Dictionary, in addition to any other words that other Rules may specify to be there.

The Ackanomic Lexicon may only be modified by use of Proposals or CSRs. Any Player may author a CSR which modifies only the Ackanomic Lexicon. No player may be considered to "control" the Lexicon, although it may be the duty of one or more players to maintain an copy of it.

Rule 1-2-2/23
Spelling Bee
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

1) The Spelling Bee is an unownable entity. Its purpose is to fly through Stingable Entities and sting out misspelled or mistyped words. It may not fly through, or sting, any other entities.

2) Its flight may be initiated by a player privileged to do so, as a public action.

3) The Stingable Entities are:

a) The Rules and the Official Rules Document
b) The CFJ Archive

4) A player initiates its flight by posting a public message with either the word "Spelling" or the word "Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis" in its subject line. Its flight consists of, in that post, a listing of all changes being made, clearly identified by title, number, or document as appropriate, old word, and replacement word. These changes are called "stingings" and must be made in accordance with the rules below. Words in titles and headers of Rules and CFJs may be stung. No one may initiate a flight which is illegal, or contains illegal stingings.

5a) Permissible Stingings:

a) Replacing a misspelled word with its correctly spelled equivalent.
b) Changing the capitalization of the first letter of a word.
c) Replacing correctly spelled words with the word that was intended. I.e., replacing "an" with "and" in the following example from R3-3: "A Judgement may be accompanied by reasons an arguments".
d) Replacing proper nouns with their proper spelling when the proper spelling is generally known and accepted.
e) Adding a period at the end of a sentence when it is missing.
f) Correcting the labels (numbers or letters) of a set of numbered or lettered sections when there are skipped or repeated labels, and at the same time, changing any reference in any rules to any of the relabeled sections so that they refer to the intended sections.

5b) Impermissible stingings. This list takes precedence over 5a) where there is conflict:

a) Replacing a creative or made up word, such as "Torkola".
b) Replacing British, American, or archaic spellings with their American, British, or non-archaic equivalent.
c) Replacing a foreign word with its Anglicized equivalent.
d) Replacing Spivak pronouns with other pronouns, or replacing non-gender neutral language with gender neutral language, or replacing any pronoun or phrase with a Spivak pronoun.
e) Replacing words in quotes or words followed by (sic).
f) Replacing slang or colloquial words, or spellings thereof.
g) Changing the word, such as replacing "superceeds" with "takes precedence over", or "computer" with "machine", even if the word being replaced is misspelled.
h) Fixing grammar errors, except what is allowed by 5a).
i) Replacing abbreviations and acronyms.
j) Making any change that violates the "spirit" of what was intended in the writing being edited.

6) Upon the flight being announced, the legal changes are applied to the document(s) stung.

7) Changes made by the Spelling Bee are not noted below the appropriate entity, as is customary for other changes.

8) Where there is doubt, correct spellings are adjudicated by the Official Dictionary.

Rule 1-2-3/2
Infinite Schminfinite
ThinMan (John Bollinger)

If the rules are modified so as to specify that an action occurs without specifying at what time or under what circumstances that action occurs, then the action occurs exactly once, an infinitesimal time after the rules are so modified.

Rule 1-2-4/2
Postal Code
breadbox (Brian Raiter)

The Postal Code is an official document maintained by the Postmaster.

The Postal Code must always define which mailing list is the official mailing list, and which is the official voting mailing list. The Postal Code shall also indicate which mailing lists are public fora, and what actions, if any, are restricted on each. For the purposes of this rule and the restrictions in the Postal Code, an action is a statement that the player is doing something regulated by the rules, or a public post required by the rules. [Only actions are regulated; discussion can take place anywhere, though players should try to post to appropriate lists.]

There may be multiple forms of a given mailing list (such as a regular list and a digest list).

Rule 1-2-4-1/11
No E-mail, No Game
/dev/joe (Joseph DeVincentis)

All persons participating in Ackanomic must have a valid e-mail address reachable from the official mailing list at the time they join, or else they may not join or participate.

An active player who is not subscribed to at least one form of the official mailing list is committing the Crime of Disinterest. A voting player who is not subscribed to at least one form of the official voting mailing list is committing the Crime of the Vermilion Stripe.

Any person subscribed to any public forum who is not a player is considered to be an observer.

If a message is sent to a mailing list named in the Postal Code, then it is a public message if and only if the Postal Code indicates that mailing list is a public forum, and any actions attempted in the message obey the restrictions outlined in the Postal Code for that list.

A message not sent via a mailing list named in the Postal Code is a public message if and only if it is sent to all active players.

[It is strongly encouraged that the subject line of public messages contain either "Ackanomic:" or "Acka:"; see Rule 6-4-12.]

A private message qualifies as being "from" a certain Player if and only if the recipient is satisfied that the sender of the message was in fact the Player in question. An officer who receives private messages in the course of his Duties may set a reasonable protocol in place for verifying the authorship of such messages.

All participants in Ackanomic should configure their e-mail software to correctly report the current time for the time zone specified.

Rule 1-2-5/4
Timing
ThinMan (John Bollinger)

Posts that are sent through any mailing list maintained by the Postmaster are deemed to have occurred at the time that they are received by the list server. Posts that are not sent through such a mailing list and for which the Speaker is one of the designated recipients are deemed to have occurred at the time that they are received by the Speaker's mail server. Other posts not sent through any of the Postmaster's mailing lists are deemed to have occurred at the earliest time that they are received by the mail server of any of the Players, other than the sender, designated as recipients. If a Player posts a message only to himself, then that post is deemed to have occurred at the time that it was sent.

(The term "mail server" is intentionally left open to some interpretation. It is intended to indicate the actual computer used for e-mail by the relevant player if that computer has a full-time internet -- or other form of e-mail -- connection; otherwise it is intended to mean that computer from which the relevant player downloads his mail.)

Players are encouraged to use an appropriate Postmaster-maintained mailing list if available. If the times of two posts are compared and
(i) only one of them went through one of the Postmaster's lists and
(ii) their times are otherwise within three minutes of each other, then the post sent through the Postmaster's list is deemed to have occurred first.

This rule defers to any rule which specifies an alternative method for determining the times or relative times of posts.

Rule 1-2-6/6
Public Actions
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

This rule defers to all other rules.

Each attempt to perform an action either succeeds or fails. To perform an action entails two things: first, to attempt the action; and second, for the attempt to succeed. Referring to information contained in other documents or data sources does not constitute including that information in the message.

The rules may specify that certain possible courses of play are public actions. Any Intelligent or Trading Entity may attempt any public action available to it simply by sending a public message specifying the action to be taken provided that the rules do not specify an alternate mechanism for the action. However, if any information that is necessary to specify the action fully and unambiguously is left out of that message, then the attempt fails. [An attempt may also fail for other reasons.]

If the rules specify that a certain course of play is available to a Intelligent or Trading Entity, but do not specify how that course of play is to be taken, then that course of play is a public action, and it is taken as described above.

Rule 1-2-8-1/5
Remembrance Day
else...if (Henry Towsner)

July 31st is an Ackanomic holiday known as Remembrance Day, commemorating the day the last unchanged rule from the original ruleset was repealed.

For each proposal which is accepted on Remembrance Day that creates or repeals at least one rule, the author of that proposal receives a Boon of the Ancients.

Rule 1-3/16
Crisis Resolution
The Governor (Dan Marsh)

1) The Speaker or the Acting Speaker, and no other players, may declare a State of Crisis at any time via public announcement, provided the game is not in a State of Crisis. Upon such declaration being legally made, the game is said to be in a State of Crisis until the State of Crisis is lifted as specified by the rules.

2) When, and only when, the game is in a State of Crisis the following officers have the following powers:

a) The Speaker may declare the State of Crisis lifted. b) The President or Acting President may publicly issue a State of Crisis Resolution Document detailing a list of changes to be made in the ruleset. These changes will be applied three days after the issuance of that document, or at the end of a failed challenge (whichever is later) unless it has been challenged and defeated. The President may retract a State of Crisis Resolution Document before it is applied, if there is no challenge hearing pending.

3) Any voting player may publicly challenge the State of Crisis Resolution Document within three days of its issuance, provided that document has not been previously challenged. If such a challenge is lodged, a Hearing is called. The valid responses in this Hearing are "The President is scamming us", and "This will patch the crisis". If the verdict of the Hearing shows that the President is scamming us, the document is defeated, and an Impeachment Paper is immediately filed against the President. Otherwise, the challenge is said to have failed.

This rule takes precedence over any rule with which it conflicts.

Rule 1-5/7
Random Things
ThinMan (John Bollinger)

I. Whenever the rules call for a random determination to be made among a finite number of possibilities, each of the alternatives shall be assigned the same probability. [I.e. use uniform weights.] This rule defers to any rule that specifies an alternative weighting scheme.

II. An event that depends on a random determination for its full specification shall not occur until the random determination is publicly knowable, unless it is a regular event whose time is specified by the Rules(i.e. the distribution of the Magic Potato).

III. Whenever the rules call for a unique entity to be given or transferred to a random player, the player who currently has that entity (if any), is excluded from the pool from which the random selection is made.

Rule 1-6/16
" "
mr cwm (Eric Murray)

[Web-Harfer's note: The name of this rule is a single space character.]

No two named entities may have names that match.

No named entity may have a name that matches a former name of any current or former player, except that a player may have a name e previously held.

An attempt to do anything that requires a name to be chosen [such as creating a Trinket] fails if the chosen name matches a name already in use.

Two names match if and only if their primitive forms are the same. The primitive form of a name is found by removing all articles ("a", "an", and "the") from the name, then removing all characters except letters and numbers, then converting all uppercase letters to lowercase. ["Bronze Torch" and "Bron, the Zet oRch" have the same primitive form: bronzetorch.]

If two names are found to match in conflict with the first paragraph of this rule, the Speaker shall change one or both of the names in such a way as to fix the problem. All Ackanomic business besides Rules that referred to such an entity by name shall be changed to indicate the new name, and all Rules which refer to the entity by its old name shall still refer to that entity, even though the name has changed. The Speaker should try to make such changes so that entities whose names appear in the Rules are not renamed, if possible.

Rule 1-6-1/28
Player Names
Wayne Sheppard

Every player has exactly one Ackanomic name. This name must be a string of name characters from two to twenty characters in length. Neither the first nor the last character in this string may be the space character, and there must be at least one character that is not a numeric digit. All official nomic business shall use this name to refer to that player.

No player may change eir Ackanomic name, but rules and entities granted the power by the rules may change players' Ackanomic names, provided the new name is in accordance with the rules.

The Registrar is required to record and announce any legal name changes, and is encouraged but not required to point out any failed name changes as well.

When a player's Ackanomic name is changed, all Ackanomic business besides Rules will be changed to follow eir new name, and any Rules which refer to the player by their old name will still refer to that player even though their name has changed.

Rule 1-6-1-2/4
Sanctity of Harf
Robert Sevin (Mitchell Harding)

No player may have the character string (delimited by the quotation marks) "harf", nor any variation wherein the only difference is capitalization, contained within their Ackanomic name.

Rule 1-6-2/15
Proposal and Rule Titles
Wayne (Wayne Sheppard)

Rules and Proposals are named, unownable entities. The names of Rules and Proposals are referred to as their titles.

The titles of Rules and Proposals are not required to be unique, with respect to each other or with respect to any other entity. (This paragraph takes precedence over Rule 1-6.)

The following characters:

" : ; ( )

[i.e., double-quote, backquote, colon, semicolon, and parentheses] are legal name characters when they appear in the titles of Proposals and Rules. Proposals and Rules may have titles of up to one hundred forty name characters.

When a Proposal is accepted that creates a new Rule, the new Rule shall have the title indicated by the Proposal, or, if no valid title is specified, the new Rule shall have the same title as the Proposal.

Rule 1-6-3/11
Entity Names
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

Each entity is either named (which means it has a name) or nameless. An entity is nameless unless the Rules specify otherwise.

When a named entity is created, it shall be given a name in accordance with the Rules.

A name is a sequence of no more than seventy name characters. The name characters are: 

! # $ % & * + - / 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 = ? @ \ ^ _ |
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z
~ . , '
and the space character.

[Parentheses, double quotes, back quotes, square brackets, angle brackets, braces, colons, and non-ASCII characters are not name characters.]

If a named entity at any time ever does not have a name, or has a name which does not comply with the Rules, it shall immediately take the name "Nameless Thing #X", where X is the lowest positive integer creating a legal name for the entity. If this would result in multiple entities having the same name, one of them is chosen at random. If this method does not produce a legal name, the entity remains unnamed.

The Rules may specify a way in which an entities name is changed. Regardless of such rules, this fails if the new name would be illegal. A name is illegal if it includes a non-name character, is more than 70 characters long, or is already the name of an Entity.

Rule 1-8/7
Retractions
Vynd (John Frederick McCoy)

A player may retract his own proposal as a public action. This action will fail if the results of that proposal have already been announced at the time that the action is attempted. All votes cast on a retracted proposal shall be ignored.

A player may retract his own CFJ as a public action. This action will fail if a verdict other than Undecided has already been delivered on the CFJ.

A player may retract his own Miscellaneous Submission as a public action. This action will fail if a decision on the acceptance or rejection of the submission is already publicly knowable. This section takes precedence over any rule which would prevent retraction of these entities. Instances of following, and nothing else, are Miscellaneous Submissions

a) Impeachment Papers
b) Common Sense Reports
c) New Games and Contest submissions as described by Rule 12-1

Rule 1-9/0
Harfer Protection
else...if (Henry Towsner)

No player shall be penalized in any way for sending a public message which e is required or expected to send; this shall include any harfing or other duties associated with officers e holds, as well as any refereeing or similar activities. This rule takes precedence over all other rules, especially "Gaol" and "Pomp and Circumstance".

Rule 1-10/29
Rule Numbers

I. All rules have an H number. An H number consists of a string of positive integers separated by hyphens. Each integer in that string is known as a locator.

The following relations are defined between rules: (Z means an indeterminate set of locators separated by hyphens, X means a single locator. Zn, where n is an integer, is another indeterminate set of locators, Xn is another single locator.) 

Rule 1          Rule 2         Rule 1 is a ____ of Rule 2
Z               Z-X            Parent
Z-X             Z              Child
Z1              Z1-Z2          Ancestor
Z1-Z2           Z1             Descendant
Z-X1            Z-X2           Sibling
An H number is larger than another H number if the first (from left to right) integer which differs between the two is larger; a rule is always larger than all its ancestors. When a rule Z1 is renumbered to become rule Z2, all its children Z1-X are renumbered to Z2-X

II. When a new rule is created it is numbered as follows:

1. If the creator (be it proposal, rule, or something else) assigned it a valid H number not already assigned to a rule than it receives that number.

2. Otherwise, if the creator assigned it a valid H number and that rule already exists and has a parent (hereafter called THEPARENT), or the creator specified that it be the child of an existing rule (hereafter called THEPARENT) without specifying an H number, then the rule receives the smallest H number not already assigned to a rule which would make it a child of THEPARENT.

3. Otherwise, it is given the smallest H number which would make a child of the Unassigned Rule Section.

Rule 1-10-1/2
Rule Suites
JT (JT Traub)

A rule is considered to be the head of a Rule Suite if the rule contains the text 'This is the head of the X Rule Suite.' where X is replaced by the name of the Rule Suite as the first sentence of the rule.

All descendants of the head of a Rule Suite are members of that Rule Suite. The head of a Rule Suite is also considered to be a member of that Rule Suite.

Rule 2/0
Proposals
else...if (Henry Towsner)

A Voting player may submit a proposal by sending its text to the Promoter, who shall then post it publicly to be voted on. If there is at least one Sphere of Influence in existence, the author (or the Promoter if the author fails to) shall specify a Sphere of Influence as the subcommittee of the proposal. However, if the number of proposals authored by that player currently in their authorised voting period is equal to or exceeds their Proposal characteristic, any attempt to submit a proposal will lead to that proposal being automatically retracted, and the player being put in Gaol with a sentence of 1 day.

Once a proposal has been properly distributed, none of its text may be altered; likewise, its authorship and time of distribution cannot be changed.

If two proposals currently in the proposal queue would have identical effects on the game state if passed, or a CFJ finds them to be substantially similar, then the later of the two to be submitted shall be deemed invalid and removed from voting consideration.

Rule 2-1/0
Voting
else...if (Henry Towsner)

All proposals shall be voted on, unless they are retracted or deemed invalid in accordance with the Rules. In these cases, they are removed from consideration, and are considered to be neither accepted or rejected.

The prescribed voting period on a proposal is seven days, starting from the moment that the proposal is publicly distributed as specified by the rules.

Entities may vote only as specified by the rules. Non-entities may not vote.

Voting Players may vote an integer with an absolute value less than or equal to 100 plus 20 times their Voting Characteristic on each proposal, by sending their vote to the Tabulator.

Players who vote less than zero on a proposal are said to have voted to reject it, while players who vote greater than zero are said to have voted to accept it.

Votes must be unambiguous and unconditional. A Voting Player may also choose not to vote on a proposal, which is called abstaining. Voting Players who do not vote within the prescribed voting period shall be deemed to have abstained. Voting Players may change their vote up until the end of the prescribed voting period, but in any case are limited to one vote per proposal.

A proposal's Acceptance Index is the sum of all positive votes, plus 1.5 times the sum of all negative votes. Only those votes legally cast within its prescribed voting period are considered. A proposal's Acceptance Threshold is 0, unless changed as described in the rules.

Rule 2-1-1/5
Fair Voting Practices
JT (JT Traub)

I. Voting Actions

The following are voting actions:

A. Casting a legal vote as defined by rule 2-1.

II. The Right to Fair Voting

A proposal is invalid if it calls for one or more effects that discriminate in any way between players based on their voting actions on that proposal, or any other specific proposal or proposals identified in the proposal. Effects that depend on the way players vote are allowed if they apply to all proposals, or to all proposals in one or more classes previously defined by the rules.

III. Effects Triggered on Changing the Triggering Rules

If a proposal adds, changes, or repeals rules that generate effects or cause some entity to generate effects (including but not limited to score changes) based on the way players vote, then those rules generate no effects based on the way players vote on that particular proposal. This section of this rule takes precedence over all other rules which generate effects based on the way players vote on proposals.

Rule 2-2/1
Results
else...if (Henry Towsner)

A proposal's Subcommittee Acceptance Index is the sum of all positive votes cast by members of the proposal's subcommittee, plus 1.5 times the sum of all negative votes cast by the same subcommittee. Only those votes legally cast within its prescribed voting period are considered. A proposal's Subcommittee Acceptance Threshold is 0, unless changed as described in the rules.

As soon as possible after a proposal's prescribed voting period ends, the votes on that proposal shall be posted publicly. If the Subcommittee Acceptance Index exceeds its Subcommittee Acceptance Threshold then the proposal is considered to have passed in subcommittee. Otherwise it is rejected in subcommittee. A proposal is rejected in subcommittee if its subcommittee is no longer a Sphere of Influence at the end of the proposal's voting period. If the proposal does not have a subcommittee than it is treated as automatically being passed in subcommittee. If the proposal passes in subcommittee and its Acceptance Index exceeds its Acceptance Threshold then it is accepted. Otherwise it is rejected.

If a proposal is accepted, then any one-time effects, such as changes to the rules, shall be applied, one at a time, in the order in which they appear in the proposal. (Ambiguous, retroactive, and/or meaningless effects are ignored.)

Rule 2-2-2/0
Mannna Results
else...if (Henry Towsner)

When A Proposal's Voting Results are Reported, but prior to any effects generated by it (including any scoring changes), the following Mannna changes shall be applied to all players who did not abstain on the proposal:

a) Players who cast a vote with an absolute value greater than 100 loose 100 less than the absolute value of their vote in Mannna.
b) Players who cast a vote with an absolute value between 60 and 100, inclusive, gain 50 less half the absolute value of their vote, rounded down, in Mannna.
c) Players who cast a vote with an absolute value less than 60 gain 20 Mannna.
d) Players who cast a vote whose absolute value equals the absolute value of the Proposal's Acceptance Index receive that amount in Mannna in addition to any granted to or taken from them by the previous steps.

Rule 2-2-5/10
Brass Monkey
Techno (Jerome Herrman)

The Brass Monkey is a very large, unique, unownable entity with a low, booming voice.

A Streak begins when a proposal is accepted and there is no Streak already underway. The Streak includes the proposal that started it and all the accepted proposals that follow, until the next time a proposal is rejected. The Streak is then broken.

The ordering of proposals, for the purpose of determining a Streak, shall depend only on the numerical ordering of the Proposals. A proposal is considered to immediately follow another proposal either if the first's number immediately follows the second, or the only proposals which were assigned numbers less than the first and greater than the second were retracted or otherwise removed from voting consideration.

If ten or more proposals are accepted during a single Streak, it is a Chrome Streak. Chrome Streaks are Strange. When a Chrome Streak is broken, the Brass Monkey shall climb to the top of the tallest building in Acka Land and proclaim:

"The makers of the Chrome Streak shall be awarded 5 bonus AckaDollars!"

With that, each Player shall receive 5 AckaDollars for each proposal he or she submitted that was accepted during the Streak (including those that were accepted before it was Chrome), up to a maximum of 15 AckaDollars per Player.

Rule 2-2-6/13
Let there be Harf!
snowgod (Phil Ackley)

The Unique Title of Harfmeister exists. If, at any time, no one has the Title of Harfmeister, the Title is given to the Speaker.

The Harfmeister may designate a proposal currently under voting consideration as Harfy. This action fails if there are already three proposals designated Harfy or if the proposal specified is attributed to the Harfmeister. A proposal designated Harfy remains so designated as long as it is under voting consideration; it ceases to be designated Harfy as soon as it ceases to be under voting consideration.

If a Harfy proposal passes, its author gains 5 AckaDollars and the title of Harfmeister passes from the current Harfmeister to the author of the Harfy proposal. If two or more Harfy proposals are accepted simultaneously, the title of Harfmeister shall go to the author of the highest numbered one.

The Harfmeister should also be on the lookout for particularly harfy courses of action, things which might later be considered for a Silver Moon, or at least are worth a good laugh at the time. The Harfmeister has the privilege of designating a player other than emself to be "Funky and Stylish".

"Funky and Stylish" is a unique title. When a player is designated "Funky and Stylish", they gain 5 AckaDollars. Only one player may be designated "Funky and Stylish" per calendar week.

This privilege of the Harfmeister should be used regularly, when it is justified. Failure to do so on a regular basis, without justification, may lead to accusations that the Harfmeister is hogging the harf, as described below.

The Harfmeister may use his or her discretion in determining what is to be considered Harfy for the purposes of this rule, but it is considered bad form to designate a proposal as Harfy that is not really Harfy, and other players are permitted to sneer.

If any voting player feels the Harfmeister is hogging the Harf [that is, sitting on the title of Harfmeister with no intent to designate any proposals as Harfy], they may start an Inquisition. An Inquisition is a Hearing. It is also Strange. The player who started the Inquisition is the Hearing Harfer and is called the Supreme Inquisitor while it is in session. The valid responses to an Inquisition are 'No! He's going to share the Harf!', or 'Yes! He is Hogging the Harf!' If the verdict is the latter, the Harfmeister is guilty of hogging the Harf and must immediately go to his or her home if he or she may legally do so. The person who called for the Inquisition then becomes the Harfmeister.

Rule 2-2-8/2
A Minority of One
Slakko (Duncan Richer)

If a proposal is rejected, and exactly one player voted to reject the proposal, then that player shall receive the title of Tyrant, and any other player who possesses the title of Tyrant shall lose it. If the player in question was already the Tyrant, then half eir AckaDollars shall be distributed equally amongst all other players (rounding away from 0).

Whenever a player is made Tyrant by application of this rule, their Voting Characteristic shall be increased by 1, and they shall receive 500 Mannna. However, votes sent to the Tabulator from a player who is the Tyrant are only valid if they lie between -100 and 100 inclusive.

Rule 3/27
Invoking Judgement

A Call for Judgement (CFJ), is an assertion about the rules, the facts, or their interpretation. A CFJ should include a single, clear, and clearly labeled statement that can be answered TRUE or FALSE. The remainder of the CFJ may consist of additional comments or reasoning, which the Judge is under no obligation to consider.

A CFJ may be made by any active player by sending it to the Clerk of the Court, who will select a judge as described in the rules, and then post it publicly, along with the identity of the selected Judge.

CFJs with no clear statement, or consisting of empty statements or inherently contradictory statements or multiple statements, in the judgement of the Judge, shall be judged "Invalid". A statement with multiple sentences is not necessarily disqualified; it is up to the judgement of the Judge as to whether such submission is Invalid, as per above.

[e.g. "SnafuMoose has the power to amend a rule" is valid, while "Can I amend a rule?" is not (cannot be answered true, false). "I think PlayerXXX is a butthead" is also not valid, since it also cannot be answered true/false ("PlayerXXX is a butthead" is valid)]

Any CFJ whose statement is substantially similar, or whose negative is substantially similar, to the statement of another CFJ submitted by the same player within the past week, in the judgement of the judge, shall be judged Invalid. This applies even in the case that the previously submitted CFJ was retracted by the player in question. However, the provisions of this paragraph shall not apply if the prior CFJ was declared Invalid by the Clerk of Court due to a lack of eligible judges, as provided in Rule 3-1.

Rule 3-1/21
Selecting A Judge

When a Player is to be selected to judge a CFJ the following steps are performed in order to determine those Players who are eligible to judge it:

i) All Voting Players are eligible.

ii) All Players on the CFJ Ineligibility List are excluded.

iii) The author of the CFJ is excluded.

iv) If the CFJ is also a CFCJ the Player or Players named in its statement are excluded.

v) All Justices are excluded.

vi) All Players who have declined to judge the CFJ are excluded.

vii) All Players who have already been assigned a CFJ and are yet decline or return a verdict on it are excluded, unless this would reduce the number of eligible Players to less than half the number of Active Players.

If any of the above steps would cause the number of eligible players to be reduced to zero or fewer, that step is not performed.

When a CFJ is received by the Clerk of the Court, if no Active Players are eligible to judge it, then the CFJ is deemed Invalid, and removed from consideration, and no judge is selected. Otherwise, the Clerk of the Court randomly selects a Player from those eligible to judge it.

The selected Judge may decline a particular appointment, as a public action or by mailing the Clerk of the Courts, within 3 days of being selected. In this case, a new Judge is selected as described above.

As a public action, an Active Player may remove their name from the CFJ Ineligibility List if it is on the List, or add their name to the List if it is not there already.

Players not on the CFJ ineligibility list who have a degree in Jurisprudence shall have twice the chance of being selected for a CFJ.

Rule 3-2/11
Delivering Judgement

Having been appointed and having not declined, a Judge has exactly one week from the time of eir appointment to post eir Judgment to the Clerk of the Court. A Judge who defaults is a deadbeat. This causes em to be penalized 10 AckaDollars, eir name to be added to the CFJ Ineligibility List, and all CFJs to which e is appointed Judge to be reassigned to new judges as if e had declined judgment.

Any judge may change eir mind on a verdict that e has sent to the Clerk of the Court (CotC) but has not yet been distributed by the CotC by mailing the CotC informing em of this fact. At this point the initial judgement will be considered to have not been posted to the CotC.

Rule 3-3/8
Possible Judgements

The following are the only possible Judgements: (1) True; (2) False; (3) Undecided; (4) Invalid; or (5) Undecidable [CFJs should be judged invalid if they are not well formed and undecidable if they either rely on some information which is not publicly knowable, or a statement of indeterminate truth]. A Judgement may be accompanied by reasons and arguments, but any such reasons and arguments form no part of the official Judgement itself.

All Judgements must be in accordance with all the rules in effect at the time judgement was invoked, and with respect to the game state at that time. When the rules are silent, inconsistent, or unclear on the statement in question, however, then the Judge shall consider currently existing game custom and the spirit of the game in reaching a decision.

If the Judgement is Undecided then the CFJ shall be decided by the Supreme Court as if it had been appealed, except that the original Judge shall not be penalized for an overturned verdict on that CFJ.

Rule 3-4/38
Overturning Judgements

I. Sending CFJs to the Supreme Court

After any Judgement is returned, an active player may appeal the case to the Supreme Court for consideration. The time period for appeal shall be 4 days from the posting of the Judgement.

The player may include with his appeal any such material he deems relevant to the case. The Court is under no obligation to consider such material, and should use normal procedures to determine a verdict.

If a single judgement is appealed more than once, only the first one shall cause the process of determining a new judgement to begin, and the previous judge shall be penalized only once if the verdict is overturned, though all who appealed that judgement shall be penalized if the verdict is upheld, and all appealers' reasonings are added to the official record.

II. How the Supreme Court judges a CFJ

The Supreme Court shall then decide the case, and should return its verdict within one week. If this is the first time the Supreme Court has considered that CFJ, the unanimous decision of the owners of the Supreme Cortex that was assigned the CFJ shall be the verdict of the Court. If the Supreme Court has already returned a verdict on the CFJ in question, and this verdict was appealed, the Supreme Court's verdict shall be the unanimous decision of all active Justices (returned within one week of the full Court receiving the CFJ) or the decision of a 2/3 supermajority of the active Justices (if the Court does not reach a unanimous decision within one week).

III. Appeal limits

In the event that an active player opposes the appeal, they may appeal again to the Supreme Court, assuming they are not exceeding any appeal limits specified elsewhere in this, or other rules.

Supreme Court Justices or Acting Supreme Court Justices may not appeal Judgements or Supreme Court appellate decisions to the Supreme Court unless they also exercise their option under Section VI of this Rule to decline judgement on that CFJ.

A verdict returned by the Supreme Court as a whole (e.g. a second appeal verdict) may not be appealed. Only the most recent judgement on any CFJ may be appealed.

IV. Delays

Supreme Cortices should make every effort to return verdicts assigned to them within a reasonable amount of time in order to keep the game moving along. A Justice may decline a CFJ assigned to them (as part of a cortex) as a public action.

In addition, if a Cortex has been considering a particular CFJ for more than 30 days, that Cortex (ie both members) shall automatically decline that CFJ upon this fact being pointed out publicly by any active player.

When a Justice declines a CFJ assigned to em, e shall be replaced according to the usual method for selecting cortex members.

Rule 3-4-1/8
Selecting a Cortex
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

Whenever the Rules call for the Supreme Court to consider a CFJ for the first time, the Clerk of the Courts shall assign that CFJ to a Supreme Cortex and select its two members, as outlines below. A Supreme Cortex exists only for the purpose of judging a single case, although there may be multiple Cortices with overlapping or identical memberships.

When the CotC is required to select one or more players to be part of a Supreme Cortex (hereafter Cortex) e shall do so based on the following guidelines:
1) All active members of the Supreme Court, other than those who are already part of the Cortex, are considered to be in the pool of candidates.
2) Any player who has declined the case is removed from the pool.
3) Any player who is named as a defendant is removed from the pool.
4) Any player who made the case initially is removed from the pool.
5) Any player who appealed the case is removed from the pool.

If steps 3,4 or 5 would result in fewer than the required number of players, it is not performed. If the pool does not contain sufficient players than the Clerk of the Courts may appoint enough players to the Supreme Court as Emergency Justices to judge that CFJ only; the Clerk may not appoint the initiator, the defendant, or a player who has declined that CFJ; e is encouraged to nominate players with bronze torches, players with degrees in Jurisprudence or Legislation, and players who have judged a large number of CFJs; it is a power of the President to veto any such appointment. Otherwise, sufficient players are selected and removed from the pool, starting with the players who are judging the least number of cases. Ties are broken randomly.

If the Rules direct the Supreme Court to consider a given CFJ for a second time, the entire Court shall consider the matter (as opposed to a single Cortex).

Rule 3-5/8
Justices Are Keeper Of The Sacred Laws
Calvin N Hobbes (Thierry Joffrain)

Before the result of a CFJ is made public, a Justice or Bronze Torch owner can add their own reasoning to the official publication of the result by sending it either to the Clerk of the Court, or to the public forum. Prior to its official publication, this reasoning can be made public by no one other than the author of the reasoning.

Upon the Judge or Court reaching a verdict, the Clerk of the Court will also add any reasoning submitted under the auspices of this rule to the official publication of the CFJ, along with the judge's decision.

For one week following the Supreme Court returning a non-unanimous verdict on a CFJ appeal, dissenting Justices may publicly post an official Dissent to the Supreme Court's reasoning. This Dissent should be included along with the majority reasoning in any CFJ archives.

Rule 3-6/30
Criminal Justice
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

This rule defines the Call for Criminal Judgement (CFCJ) procedure. Except as detailed in this rule, it shall be like the Call for Judgement in all ways, including how it is submitted, how judges are selected, how it is appealed, etc. Any changes to the CFJ procedure will automatically be "inherited" by the CFCJ procedure when they do not contradict the exceptions detailed in this rule.

1) The player submitting the CFCJ shall pay the standard Harfer Fee.

2) A CFCJ will be clearly labelled as such, to distinguish it from an ordinary CFJ.

3) Its "statement" shall be "X committed the Crime of Y", where X is replaced with the name of a registered player and Y is replaced by the name of a Crime as defined in the current ruleset.

4) Its "reasoning" section shall show how Player X committed the Crime of Y. CFCJs shall only be judged TRUE if the Crime Y was committed by player X. CFCJs which do not detail exactly one Crime, in the judgement of the judge, shall be judged INVALID. CFCJs in which player X had not committed crime Y for more than 30 days prior to the time the CFCJ was first distributed, in the judgement of the judge, shall be judged INVALID.

5) It shall include a "suggested penalty" section, which is a recommended penalty to be imposed on Player X, should a verdict of TRUE be reached. More than one class of penalty may be recommended. The valid classes of penalties are:
a) a PUBLIC APOLOGY of 1 or more lines by Player X.

b) the TRANSFERENCE of 0 or more entities or characteristics associated with Player X to either the Treasury or the initiator of the CFCJ.

c) a SENTENCE in the Gaol of 1 or more days for Player X.

d) the REMOVAL of Player X from one or more Institutions to which e currently belongs.

e) The IMPEACHMENT of Player X from a single specific office which e currently holds.

f) the EXPULSION of Player X from the game.

6) A Crime may, when defined by a rule, contain a Minimum Penalty. When a Crime contains a Minimum Penalty, a verdict of TRUE on the CFCJ must include at least that Minimum Penalty as party of the actual penalty.

7) Before the result of a CFCJ is made public the player who is alleged to have committed a crime may add their own reasoning and claims of mitigating circumstance to the official publication of the result by sending it either to the person in charge of CFCJs, or to the public forum.

8) Upon a verdict of FALSE on the CFCJ, no penalty shall be imposed upon Player X.

8a) Upon a verdict of TRUE, the judge may retain or alter the recommended penalty. The result will become the actual penalty. This will be imposed following a 3 day "grace period". If the Crime for which the CFCJ is submitted specifies a Minimum Penalty, and the actual penalty does not include at least the Minimum Penalty, then the actual penalty is changed to include the Minimum Penalty. Failure to include the Minimum Penalty in the actual penalty is the Crime of Excessive Leniency on the part of the judge.

9b) If the penalty was a SENTENCE in the Gaol, player X shall be moved from their current Location to the Gaol at the end of the grace period, at which time their sentence will start. If, however, player X was already in the Gaol at the end of the grace period, the sentence they are currently serving shall be increased by the length of the new sentence.

9c) If the penalty specifies a TRANSFERENCE of any entity which it is not permissible to transfer, that part of the penalty shall be void, but such shall not necessarily void other parts of the penalty.

9d) If the penalty includes a PUBLIC APOLOGY, Player X is required to post a public message of at least the court-required length apologizing for his criminal ways. This should be done within three days of the expiration of his grace period, and it should have "Acka: Public Apology" as its subject line. Failure to comply will result in the addition of three days to that player's Gaol sentence, if he is in Gaol, or the immediate transfer of that player to the Gaol for a three-day incarceration if he is not in Gaol. Self-abasement is especially encouraged in such a message.

10a) All other verdicts shall work as they would for a CFJ. Any verdict may be appealed as with a CFJ.

10b) If a TRUE verdict is not upheld on an appeal, any penalties, except SENTENCE, are reversed, effective the time of the appeal verdict. The amount of any penalty of SENTENCE is subtracted from player X's current sentence (if any, assume 0 if none), and the player is released from Gaol if their resultant sentence is non-positive. The player is also paid A$10 times the amount of the SENTENCE, up to a maximum of A$200.

10c) If a TRUE verdict is upheld on an appeal, the appellate court or judge may impose a penalty different from the previously imposed penalty. If such an appeal verdict is delivered during the grace period, the new penalty is imposed at the end of that grace period instead of the original one (i.e., the grace period is not adjusted). If the appeal verdict is delivered after the grace period ended (previous penalty already imposed), then the appropriate transactions are performed to adjust the penalty. In this case, if either penalty involved a SENTENCE in the Gaol, then the difference is tacked on or subtracted from player X's current sentence. If the result is non-positive, player X is released from the Gaol if they are there. If the result is positive, and player X is not in Gaol, they are placed there immediately.

11) No more than one CFCJ may be brought against a single player for a single instance of committing a given Crime. No one may be tried more than once for the same action even if it commits more than one Crime.

Rule 4/30
Players and Player States

I. Player States

All natural persons exist in exactly one of the following states:
Active
Vacationing
On Ice
Non-Player

Those natural persons, and only those natural persons, who are not Non-Players are Players. Players are named, tradeable entities. Non-Players may observe the game and participate in discussions, but their posts shall not affect the game state except as described in rule 4-1. Non-Players are not entities.

No natural person may be associated with more than one player concurrently. No matter how many times a person legally registers as a player in Ackanomic, that person is always considered the same player. [That is, if a player quits and later rejoins, e is considered the same player.]

Active Players are Intelligent, Trading Entities. Vacationing or On Ice players (collectively known as Inactive players), or Non-Players, are neither Intelligent nor Trading.

II. Player-related Definitions

a) Only Active players may be randomly selected for anything, except where the rules specifically allow Inactive players to be selected.
b) Inactive players may only leave the game, change their state, or send public messages; they may perform no other actions.
c) Where the rules refer to a "Vacationing" player, that specifically means a player whose state is "Vacationing".
d) A "Newbie" is a Player whose AckaAge is less than 21 days.
e) A Player's AckaAge is the length of time since they first registered as a Player of Ackanomic (or since when the game started, whichever is less).
f) A "pending" Player is a Voting Player who has not voted on a proposal since their most recent registration.

g) A Player who has changed eir state from On Ice less than 21 days ago having been On Ice continuously for at least 90 days prior to that, is also a newbie. At any time while e is still a newbie, e may request that the registrar select a mentor for em. III. Changing State

A Player may change eir state as a public action by announcing the new player state, provided e has not changed eir state as a public action during the past 3 days, and provided e follows all other restrictions placed on eir ability to change states. When a player voluntarily ceases to be Vacationing if e did not specify a new player state, e becomes Active. A player may never voluntarily change eir state to Non-Player, but may have eir state changed to Non-Player through the action of the rules. Whenever a player's state or level is changed, the appropriate following section applies to them

IV. Activity Levels

All Players are either Voting or Non-Voting. The activity level is latent while the player is Inactive, however when the player becomes Active again eir Voting/Non-Voting status is preserved.

V. Upon Becoming Non-Voting:
a) E is treated as having declined judgement on all CFJs that have been assigned to em, and treated as having failed to return a verdict on any e has accepted. This includes those for which the three day limit for declining has passed; no deadbeat penalty is assigned, and the CFJ is randomly assigned as in Rule 3-1.
b) E is removed from all offices non-voting players cannot hold, and removed from the list of candidates in any Election or Nomination for an office non-voting players cannot hold.
c) E is removed from the mentor pool.

VI. Upon Becoming (and while) Vacationing:
a) Their expected duration of Vacation is set at 28 days if unspecified, otherwise it is calculated as 14 days plus the specified duration, with an overriding minimum of 3 days and maximum of 75 days. (Durations specified as a range of time are assumed to span from the time of specification until the end of the specified range of time.) Players who go on Vacation voluntarily may specify a duration at the time they specify they are going on Vacation.
b) Upon having been on vacation for a period of time in excess of the expected duration of eir vacation, their state is changed to On Ice.

VII. Upon Becoming (and while) On Ice:

a) They are removed from any offices they hold.
b) Section V is applied as if they became Non-Voting.
c) All their existing votes on proposals, elections, and hearings whose results have not yet been released are canceled.
d) They are removed from all Institutions of which they are a member.
e) If the Player never voted, their state is changed to Non-Player.
f) They cease to own emself and are placed in the treasury.
g) Upon being On-Ice for 90 days, their state is changed to Non-Player, unless they (or their likeness) is enshrined in the Hall of Elders, in which case they will never become a Non-Player.

VIII. Upon Becoming a Non-Player:

a) E is removed from the CFJ Ineligibility List if possible.
b) E ceases to own all of eir entities. Any non-tradeable entities which became wholly unowned after the application of the previous sentence are destroyed.

This rule has precedence over all other rules. Where rules other than this one refer to Voting or Non-Voting players, they are assumed to refer only to Active Voting or Active Non-Voting players unless they specifically include Inactive players.

Rule 4-1/25
Joining the Game
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

I. Joining as a New Player

A Non-Player wishing to join the game shall notify the Registrar, providing a valid e-mail address, their real name, the legal Ackanomic name they wish to play under, and optionally the Ackanomic name of the current active player who convinced them to join the game, how they heard about the game, and whether they wish to be a Voting or Non-Voting player.

Upon them providing this information, and the Registrar being satisfied that it is legal, the Registrar shall post a public message announcing the new player along with the information they provided. Upon the posting of this announcement, the person's state is changed to either Voting (the default) or Non-Voting, depending on their wishes expressed as above. New players own emselves.

II. Upon the joining of a new player, the following procedure takes place, in the order shown:

1) The new player is granted a building thereupon as their residence. This building shall be known as their Home. This building shall also be known as "player name's House", where "player name" is replaced by their Ackanomic name.

2) The new player is paid from the Treasury the sum of A$900 and receives 100 Mannna.

3) The Registrar shall select a Mentor for the new player. If the player provided a valid Sponsor, that Sponsor shall be the first choice of Mentor for the new player if e is eligible as a Mentor. If the Mentor was chosen from the mentor pool, e receives The Standard Harfer Fee from the Treasury immediately; otherwise, e receives The Standard Harfer Fee if and when e accepts the mentorship.

Rule 4-1-1/11
Mentors
snowgod (Phil Ackley)

When the Registrar must select a Mentor for a new player, e shall follow these guidelines. No one may become a Mentor except as specified in the rules.

It is the duty of the Registrar to maintain a list of players who are in the Mentor pool. Any Active player may place emself in the Mentor pool or remove emself therefrom by notifying the Registrar. If there are not enough players in the Mentor pool to assign a Mentor for each new player, the Registrar may randomly select an active player from the general population. A player who is currently serving as Mentor to a new player is not considered to be in the Mentor pool while so serving.

Non-volunteering selectees must publicly accept mentorship within 1 day or be assumed to have declined, in which case the registrar must select a new Mentor.

The duties of the Mentor are as follows:

1) Answer any questions concerning game procedure to the new player.

2) Provide the new player with history and arguments for and against either side of a proposal in the voting queue upon the new player's request.

3) Provide the new player with information on any matter that requires eir immediate attention [for example, a newly active player who is required to return judgement].

4) Answer any other questions the new player has concerning the game of Ackanomic.

The Mentor shall be responsible for performing these duties while the player is a Newbie, or until the new player declines further services [whichever comes first].

A Mentor shall provide information to the new player without bias while performing the above duties.

Rule 4-1-2/7
Crazy French-Scotsmen
Robert Sevin (Mitchell Harding)

Any Newbie may publicly complain when they lose any AckaDollars or currency. When they exercise this option, the penalty will immediately be counteracted. In order for this complaint to have the effects described in this rule, it must express the sentiment "I didn't understand the rules! You keep changing the rules! You never told me about that rule!". It need not (and in fact is encouraged not to) use those exact phrases, but it must adequately express those sentiments.

If the penalty involved a loss of AckaDollars, the penalized player's AckaDollars (after having the penalty revoked) will be raised to the first prime number higher than their current AckaDollars. If the penalty involved a loss of currency, the player with the most currency (in case of a tie, the player with the most currency whose Ackanomic name occurs first alphabetically) must give the new player currency, the amount of which must be positive and non-zero. The player cannot be selected to give themselves currency. In this case, whichever player (other than the penalized player) with the most vowels in their name will give the penalized player a positive non-zero amount of currency.

This public complaining may only be exercised 3 times by any player. If a player manages to legitimately exercise this ability 3 times within a 48 hour period, they will be dubbed a Crazy Scotsman. If the player manages to legitimately exercise this ability 3 times within a 24 hour period, they will instead by dubbed a Crazy French-Scotsman. Crazy Scotsman and Crazy French-Scotsman are both Titles.

Rule 4-2/20
Leaving the Game
pTang1001001sos (Mark Nau)

Any person may leave the game by posting in a public message that they are doing so. For the purposes of the rules, they are considered to have "left the game" at the time of their announcement.

Upon leaving, if they are a player, their state is changed to On Ice, unless they are already On Ice. Then, in all cases, they are unsubscribed from all official mailing lists unless they request not to be.

Whenever other rules direct the removal of a person from the game, they are removed via the procedure described in the previous paragraph.

Rule 4-3/19
Far Out
Mitchell Harding

Any active player who has not performed a game action within the last fourteen days (seven if they are an officer) is Off in Fairy Land. If the speaker is made aware that a player is Off in Fairy Land, then the Speaker shall ask that player if they wish to continue playing. For the purposes of this rule, responding to such a request is considered a game action. If the player fails to perform a game action within 3 days, their location is changed to Fairy Land.

As soon as it is publicly knowable that a player who is Off in Fairy Land wishes to continue play, they cease to be Off in Fairy Land and are said to have Come Down To Earth. If a player indicates that e wishes to leave the game, then e may be removed from the game by the Speaker making this known, in which case they are removed from the game.

If the Speaker is Off in Fairy Land, however, and this fact is pointed out publicly, the Speaker has 3 days to respond or their location is changed to Fairy Land.

Rule 4-4/3
Characteristics
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

Certain types of entities may be defined as having Characteristics, which are named but are not entities. However, Characteristic names follow the same Rules as entity names; that is, a Characteristic may not have a given name unless it is legal for an Entity to have that name.

If a Characteristic is defined for a given entity, then that entity has a number associated with that Characteristic, called the Value of that Characteristic. (For instance, if Trinkets had a Size characteristic, then the "whatever it is we're auctioning today" may have a Size Value of 1.)

The normal range for a Characteristic is from 0 to 100, unless the Rule describing that Characteristic assigns a different range. It is possible for the range of a Characteristic to be infinite or semi-infinite. The default value for a Characteristic is either 0 or the lowest possible value for that Characteristic, whichever is lower, unless a different value is defined to be the default for that Characteristic.

The value of a Characteristic may only be changed as described by the Rules. If the Rules describe a Characteristic being "lost" or "gained" with respect to a given entity, then that entity's Characteristic Value is considered to be lowered or raised by the amount described(one, by default).

Rule 4-4-1/1
Proposal Rights
Slakko (Duncan Richer)

Each player has a Characteristic called Proposal, which has a default value of 5.

Any player may pay A$1000 to increase their Proposal characteristic by 1.

Any player may elect to lower their Proposal characteristic by 1 in return for A$800, provided their Proposal characteristic is not already less than 2.

If a player's Proposal characteristic is less than 1, it is changed to 1. The previous sentence defers to all other Rules.

Rule 4-4-3/5
Characteristic: Harf
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

Players possess the Characteristic of Harf. The Harf Value for a Player starts at a default of 0, and has a range which encompasses any integral value.

Whenever a Player gains AckaDollars from Rule 2-2-6, eir Harf Value goes up by the number of AckaDollars e gains thereby. A Player who is convicted of hogging the Harf loses 5 Harf; if an Inquisition is called and the verdict is 'No! He's going to share the Harf!', then the Supreme Inquisitor for that Hearing loses 5 Harf.

Whenever a proposal is declared harfy its author gains 1 Harf.

Rule 4-4-7/4
Voting Characteristic
Slakko (Duncan Richer)

Each player has a Characteristic called their Voting Characteristic. It has a Default Value of 3.

A player may pay A$2500 to raise their Voting Characteristic by 1. A player with Voting Characteristic greater than 0 may lower their Voting Characteristic by 1 as a Public Action, and receive A$2000 for doing so.

No player may raise their Voting Characteristic more than 5 points above the modal Voting Characteristic of all Voting Players.

Rule 4-5/5
A Degree Proves You're Educated
Studge (Tom Mueller)

Section 1 The Student

A player, who is not already a student, may gain the title student by paying the SHF and announcing a major as a public action. Acceptable majors are those fields listed in Section 5 of this rule or "Visionary". No player may become a student in a major that e holds a PhD in.

Before submitting eir thesis it is considered good form for a student to conduct surveys, make experimental proposals, and generally be involved in a study.

Section 2 The Thesis

There is a general class of unownable entity called the Thesis. All Theses are of some type and must have more than 500 words. Players who are and have been students for a month may create a thesis by paying the SHF and posting it publicly such an action causes em to stop being a student. A thesis' type is the same as the student's major. The Thesis should:
1. Demonstrate the erudition of the student in the student's major.
2. Contain at least three footnotes referencing Rules, Proposals, CFJs, old messages, or other Theses.
3. Be consistent with every Thesis that has already been accepted or contain a lengthy explanation of how and why a Thesis is wrong where the new contradicts the old.

Section 3 Grading The Thesis

When a Thesis is created, the Dean must call an Educational Hearing on its acceptability. Valid responses are "Burn the Heretic!" and "Students who THINK? What will they come up with next..." For each degree a player has in the major of the thesis, the University shall cast an additional vote in the hearing equivalent to that player's vote. For the Thesis to be accepted, more than 1/2 of the valid responses should be "Students who THINK? What will they come up with next...". If the Thesis is not accepted it is destroyed. If it is accepted, then the player who created it gets a degree in the whatever major the Thesis was for.

Each time a player gets a degree in some major they get the lowest degree they do not already have in that major among BA, MA and PhD (where the degrees are listed lowest to highest). Degrees are Titles. Players with a degree may place appropriate, yet cryptic, letters after their name [B(Harf)]. Players with a PhD may use the prefix Dr and charge exorbitant consultation fees.

Section 4 How Majors Work

If a Thesis is Visionary it should propose a new major and fill the above Section 2 requirements for that new major instead of an actual major called "Visionary".

If the Thesis is Visionary then more than 2/3 (not 1/2) of the valid responses must be "Students who THINK? What will they come up with next..." for it to be accepted.

If a Visionary Thesis is accepted then its type changes to the major it proposed, this major is added to Section 5, and the player who created the Visionary Thesis gets a degree in the new major, not a major called "Visionary".

Section five of this rule serves only to indicate what majors are available at the Ackanomic University and is therefore a list of major names and Thesis types incapable of actually authorizing wholly new systems in Ackanomic.

Section 5 Majors

Custom
Harfology
History
Inter Nomic Relations
Jurisprudence
Legislation
Scamology
Treasure Hunting

Rule 4-6/6
Reincarnating Into The Third Cat
Calvin N Hobbes (Thierry Joffrain)

When a player starts playing for the first time, they are said to have never been reincarnated. For every two chronologically consecutive proposals made by a certain player which have a difference of more than 200 in their number, then that player is said to have reincarnated once.

Third Cat is a unique title. If a single active player active player has been reincarnated more times than any other active player, but does not have the title Third Cat, then that player receives the title Third Cat.

Passive Contemplator is a unique title. If a single active player has a greater difference between the numbers of two his chronologically consecutive proposals than does any other active player, but does not have the title Passive Contemplator, then that player receives the title Passive Contemplator.

The Brass Monkey is a great admirer of passive contemplation. Because of this, if the Passive Contemplator casts a nonzero vote on a proposal whose number ends in 00, the Brass Monkey casts a vote with an absolute value of 60 with the same sign as that of the Passive Contemplator's vote.

E also likes reincarnation in general, so e casts a vote whose value matches the vote of the Third Cat on all proposals whose numbers end in 57.

Rule 4-10/3
Awards and Orders
Slakko (Duncan Richer)

Orders of Heraldry are collections of Titles, and are thus collections of classes of non-tradeable entities. Each Order contains five different titles, each of which correspond to a rank in that order. The ranks are, in increasing order of prestige, Medallist, Ordinary Member, Commander, Knight Commander and Grand Commander, which may be abbreviated M, OM, C, KC and GC appropriately. It is good form for the names of orders to be easily abbreviable (e.g. so that a Grand Commander of the Order of the Loophole Surfboard can be abbreviated as GCLS).

When a player gains a more prestigious title in an Order e loses all inferior titles in that Order.

Unless other rules explicitly state how ranks in a particular Order can be achieved, ranks in that Order can only be achieved by the following method:

Players may nominate other Players to receive a particular Order by notifying the President. No player may make more than one nomination per calendar month. The President may grant or deny the request at whim, but must state so publicly, and it is a Duty of the President to respond to such requests. It is good form to give vague yet plausible reasons for denial or acceptance of any nomination. If the nomination is accepted, then the player nominated receives the lowest rank in that Order which they have not already achieved, if such exists.

The following Orders of Heraldry exist:

Order of the Blue Cross (BC)
Order of the Harf (H)
Order of the Loophole Surfboard (LS)
Order of the Steel Flea (SF)
Order of the Fifteen Minutes (FM)
Order of the Hyperactive Aardvark (HA)

Rule 4-10-1/16
The Blue Cross
Calvin N Hobbes (Thierry Joffrain)

Each player has a Blue Cross Rank; it is a non-negative integer. At all times, a player's Blue Cross Rank is equal to the number of non-Null proposals he submitted which have been accepted, plus an additional 10 if he has a Blue Cross Bonus. If a player has registered for the game and quit one or more times previous to his most recent registration, proposals he made under his previous registration(s) shall count towards his Blue Cross Rank if they were accepted, even if he wasn't a player when they were accepted.

When a player first reaches or exceeds certain Blue Cross Ranks, they acquire ranks in the Order of the Blue Cross, as follows:

Reaching or exceeding BCR 20 makes a player an MBC.
Reaching or exceeding BCR 60 makes a player an OMBC.
Reaching or exceeding BCR 180 makes a player a CBC.
Reaching or exceeding BCR 340 makes a player a KCBC.
Reaching or exceeding BCR 500 makes a player a GCBC.

Rule 4-10-2/0
The Hyperactive Aardvark
Reductio (Elio M. Garcia)

The auspicious Order of the Hyperactive Aardvark seeks to recognize those people with an inordinate compulsion to create rules and amendments as swiftly as possible in Ackanomic.

The Order's breadth extends from the period 3 months after the founding of Ackanomic [because the initial rule set was sparse enough that the first bunch of rules were created quickly and without much difficulty] to however long the Rule remains in the rule set.

During the first three months after a player has joined Ackanomic, any proposal which they authored which creates at least one new rule gains the author the next successive rank in the Order of the Hyperactive Aardvark.

After the first three months, a player may gain membership or successive ranks in the Order of the Hyperactive Aardvark by passing 8 non-boring, non-null proposals within a calendar month. No more than one rank may be gained in the Order of the Hyperactive Aardvark during any given month.

Rule 4-11/17
Boons of the Ancients
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

1) Whenever the rules specify a Boon of the Ancients is bestowed upon a particular player, the Boon is chosen from the list below, created if necessary (or as described following), and transferred to the particular player (or elsewhere, as described following).

2) Boons may either be bestowed randomly or deterministically. If the rule bestowing the Boon does not specify a method, the random method is used.

3) Under the deterministic method, the player designated to receive the Boon ("player" for the purposes of this rule) has 3 days to choose a Boon for himself to receive. No Boon is bestowed if three days pass and the player has made no selection.

4) Under the random method, the numbers in parentheses following each choice are summed, and the probability of receiving a particular Boon on the list is the number in parentheses after that Boon divided by the sum. The Officer in Charge of Random Things then randomly chooses a Boon for the player to receive based on these probabilities.

5) If the Boon is not of type "Must Describe", it is immediately created if necessary, and transferred to the player after it has been chosen.

6) If the Boon is of type Must Describe, the player has 3 days to post a description of the Boon as specified in the list. If no description is posted in that time, no Boon is bestowed. A Boon is of type Must Describe if the words "Must Describe" appear in its description in the list below.

7) Boons of type Must Describe are created 7 days after their description is posted, or when the results of a Bogusity Hearing on that particular Boon's description are publicly knowable, whichever is later, unless the Boon is found to be Bogus, in which case the player receives no Boon, and/or no Boon is created.

8) Any player may call a Bogusity Hearing within three days of a description of a Must Describe Boon being posted. The player who made the call is the Hearing Harfer and is called the Principal Authenticator while it is in session. Only one such Hearing may be called per Boon. The player who described the Boon may not vote in the hearing. This takes precedence over R5. The valid responses to the Bogusity Hearing are "This loophole surfer is totally Bogus", and "That's a pretty cool idea". If the result is the former, the Boon is found to be Bogus and the player who described it loses 20 AckaDollars.

9) Boon list:

a) Ancient wisdom.

b) The gods are bored. The player is given pointy ears (2).

c) The gods are grouchy. The player receives 2 Chartreuse Goose Cards. (1)

Rule 5/20
Hearings
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

A Rule may specify circumstances under which a Hearing is called. When this happens, the Hearing Harfer shall announce in a public message that it has been called, naming the type of Hearing, describing the circumstances that brought it about, and listing the valid responses [and other pertinent details]. As of this announcement, the Hearing is in session.

Count Tabula shall be the Hearing Harfer unless the rules specify someone else for that duty for a particular Hearing. The Hearing Harfer is considered an officer with respect to clauses in the rules regulating officer efficiency.

While a Hearing is in session, each Player may send his or her response to that Hearing to the Hearing Harfer for that Hearing privately. The Hearing Harfer shall record each response that matches one of the valid responses for the Hearing. If a Player who has already responded sends another valid response, the Hearing Harfer shall discard the previous response and record the new one. If a non-player entity is authorised by the Rules to state one or more responses on a particular Hearing, then the Hearing Harfer shall also record these responses. Any response contained in a post that does not unambiguously identify the Hearing it is in response to, even if only one Hearing is in progress, is invalid. Non-voting players may not vote in hearings, unless a rule says otherwise for a specific type of hearing.

The Hearing shall end when it has been in session for three days, unless another rule defines a longer period of time for a particular Hearing. When it ends, it ceases to be in session.

Once a Hearing has ended, it has a verdict. The verdict of the Hearing is whichever valid response was given by the most Players, and other entities capable of voting in hearings, in response to the Hearing, if exactly one valid response holds this distinction. Otherwise, if there is a tie among two or more responses, or there were no responses, the result of the Hearing is said to be inconclusive.

A Hearing is Serious if there exists one or more verdicts for that particular Hearing that would lead to a modification of the ruleset. Other rules may define other times at which a Hearing is Serious.

If exactly one of the verdicts of a Serious Hearing would lead to a modification of the ruleset, that verdict must receive sufficient votes such that if it were a proposal it would be accepted, treating votes for that verdict as votes of 100 and all other votes in the hearing as votes of -100. In this case, if this particular response would fail to be accepted, the response that received the second most responses is the verdict of the Hearing.

When the results of a Hearing are inconclusive, the Hearing Harfer shall recount the votes, discounting any cast by a non-Player Entity. If the result is still inconclusive, the result is whichever of the tied responses appears first in the Rule defining them, unless the Rule for a particular hearing defines an alternative way to resolve the inconclusive hearing.

A hearing may be retracted, provided it is in session, by the Hearing Harfer for that Hearing. A retracted Hearing has no verdict, and its conclusion has no effect on the Rules unless the Rules explicitly apply to retracted hearings.

Rule 5-2/10
Politeness Moon
Mitchell Harding

Any Player sending a public message should avoid deliberate rudeness and/or ad hominem attacks, where deliberate rudeness is characterized by not furthering game play or discussion and/or doing so in such a way as to unnecessarily offend or alienate players from the game of Ackanomic. Any Player may call a Hearing on the matter of whether a certain public message from another Player was polite.

The valid responses to a Politeness Moon Hearing are "Yes, it was polite." and "No, it was not polite.". If the verdict of the Hearing shows that the message was not polite, the Player who sent it loses 1 harf. If it shows that it was polite, its author gets the nickname Jazz JackRabbit for the next 3 days, and the player who called the hearing loses 1 harf.

Rule 6/31
Offices, Commonalities
pTang1001001sos (Mark Nau)

Offices are named, unownable entities

The following applies to all Offices:

(i) Seats:

A Seat of an Office is an unownable entity, unless the rules specify otherwise for a particular Office or Seat. [Seats are held, not owned.] The Rule that creates an Office should specify how many players can hold that Office at any one time. This is referred to as the number of "Seats" an Office has. If the Rules fail to specify the number of Seats for any given Office, the Office has only one Seat. A Seat is either held by one Player or it is vacant. No player may hold more than one seat for a given Office, including any seat held in an acting capacity, and the holder of a seat in a given Office is ineligible to be Nominated for that Office unless the seat e currently holds is up for grabs. Non-voting players may not hold offices unless a rule says otherwise for a specific office. Players are the only entities eligible to serve as officers. When an office ceases to be defined as an office by any rule, the player who held the office is removed from the office and that office is destroyed; this removal and destruction takes precedence over any rule which conflicts with this sentence.

(ii) Duties:

The Duties of an Office are the tasks that the Officer(s) are expected to carry out to facilitate the conduct of Ackanomic business. Duties tend to be typified by the compilation, maintenance, and distribution of information. It is possible that an office has no duties.

(iii) Privileges:

The Privileges of an Office are the considerations the Officer(s) receive according to the Rules regulating the Office. Examples can include the receipt of Ackanomic currency, the ability to cast extra votes in certain circumstance, or special consideration with regards to making appointments or issuing CFJ decisions. It is possible than an office has no privileges.

(iv) Salaries:

If the Rules specify that a particular Officer is to receive a specified salary in A$s, then that number of A$ is transferred from the Treasury to that Officer at noon on the first Monday of each month.

(v) Term of Office:

a) The Rules may specify a Term of Office, which is the amount of time a Player may hold an Office before his Term is considered to have expired. If the Rules fail to specify a Term for any Office, the Office is considered to have none, which is to say that the Term never expires.

b) The Rules may specify a Minimum Term of Office. When a player has held a particular seat of an office for a period greater than its Minimum Term of Office, any player who is eligible to hold that seat may as a public action demand "an end to this banna republic", specifying the seat. When this occurs the term of office for the specified seat expires and an election is held. The player who called for the election is automatically nominated. If the rules fail to specify a Minimum Term of Office for a particular office, then this paragraph shall not apply to that office.

c) When a Player's Term expires, he is no longer considered to be holding the Office. The Player performs the Office in an "Acting" role until the Seat is filled.

d) If the Rules should ever require an Election or Nomination to be called for an Office seat which is not currently vacant, then its Term of Office shall be considered to end when the Election or Nomination is called.

(vi) Stepping Down:

An Officer may always voluntarily step down from office, leaving it vacant. Whenever possible, the Officer should give at least 3 day's notice of his intention to vacate an office.

(vii)

A player may not acquire offices except as specified by the rules.

(viii) Optional Offices

An office is considered "optional" if and only if it is specified as such by the rules. An optional office has the following effects:

a) A player filling an optional office in an acting capacity is not required to perform the duties of that office.

b) If a nomination is held for an optional office, and no one volunteers for that office, no action is taken to fill the office once the nomination period ends, except as follows: If an optional office is vacant, and no nomination or election is currently being held for that office, any player may insist that a nomination (or election, as the case may be) commence, by making a statement to that effect to the public forum. At such time, a nomination (election) shall be conducted by the appropriate officer.

(ix) Office Type

All offices are either Functional or Political. If the rules fail to specify the type of an office, that office is a Political Office. Vacancies in a particular Political office are filled by election for office (by the procedure in R6-2), unless other rules specify otherwise. In the case of an optional Political office where a nomination did not produce any volunteers, the election process is aborted at that point.

(x) Efficiency

Officers have 3 days to correctly complete the tasks and duties they are responsible for, not counting any time the officer is vacationing or in Gaol, unless other rules unambiguously specify a different finite amount of time for these things.

Rule 6-1/13
Acting Officers
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

I. Definition of An Acting Officer

The Rules may specify conditions under which a Player serves in an Office in an "Acting" capacity; e is referred to as an Acting Officer. E is not considered to actually "hold" the Office with reference to any Rule besides this one and Rule 6.

An Acting Officer is responsible for performing all of the Duties of that Office. E receives none of its Privileges, except for the following:

i. Privileges which are also explicitly defined to be Duties by the Rules.
ii. Privileges required to perform explicitly defined Duties.
iii. Privileges explicitly stated to be available to an Acting Officer.
iv. All privileges of the Office when the Acting Officer is filling in for a Vacationing player.

II. Who May Hold An Acting Office

Any voting player may become an Acting Officer, unless e holds a seat of that Office. Non-voting players may only be Acting Officers for Offices which may normally be held by non-voting players, subject to the same limitation as voting players.

An entity never holds a particular seat in both an Acting capacity and a "normal" capacity. If this ever appears to be the case, it is assumed that e is holding the office in an Acting capacity only.

If a player who holds a seat of an Office in an Acting capacity resigns from that Office or otherwise becomes ineligible to hold that Office, then at that point e is no longer an Acting Officer for that seat. This also occurs when there is a holder of that Office in a "normal" capacity, i.e. when an Officer is appointed to hold a vacant Office, or when a Vacationing Officer again becomes active.

III.

There are two Cabinets, the Upper and Lower Cabinets. A player is a member of a Cabinet if e is an officer or acting officer for an office which is in that Cabinet. The Substitutes for a Cabinet are the voting Officers in that Cabinet who hold those offices in a non-Acting capacity, ordered in the same order as the offices they hold. The following offices are in the Upper Cabinet, from first to last: President, Speaker, Clerk of the Courts, Financier, Scorekeeper, Promoter, Tabulator, Count Tabula, Postmaster, Rule-Harfer, Web-Harfer, Map-Harfer, Org-Harfer, Treasure-Harfer. The following offices are in the Lower Cabinet, from first to last: Registrar, Herald, Dean, Spelling Exchequer, Dungeon Master, Poet Laureate, Scaremonger.

IV.

When a player goes on vacation, e may name one player to be the Acting Officer for em for each office e holds. An Acting Officer may resign as an Acting Officer as a public action, and may optionally specify a replacement at that time. If no active player holds a given functional office in any capacity (for instance because the holder went on vacation or resigned as Acting Officer without specifying a replacement), the office is assigned to the first Substitute in that office's Cabinet who has not resigned as Acting Officer for that office since it was last held in a non-Acting capacity.

Rule 6-2/17
Offices, Related Definitions
pTang1001001sos (Mark Nau)

(i) A Nomination is conducted as follows:

a) The appropriate Officer publicly announces the beginning of the Nomination, the reason the Nomination is being called, and when the Nomination shall end.

b) If there is no Nomination Period specified for the Nomination, the default Period is 3 days.

c) During the Nomination Period, volunteers shall notify the appropriate Officer of their intent to be considered.

d) At the end of the Nomination Period, the appropriate Officer shall publicly report the list of eligible volunteers (Nominees). During the first day of an election, a nominee may publicly withdraw and name another nominee for the same office who has not withdrawn; if the nominee does not specify such a nominee then the attempt to withdraw fails. When Count Tabula counts the votes for this election, all votes cast by players for the withdrawn nominee will instead be counted as if they were cast for the player the withdrawn nominee named.

e) If there are no eligible volunteers, the Nomination Period shall continue until there is an eligible volunteer, except in the case of optional offices [q.v. Rule 6, section (ix)].

f) If the rules fail to state who is eligible to volunteer, then all Players are eligible.

(ii) An Election for Office is conducted as follows:

a) A Nomination is conducted. Any Player who is eligible to hold the Office is eligible to volunteer.

b) If the number of Nominees is the same as the number of vacant Seats for the Office in question, the appropriate Officer shall announce this fact, and the Seats shall be filled by the Nominees. This shall conclude the Election process; no actual Election shall be held in this case. Otherwise,

c) The appropriate Officer publicly announces the start of the Election, the Office for which the Election is being held, and when the Election will end.

d) Elections last 3 days from the time the appropriate officer announces he is starting to accept votes.

During the Election Period, each voting player may cast one vote for any one of the Nominees by so notifying the appropriate Officer. A voting player may change eir vote at any time by so notifying the appropriate Officer. The appropriate Officer shall only consider the last vote e received from each voting player.

f) At the end of the Election Period, the appropriate Officer shall publicly announce the vote tallies for each Nominee, and which Nominee(s) shall hold the Office.

g) Letting N stand for the number of vacant Seats for the Office in question, the top N Nominees, ranked by votes received, shall hold the Office.

h) In the event of a tie for number of votes received, the tie can be resolved in one of the following manners:

1) Recount: Count Tabula shall once again tally the votes and announce the election's winner(s) as described in sections (f) and (g) above, except that this time, votes by non-Player entities shall not be counted.

2) Random: Count Tabula shall randomly assign a ranking order among any Nominees tied for votes received. All tied Nominees shall be ranked this way, including any non-active ones.

3) <Officer> Preference: the Officer named shall select a ranking order among any Nominees tied for votes.

4) New Election: the entire Election for Office shall start over, with all results of the current Election for Office disregarded.

i) If the Rules fail to specify what method shall be used to resolve ties, then the Random method shall be used.

Rule 6-2-1/1
Assistant Officers
Laa Laa (Tom Walmsley)

An officer is considered to have performed a duty if either he or any assistant officer for that office has performed that duty.

Any officer may, as a privilege of office which is permitted for acting officers, appoint any player eligible to hold that office as an assistant officer for that office. (E.g. the Web Harfer may appoint someone assistant Web Harfer.) The player so appointed becomes an assistant officer for that office upon publicly accepting the appointment within three days.

Any officer may, as a privilege of office which is permitted for acting officers, dismiss any assistant officer for that office. (E.g. the Spelling Exchequer may dismiss any assistant Spelling Exchequer.) The assistant so dismissed immediately ceases to be an assistant officer for that office, but no other assistant officer positions he may hold are affected.

An assistant officer may resign from any or all of his assistant officer positions at any time. Upon resigning from an assistant officer position for a particular office, a player ceases to be an assistant officer for that office.

All appointments, dismissals, and resignations described by this rule are accomplished as public actions. Players may not become or cease to be assistant officers except as described by this rule.

Rule 6-3/19
Offices, Impeachment
pTang1001001sos (Mark Nau)

This rule defers precedence to other rules which describe methods for impeaching officers.

An Officer is Impeached by the following process:

(i) An Impeachment Paper (IP) is authored by a voting Player and posted to the public forum. The IP shall contain the stated intent to remove one Player from one Office held by that Player. An author may only have one IP pending at any one time. A player may not submit more than one IP per calendar week, and may not submit more than one IP against the same officer in a calendar month.

(ii) All voting Players except the Officer named in the IP shall be able to cast one vote either YES or NO on the matter of removing said Officer from Office. The voting period shall be 3 days. All votes on the IP shall be cast in the public forum.

(iii) Upon submission of the IP, and while it remains unresolved, the entity holding the Office shall be said to be holding it in an Acting capacity.

(iv) At the expiration of the voting period, there will be a resolution of ACCEPTED or REJECTED for the IP. An IP is always rejected if less than 25% of all active players, excluding the Officer named in the IP, vote on that IP. An IP is also REJECTED unless it meets one or more of the conditions below, in which case it is ACCEPTED a) at least 1/2 of all active players, excluding the Officer named in the IP, voted YES. b) At least 2/3 of all players who voted on the IP voted YES.

(v) If the IP is ACCEPTED, the Player named in the IP is no longer considered to be the "Acting" officer, and the Seat is open, unless the office was Functional, in which case the player who authored the IP receives the position.

(vi) If the IP is REJECTED, the Player named in the IP is restored to Office, and the author of the IP is penalized 20 AckaDollars.

(vii) The Rules may specify additional means of impeachment without invalidating the process outlined above. As well, this rule defers to all other rules on the matter of what conditions are required for an IP to be ACCEPTED.

Rule 6-4/22
Functional Offices, Commonalties
pTang1001001sos (Mark Nau)

This rule takes precedence over rule 6.

An Office is a Functional Office if and only if the Rules specify it as such.

The following applies to all Functional Offices:

(i) A functional Office has only one Seat unless the Rules specify otherwise.

(ii) As a Privilege of Office, each Player shall receive a monthly salary equal to the Standard Harfer Fee for every Functional Office held.

(iii) A Vacationing Functional Officer is considered to have vacated eir Seat for the duration of eir vacation, after which he shall hold the Seat once again. At his discretion, the President may appoint a volunteer to fill an "Acting" role for a Functional Office vacated by vacation. In this case, there shall be no action to fill the empty Seat. This section takes precedence over section (vi) of this Rule.

(iv) The President is the Supervisory Office for all Functional Offices, unless otherwise specified for that specific Office.

(v) Functional Officers may be impeached by the following process:

a) The President declares publicly his intention to impeach a stated Player from a given Functional Office.
b) At least 2/3 of all active justices comprising the Supreme Court (sans the player being impeached if e is a Justice) concurs with the impeachment by publicly agreeing within 3 days of the President's declaration.
c) At this time, the Functional Office is vacant.

(vi) Whenever a Functional Office has a vacant Seat, or if the current holder of that Seat publicly states an intent to vacate his Seat and requests the President conduct a Nomination to fill it, the President shall conduct a Nomination for that Seat. After the Nomination, the President shall select an eligible Nominee and announce that Nominee's name publicly. That Nominee shall hold the Functional Office. If the Nomination was initiated at the Functional Officer's request, he shall be considered to have resigned at the instant the new Officer is announced, if he has not already left the Seat.

Rule 6-4-1/24
Speaker
pTang1001001sos (Mark Nau)

This rule takes precedence over all other rules.

(i) The office of Speaker is a political office with one seat.

(ii) Whenever this Office is vacant, it shall be filled by an Election for Office. The specifications for the Election for Office are:

a) Nomination Period: 3 days.
b) Voting Period: 3 days.
c) Tie Resolution: New Election.
d) Each degree a Nominee holds shall cause the University to cast an extra vote for em.

(iii) As an additional Privilege of Office, the Speaker shall receive a monthly salary equal to A$10 more than the Standard Harfer Fee.

(iv) Performance of tasks required by Sections (v) thru (vii) are duties of the Office of Speaker.

(v) If, in any rule, an action is required to be carried out, and the rule does not either specify who is to carry it out or define a mechanism for choosing someone to do so, the Speaker is required to carry out the task.

(vi) If it is ever the case that no active Player is Speaker or Acting Speaker, and the application of other rules and/or the preceding clauses of this rule do not correct that situation, the following succession procedure is used to appoint an Acting Speaker:

a) All offices are listed in the order of the rule number which creates or defines the office (in the case of a rule defining multiple offices, the offices are listed in the order in which they appear in the rule).

b) All offices not held by an active player are then removed from the list.

c) The player holding the office at the top of the list becomes the Acting Speaker. If, however, that office has more than one seat, the active player whose Ackanomic name appears first in an alphabetic listing of active seatholders of that office becomes the Acting Speaker. [The Acting Speaker then has the duty to assure that all offices are filled, including Speaker, as the case may be, in accordance with the rules.]

Rule 6-4-2/11
Clerk of the Court
Robert Sevin (Mitchell Harding)

The Office of the Clerk of the Court is a Functional Office. The Duties of the Clerk of the Court are:

(a) to receive Calls for Judgement (CFJs),

(b) to select Judges for CFJs, distribute them publicly, and to otherwise administer CFJs as necessary

(c) to receive verdicts from Judges and other judicial entities, and to distribute the verdicts publicly, at which time they become official.

(d) maintaining and making public upon request the CFJ Ineligibility List.

Rule 6-4-3/18
Web-Harfer
Robert Sevin (Mitchell Harding)

The Office of the Web-Harfer is a Functional Office. The Duties are:

a) To keep the information on the Ackanomic WWW page up-to-date.

b) To select and maintain one or more links to on-line Dictionaries of the English language, and the Ackanomic Lexicon, when the Office of Spelling Exchequer is not filled.

(c) To track any game state information or data that the Rules require to be tracked, but do not specify elsewhere who is to track it, and to make that information available to any player on request or as needed [e.g. player locations, thread split information].

The Privileges are:

a) To possess a Shimmering Spellbook.

It is the responsibility of other players to make public any information that should be reflected in the WWW page.

Rule 6-4-4/9
Rule-Harfer
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

The Office of the Rule-Harfer is a Functional Office. The Duties are:

a) To keep an accurate copy of the Rules of Ackanomic (known as the Official Rules Document), and to make the text of the Official Rules Document available to any player upon request.

b) To annotate each rule in the Official Rules Document with customary ancillary information, such as the Rule's author, revision number, and revision history, when known. If the length of a Rule's revision history becomes unwieldy (in the opinion of the Rule-Harfer), and if the format in which the Official Rules Document supports such, a Rule's revision history may be maintained in a separate document, with a link to this document at the bottom of the Rule text.

The Privileges are:

a) To add section headers and other furniture to the Official Rules Document. This furniture does not become part of the Rules.

b) To add whitespace and line breaks to the Rules. The Rule-Harfer should consider all player requests to do so.

c) To maintain the Official Rules Document as separate physical documents, provided there is at least one physical document from which all the rules can be located.

d) To submit Common Sense Reports (CSRs) which only affect rule numbers and rule number references in the rules.

e) To own a Shimmering Spellbook.

f) It is a privilege of the Rule Harfer to create Shimmering Spellbooks for players, or to destroy them, as a public action.

The Official Rules Document is not the Rules. Modification of the Official Rules Document does not affect the rules.

Rule 6-4-5/13
Financier and Free Market
Calvin N Hobbes (Thierry Joffrain)

The Office of the Financier (OotF), or Financier, is a Functional Office. This rule defers to other Officer rules that define another officer to perform a subset of the duties described here.

The Duties of the Financier are:

a) To maintain accurate records of the who owns each ownable entity, what each Player owns, and what each named non-Player entity [such as the Treasury] owns.

b) To log (or collate logs made by other officers) all transfers of entity ownership and the creation and destruction of entities, and to verify that these events happen only in accordance with the Rules.

c) To make the records and logs available to any Player upon request.

d) To maintain the Free Market (FM), and to verify any transaction made there was made in accordance with the rules.

e) To perform any random determinations involved in a process related solely to the transfer of tradable entities.

Rule 6-4-6/11
Scorekeeper
David Chapman

The Office of the Scorekeeper is a Functional Office. The Duties of the Scorekeeper are:

(a) maintaining a record of the players' Mannna.
(b) recording each Mannna change
(c) announcing when a player has a negative amount of Mannna and when that has ceased to be the case.
(d) performing any random determinations involved in a process solely involving Mannna.

Rule 6-4-7/14
Promoter
David Chapman

The Office of the Promoter is a Functional Office. The Duties of the Promoter are:

(a) to accept proposal submissions from players;

(b) to keep a record of each proposal from the time it is submitted to the time its voting period ends;

(c) to assign each proposal an integer number greater than any number previously assigned to a proposal. It is expected, but not required, that the promoter shall give each proposal a number exactly one greater than the previous proposal's number;

(d) to assign a title to each proposal for which the submitter did not indicate a legal title;

(e) to promptly distribute each proposal for voting.

Rule 6-4-8/31
Tabulator
Sean Crystal

The Office of the Tabulator is a Functional Office. The Duties of the Tabulator are:

(a) to count votes on each proposal.

(b) to maintain the voting records of each player on each proposal.

(c) to report the acceptance or rejection of proposals, in the time order in which their voting periods ended.

The Tabulator need not perform these duties on any proposal which has been retracted, nullified, or deemed invalid in accordance with the Rules.

Rule 6-4-9/4
Count Tabula
Rambo R Minuteman (Tom Walmlsey)

The Office of Count Tabula is a Functional Office. The Duties of the Office include solicitation, tabulation, and reporting of votes on all Ackanomic matters, excluding Proposals. This includes, but is not limited to, Hearings (unless otherwise specified) [see Rule 5], Impeachment Papers [Rule 6-3], and all Elections for Office [Rule 6-2]. Count Tabula also has the Duty to conduct any Nominations for Office that are not the responsibility of any other Officer.

Rule 6-4-10/15
Registrar
David Chapman

The Office of the Registrar is a Functional Office. The Duties of the Registrar are:

(a) maintaining a list of all registered players, their current Ackanomic names, their e-mail addresses, and their player states.

(b) maintaining a list of all current and previous players, all Ackanomic names held by them at any point, and their True Names.

(b) furnishing new players with any game information they need, including but not limited to:

(i) instructions on how to vote and how to submit proposals,
(ii) definitions of commonly used acronyms such as CFJ, RFC, and CSR,
(iii) the address of the Ackanomic web page,
(iv) the current list of players,
(v) the current rules,
(vi) the fact that the Registrar is available to answer new players' questions
(vii) the name and email address of their Mentor.

(c) to make oneself available for questions from new players.

(d) keeping track of all of the titles and offices the players hold.

(e) asking new players how they found out about the game, and making any answer they provide public.

Rule 6-4-11-1/6
Common Sense Reports
Vynd (John McCoy)

A Common Sense Report (CSR) is a list of suggested changes to the Rules or other documents, but is not a proposal. A CSR may only be authored by someone given explicit permission to do so by the Rules. Other Rules may restrict the possible contents of a CSR authored by a given player, and nothing issued by that player is considered a CSR unless it follows these restrictions.

Whenever a player authors a CSR, he must assign it a unique number and distribute it publicly. After it has been distributed, any player may publicly object to that CSR. 3 days after it has been distributed, the changes described in a CSR are enacted, unless 2 or more players objected to the CSR within those 3 days. The author of the CSR shall publicly announce the fact of its enaction, or failure.

Rule 6-4-12/20
Postmaster
/dev/joe (Joseph DeVincentis)

The Postmaster is an optional functional office with one seat.

A duty of the Postmaster shall be to create and maintain an official mailing list and a separate official voting mailing list for Ackanomic, so public messages can be sent to one address and forwarded from there to all players and observers automatically. [The official list is intended for messages of interest to all Ackanomic, and the official voting list for messages of interest only to voting players.] The Postmaster shall create additional, optional lists as e deems it appropriate.

It is a duty of the Postmaster to keep a publicly available record of the Postal Code. It is a privilege of the Postmaster to issue CSRs that consist solely of modifications to the Postal Code.

The following is a list of privileges the Postmaster may exercise as public actions. In order to full specify the action, the Postmaster must state the email address of the person affected and the reason for exercising the privilege.

a) When a person's email [player or observer alike] is bouncing, the Postmaster may move that person's subscription from a regular list to the digest version of that list, if such exists.

b) If ten or more of an active player's email messages bounce during a period of at least three days, then the Postmaster may change that player's state to Vacationing.

c) If twenty or more of a Vacationing player's, Non-voting player's, or observer's email messages bounce during a period of at least seven days, then the Postmaster may unsubscribe that player from any and all mailing lists.

It is a privilege of the Postmaster to remove any observer from any list provided they are given seven days' notice, and they do not object within that time.

If a player posts a public message with a subject line that does not contain either "Ackanomic:" or "Acka:", the Postmaster may declare that player to have Gone Postal. A player who has Gone Postal is treated as if e is Hosed for one day; this period is extended by another day for each additional message lacking the aforementioned strings that is posted while e has Gone Postal.

Whenever a player is Hosed, all public messages by them should contain nothing but poetry, specifically original haiku, limericks, sonnets, sestinas, and rhymed couplets, and no other forms (except of course, proper madrigals). Whenever a Hosed player authors a public message that contains something other than this (excluding customary headers, quoted material written by someone else, or customary instructions to officers), they automatically transfer A$79 from them to the Treasury, if they have that much. If they don't have that much, a random entity with which they are affiliated that has that sum transfers it to the treasury. If no such entity exists either, the player is deemed Weird, with no further effects, unless they are the Harfmeister, in which case they are deemed Really Weird.

Rule 6-4-13/11
Map-Harfer
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

The Office of Map-Harfer is a Functional Office.

The duties of the Map-Harfer include:

a) To maintain and make publicly available a list of the locations of all entities, including players, for which locations are known or specified.

b) To maintain the Map of Ackanomic as specified in the Rules.

c) To maintain any other maps which do not have another Officer assigned to maintain them.

Rule 6-4-14/5
Org-Harfer
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

The Office of the Org-Harfer is a Functional Office. The Duties of the Org-Harfer are:

(a) keeping track of all Institutions, as such are defined by the Rules, including their names, membership status, type, etc.

(b) keeping track of the membership of Institutions, including the adding and removal of players, who has proxied their approval to the Institution, etc.

Rule 6-4-16/5
Treasure-Harfer
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

There exists an optional Functional Office of Treasure-Harfer.

The Duties are:

a) To keep a record of all buried and found treasures -- who buried them, who found them(if applicable), their map when revealed, and the entities they contain, as well as any other information, clues, or riddles provided formally or informally that e feels are relevant.

b) To be the default Map Custodian for any Treasure Map whose Writer requests it, as in Rule 12-9. The Treasure-Harfer is not excluded from finding any Treasure for which e is not a Map Custodian.

Rule 6-4-17/9
Spelling Exchequer
breadbox (Brian Raiter)

The optional Office of Spelling Exchequer exists.

I.

A Duty of the Office of Spelling Exchequer is to proofread Miscellaneous Submissions. The term "Miscellaneous Submissions", for the purposes of this rule, refers to texts that effect Ackanomic business, but have not yet been submitted. Such texts include submissions to other Offices [such as proposals and CFJs], and public messages that are required by the rules. Other texts may also be considered Miscellaneous Submissions for the purposes of this rule, and the Spelling Exchequer is not required to refuse any text submitted to em.

Another Duty of the Office of Spelling Exchequer is to select one or more links to on-line Dictionaries of the English language, as well as to maintain a copy the Ackanomic Lexicon and make it accessible to players upon request. The term "Official Dictionary", as used elsewhere in the Rules, shall be construed to mean the union of these Dictionaries and the Lexicon.

II.

At any time, players have the option of privately sending the Spelling Exchequer Miscellaneous Submissions to be proofread for errors in spelling, punctuation and grammar.

Unless the author has specifically requested otherwise, the Spelling Exchequer shall only make corrections or suggestions that are concerned with errors of grammar, spelling, and punctuation. [Comments regarding issues of style, for example, are normally considered inappropriate.] The Spelling Exchequer shall, in good faith, attempt to revise each document so that it is free of errors and has the intended meaning of the author. (It is recognized, however, that this is not always possible to achieve.)

Barring the exceptions listed below, the Spelling Exchequer must reply to the author within three days after receiving a text. The Spelling Exchequer's reply shall contain a corrected version of the original document, a list of errors with explanations, or some other indication of the changes deemed to be necessary. (The actual form should be one that the Spelling Exchequer judges to be the most useful to the author.)

The author of a Miscellaneous Submission may permit a longer time period for the Spelling Exchequer to compose a reply. The author should do this by specifying a different required time when sending the Miscellaneous Submission to the Spelling Exchequer, or alternately specifying that there is no required time. Any such indication shall apply only to the text it accompanies.

When the Miscellaneous Submission is a text that is to be privately sent to another Office, the player submitting the text may choose to allow it to be Directly Forwarded, as long as that player is a player other than the Spelling Exchequer. A player doing so must indicate this wish, and specify the intended final recipient unambiguously. In this case, if the Spelling Exchequer finds no errors, or finds only errors that the Spelling Bee would be permitted to fix if the text in question were a rule, then the Spelling Exchequer may send the text directly to the intended recipient, instead of replying to the original author. (If the Spelling Exchequer finds any errors of a more serious nature, e must still reply to the author as above, and must not forward it to anyone else.) The Officer who receives the proofread text shall then treat it as if it had been submitted by the original author.

If, for some reason, a document cannot be proofread within the required time, the Spelling Exchequer's reply to the author should instead be an indication of this fact (preferably with an explanation of why).

While the Spelling Exchequer is free to proofread Miscellaneous Submissions of any nature, it is understood that documents pertaining to Ackanomic business are the primary concern of this Office. In particular, texts containing potential proposals shall have the highest priority.

III.

A Privilege of the Office of Spelling Exchequer is to possess a Shimmering Spellbook.

IV.

Players are in no way required to follow the suggestions of the Spelling Exchequer. As always, the author of a public message or other text retains full control over, and full responsibility for, its content. Similarly, the Spelling Exchequer is not responsible for errors that appear in the texts of other players.

As always, the Spelling Exchequer is required, as a matter of ethics, to not allow eir actions as a player to be influenced by what e reads in the course of fulfilling eir duties as an Officer.

Rule 6-4-19/8
Dungeon Master
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

The Office of Dungeon Master is an optional functional office, whose duties are:

(i) to perform any random determinations that only effect Characteristics.

(ii) to track any Characteristics of players that are not explicitly tracked by any other officer.

Rule 6-4-20/0
Officer in Charge of Random Things
IdiotBoy (Matt Miller)

(i) The Office of Officer in Charge of Random Things (OiCoRT) is a political office with one seat.

(ii) Whenever this Office is vacant, it shall be filled by an Election for Office. The specifications for the Election for Office are:
a) Nomination Period: 3 days.
b) Voting Period: 3 days.
c) Tie Resolution: New Election.

(iii) As a Privilege of Office, the OiCoRT shall receive a salary equal to the Standard Harfer Fee, as defined by the Rules.

(iv) A Duty of Office shall be to make random determinations when the rules require such, and those rules do not specify another officer or procedure for making the random determination, or it is not possible for the specified officer to do so.

When the rules require one of a set of distinct objects to be chosen or operated on without specifying how one is to be chosen, the Officer in Charge of Random Things shall choose one of the possible choices at random, with equal probabilities for all possible choices.

Rule 6-5-1/13
President
Calvin N Hobbes (Thierry Joffrain)

The Presidency of Ackanomia is an Office with one Seat. The player who holds that seat is called the President. The President's Term of Office is 8 weeks. The Presidency is filled by an Election for Office.

In elections for President, for each degree a Nominee holds the University shall cast as an extra vote for em.

(i) The Duties are:

a) To publicly announce the occurrence of an open Seat for a Functional Office.

b) To conduct a the nominations for open Functional Office seats.

c) To publicly announce the occurrence of a Player being appointed to hold a Functional Office.

d) Other rules may define other duties.

(ii) The Privileges are:

a) To decide who among the volunteers shall be selected to hold an open Seat for Functional Office.

b) Other rules may define other privileges.

(iii) Whenever this Office is filled in an acting capacity, the Acting President may exercise Privilege "a" as listed in section (ii) of this Rule.

Rule 6-5-1-1/11
Presidential Decisions
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

All of the powers granted on this list are considered Presidential decisions. The President, and only the President, may invoke them. Such invocation must be in a public message, and must be accompanied by reasoning as to why it is being done.

I. Holiday

The President may declare any period of 1 to 7 days a Holiday, provided there are no declared Holidays which have not ended, and provided no Holiday has ended within the past 3 days. The declaration must include the Holiday's duration and start date/time.

No time during a Holiday shall count towards the times officers have to do their tasks. Nor shall it count towards any "periods" as defined elsewhere in the rules. This clause takes precedence over any rule which would require the counting of such time.

Rule 6-5-2/21
Supreme Court
Calvin N Hobbes (Thierry Joffrain)

I. Becoming a Justice

The Office of Justice has a variable number of Seats. A player eligible to be a Justice may, as a public action, make themselves a Justice. Upon them doing so, they will either occupy a formerly empty Seat in the office of Justice (should any exist), or a new Seat in the Office of Justice shall be created and they shall occupy it (this happens only in the case where no Seats in the Office of Justice were empty at the time they made themselves Justice). When a Justice resigns or is otherwise removed from eir Office, the seat they vacated is destroyed. The previous sentence notwithstanding, no game events shall cause the Office of Justice to have fewer than two seats. The Justices are collectively known as the Supreme Court.

II. Justice Eligibility

Only those players who own Bronze Torches or have a PhD in Custom, Jurisprudence or Legislation are eligible to be Justices, except that a player holding a seat in the Office of Justice is always eligible to hold that seat. A player impeached from the Office of Justice during the last 90 days, or a player who resigned from the Office of Justice during the last 30 days, is ineligible for the Office of Justice.

III. Filling in when there are fewer than two Justices

Should a Seat in the Office of Justice remain vacant for three days, or should such a Seat be vacant for any length of time if there are no players eligible to fill it, it is the privilege of the President to appoint a willing player to fill that Office. The appointee fills the empty Justice seat, regardless of eir eligibility stated elsewhere in this Rule. Players who held the office of Justice for less than two weeks are not considered former Justices for the purposes of this or other Rules.

IV. Filling in for Vacationing Justices

When a Justice goes on Vacation, for each cortices of which they are a member, a Justice is selected to replace em in an Acting capacity. This paragraph takes precedence over Rules that would prevent the same player being an Officer and an Acting Officer in the same Office.

Rule 6-5-5/9
Poet Laureate
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

The optional Office of Poet Laureate has a Minimum Term of Office of 6 months. The Duties are:

1) To compose poetry as described below.

2) To maintain a web page preserving the literary heritage of Acka.

Once a month, the President may require the Poet Laureate to compose a poem to commemorate an important milestone in Ackan history (winning a cycle of internomic, a great e-mail blizzard, the resolution of a major crisis, the enshrinement of an Elder, etc.) or to liven a festive occasion. These lists are by no means all-conclusive, and the President may require the Poet Laureate to compose for just about any event, although if players feel he is using this power frivolously, they are permitted to sneer. The Poet Laureate has seven days from the date of the President's request to publicly post such a poem, unless the President's original public request allows him a longer period of time. The Poet Laureate receives no special compensation for such compositions.

Other players may commission the Poet Laureate to write poems on their behalf (to commemorate great accomplishments of theirs, to mock their adversaries, or just to make sure their otherwise imminently forgettable career will be recorded somewhere). It is solely the privilege of the Poet Laureate to earn fees for such works, though he may refuse to accept a commission entirely. The amount of the commission fee can be anything agreed on by both the commissioning player and the Poet Laureate, so long as this does not conflict with rules regarding transfers of currency or entities. For such a commission to be binding, a public post must be made giving the commissioning player and the fee (if any). Upon completion of the requested work, this fee is transferred from the commissioning player to the Poet Laureate. A player may at any time publicly recant eir commission at which point it is no longer binding.

The Poet Laureate must also maintain a web page recording the literary treasures of Acka. Such items include poems of the Poet Laureate, Party Hall Party poems, sad little Gaol songs and Dueling Limericks (should such styles exist), and any other works of verse or song described in the rules.

Rule 6-5-7/7
Son I am able though you scare me / Watch beloved / Watch me scare you though / Able am I son
rufus (David Scheidt)

The Office of Scaremonger is an optional, political office.

The duties of Scaremonger are to promote panic and foment fear. They should take every opportunity to point out the crashing of the game, officers failing to perform their duties, and the End of the World.

While any player may publicly announce the game crashing significance embodied by an encroaching Solstice or Equinox, it is a privilege of the Scaremonger to receive 5 AckaDollars the first time they do so, 3 to 7 days prior to a particular Solstice or Equinox.

If the Scaremonger fails to adequately perform their duties, another player may call a Test of the Emergency Broadcast System.

A test of the Emergency Broadcast System is a loud tone. It is also a hearing, and player who called the Test of The Emergency Broadcast System is the Hearing Harfer. The possible votes in this hearing are "The sky is falling!" and "It is only a little hailstorm." If the verdict is "The sky is falling!", the Scaremonger is removed from office, and the Hearing Harfer is installed as Scaremonger.

In elections for Scaremonger, for each degree a candidate holds in Harfology the University shall cast an extra vote for em.

Rule 6-5-8/7
Herald
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

There exists the Political Office of Herald, with a Minimum Term In Office of 6 months.

The Herald has the following Privileges:

1. Granting Coats of Arms. This is the only way that they may be bestowed. (See Rule 7-1-6.)

2. Altering Coats of Arms by means of abatements, as described in Rule 6-5-8-1.

3. Receiving a monthly salary of the Standard Harfer Fee.

The Herald has the following Duties:

2. Maintaining a web page of graphical depictions of all the Coats of Arms of the various players and Institutions that possess them, or failing that, their blazons.

3. Announcing the beginnings and ends of Duels.

Rule 6-5-9/3
Dean
Studge (Tom Mueller)

The Office of Dean is an political office with one seat.

The duties of the Dean are:
1. To be the hearing harfer for all Educational Hearings.
2. To make Theses publicly available.
3. To shamelessly promote the usefulness of higher education.

If no player nominates themselves for Dean in an election, then the Hearing Harfer shall be given the office.

The Dean receives the SHF as a salary.

Rule 6-20-1/4
SHF
else...if (Henry Towsner)

The Standard Harfer Fee (SHF) is A$25.

Whenever the rules direct that the SHF be paid, it is paid to the Treasury.

Rule 7/9
Entities
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

Something is an entity if and only if the rules specify that it is.

An entity may not be created, destroyed, or manipulated except as specified by the Rules. It can have no material effect on the game other than those effects specified by the Rules.

Rules, the rule set, and Proposals are unownable entities. Rule changes may manipulate Rules and the Rule set.

Manipulation of an entity is permissible if such manipulation is not explicitly regulated by the rules, and such manipulation would not have a material effect on the game. In other words, the game state must be the same after the manipulation as it would have been had the manipulation not occurred.

For the purposes of this rule, discussion and messages (public or private) are not considered a material effect on the game, although actions specified within the message may have a material effect. Nor are the initiation or results of a CFJ or CFCJ concerning the matter of whether or not a certain event constitutes a material effect. It is recognized that deciding whether a particular manipulation materially affected the game state is a matter that often can only be decided by judgement alone.

Entities may not be broken into fractional pieces, and fractional pieces of entities may not be created. When any rule or anything else empowered by the rules specifies a fractional number of entities are created, destroyed, transferred, or otherwise operated upon, that action uses the least integer greater than the fractional number in place of the fractional number. This paragraph takes precedence over all other rules.

A Trading Entity may not accept or offer a trade or perform a game action which would cause the quantity of an entity it owns to be below zero, unless it would result in em owning more of that entity after the trade than before, except where the rules explicitly make an exception for that type of entity.

Named entities may own other ownable entities, or even own themselves. (Nameless entities may not.)

Each entity is either unownable, nontradeable, or tradeable. Tradeable entities are either giftable or ackable, and are either protected or exportable. Tradeable entities are ackable and protected unless the Rules specify otherwise. An entity is nontradeable unless the Rules specify otherwise.

Rule 7-1/9
Ownable Entities
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

If an entity is nontradeable or tradeable then it is ownable.

At any given time, each ownable entity is either owned by one or more named entities or unowned. Unless specified otherwise unowned entities are Somewhere Else. If the Rule(s) defining an ownable entity do not explicitly state that it may have multiple owners, then it can have at most one owner.

When an ownable entity is created, it is in the Treasury, unless the Rules specify an initial owner for it. Entities may be transferred from one owner to another only through methods specified by the Rules.

Entities may not manipulate ownable entities which they do not own except as explicitly permitted by the rules.

Rule 7-1-1/8
Garments
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

A class of entity known as a Garment exists. Garments are tradeable, unless the rules for a particular Garment specify otherwise. The owner, and only the owner, of a particular garment may don that garment if he is currently not wearing that garment, or remove it if he is currently wearing it. The location of a garment that is being worn is the same as that of its wearer These actions, when legal, are accomplished by publicly announcing them. The owner of a particular garment is said to be wearing it only from such time as he dons it until such time as he removes it or no longer owns it; no player is said to be wearing any garment he does not own. Garments may be worn and unworn, and these actions, with respect to a particular garment, may only be performed by the owner of the Garment. Only those entities explicitly designated by the rules as Garments are Garments.

Hats, which may also be referred to as headwear, are a class of garments. A player may wear at most one hat for each head e has. This rule defers to any rule describing the number and type of hats a player may wear.

Rule 7-1-1-1/0
Silly Vacation Hats
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

Silly Vacation Hats are non-tradeable Hats. An active player who owns a Silly Vacation Hat without a description has seven days to post a name and description for eir hat. If e fails to do so, then at the end of the seven days the Hat in question is destroyed.

Rule 7-1-1-2/0
Standard Garments
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

Dress Pants are Garments. Champion's Cloaks are regal non-tradeable Garments of the color(s) and design of their owner's choice. It is customary for the owner of a Champion's Cloak to describe it within 3 days of acquiring it. A player wearing a Champion's Cloak may request to be called, "Exalted One," or the honorific of eir choice. It is not necessary to honor such requests.

Rule 7-1-1-3/0
Medals
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

Medals are nameless nontradable Garments. When needed, they are created (and destroyed) by the Frobozz Magic Medal Company, Ackanomic Division.

Rule 7-1-1-3-1/0
BCR Medals
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

Blue Crosses, Silver Stripes, Gold Stripes, and Ruby Slippers are Medals.

a. A player with a Blue Cross Rank of 20 or more qualifies for a Blue Cross.
b. For each 160 points of Blue Cross Rank above 20 that a player has, he qualifies for a Ruby Slipper.
c. For each 40 points of Blue Cross Rank a player with a Blue Cross has above that required for his Blue Cross and all his Ruby Slippers, he qualifies for a Gold Stripe.
d. For each 10 points of Blue Cross Rank a player with a Blue Cross has beyond that required for his Blue Cross and all his Ruby Slippers and Gold Stripes, he qualifies for a silver stripe.

Any time a player has too many medals for his Blue Cross Rank, as defined by the previous section, then medals are taken from him and destroyed such that he no longer has too many. Any time a player has too few of any of these medals, the President or Speaker may award medals of the appropriate types to that player until he has enough of each type.

A player with two Ruby Slippers may wear them on his feet; any two Ruby Slippers so worn are considered to be a spaceship. A player wearing a spaceship may click the two Ruby Slippers together to launch himself to Kansas, provided he obeys any other restrictions in the rules on spaceship launches. Ruby Slippers magically adjust to fit any feet as needed.

Rule 7-1-1-3-2/9
Bronze Torch
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

Bronze Torches are Medals.

Bronze Torches are awarded as a recognition of merit to those players who have shown us the light through the stickiest of rule interpretation quagmires.

A Player may have at most one Bronze Torch.

Bronze Torches may be awarded by the President, the Speaker, or a Justice. Each time one is to be awarded, it is created for the occasion by the Frobozz Magic Medal Company, Ackanomic Division. They may only be awarded to a player if that player is eligible to receive one.

Once a player has delivered a total of 15 verdicts on CFJs, CFCJs, or as part of (or all of) the Supreme Court or a Cortex thereof, they are eligible for a Bronze Torch. Verdicts which are still appealable, are currently under consideration by the Supreme Court or have been overturned do not count towards this total, nor do any verdicts other than True or False. A verdict which is upheld on an appeal counts for all Judges which have issued the same official verdict on that CFJ, including first round Judges and members of a Cortex which heard a first appeal when possible.

Rule 7-1-1-3-3/5
Marks of the Champion
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

Badges of Glory are elaborate Medals of various designs. It is customary for the owner of a Badge of Glory to describe it within 3 days of acquiring it. A player who owns a Badge of Glory may request to be called, "Exalted One," or the honorific of eir choice. It is not necessary to honor such requests.

Rule 7-1-2/11
Spellbooks
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

Shimmering Spellbooks exist. They are non-tradeable entities. A player may not own more than one Shimmering Spellbook, excess books are destroyed. Players may destroy any Shimmering Spellbooks in their possession as a public action.

Any player with a Shimmering Spellbook is permitted to initiate a flight of the Spelling Bee, as in Rule 1-2-2.

Some Offices may include possession of Shimmering Spellbooks among their privileges; in this case, if ever the holder of such an Office does not possess a Shimmering Spellbook, one is created in their possession.

Rule 7-1-3/1
Lumps of Coal
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

Lumps of Coal are non-tradeable entities, and they are depressing. He may not chew the gumball. Furthermore, the description of his home is immediately changed to the sentence: A one room apartment with no window, cinder block walls, a plain wooden bench, and a pile of rags in one corner for a bed. This description may not be altered so long as the player owns a Lump of Coal.

A Lump of Coal is destroyed if the player who owns it is Enlightened, at which point that player ceases to be Enlightened. If a player is burned as a Heretic, or shot with any kind of laser, any Lump of Coal in his possession is destroyed. If a player is in possession of a Lump of Coal for a full 12 months, it is destroyed, and that player gains A$2500 (in diamonds).

Rule 7-1-4/0
The Huge Gaudily Wrapped Present
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

The Huge Gaudily Wrapped Present is a unique tradeable entity, if at any time it is not owned by a player is Somewhere Else. It is never in the Treasury. A player who owns the Huge Gaudily Wrapped Present may open it at any time as a public action. When he does so, one of two events occurs, exactly which one is determined randomly. He either: 1) Receives two pairs of dress pants; or, 2) Achieves a Winning Condition. In either case, the player ceases to own the Huge Gaudily Wrapped Present.

Rule 7-1-5/0
Blue Cross Bonus
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

A Blue Cross Bonus is a nontradeable entity.

Any time a player has more than one Blue Cross Bonus, all but one of his Blue Cross Bonuses are destroyed. Any time a rule requires that a player be given a Blue Cross Bonus, one is created with his name stamped in gold upon it, and it is given to that player.

When a President has ended a term in office by resigning, or due to his term of office expiring, and he has served at least 6 weeks in that office, then he is given a Blue Cross Bonus if he does not already have one, except in the case that the player resigned from the office of President while an Impeachment Paper was pending to remove him from that office.

Rule 7-1-6/12
Heraldry
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

Any player or Institution may have a Coat of Arms. Coats of Arms are nontradeable entities.

Any entity eligible to have a Coat of Arms may submit a proposed design to the Herald. E may refuse the design at eir discretion, and must do so if it is the same as the Coat of Arms of any other player or institution. If e approves of the design, Herald shall announce the Coat of Arms publicly by posting its blazon. (A blazon is a textual description of the Coat of Arms in standard heraldic language.)

If the bearer of a Coat of Arms should ever be found guilty of a Crime (i.e. a CFCJs final verdict is that they committed a Crime), then the Herald, may alter eir Coat of Arms by means of an abatement. E may also set conditions to the Arms-bearer for the removal of the abatement.

Coats of Arms are not Garments, but for A$10 a player with a Coat of Arms may purchase a Surcoat bearing their Coat of Arms. Surcoats are Garments.

The Ackanomic Coat of Arms is: Per pale sable and barry wavy tenne and purpure, a scale of justice between a frog and a life-glider, all or.

Rule 7-1-7/14
Prosthetic Foreheads
/dev/joe (Joseph DeVincentis)

There is an endless supply and an endless variety of Prosthetic Foreheads. Prosthetic Foreheads are tradeable entities.

Prosthetic Foreheads are unique. No two Prosthetic Foreheads are identical, nor for that matter are any two Prosthetic Foreheads substantially similar. Whenever a player describes a Prosthetic Forehead as a condition of buying it from the Treasury, any player who feels the recently purchased Prosthetic Forehead bears too great a resemblance to a previously existing Prosthetic Forehead may summon a Forehead Tribunal within three days of the offending Prosthetic Forehead's purchase. A single Prosthetic Forehead may be subjected to only one Forehead Tribunal; only the first call for a Forehead Tribunal on any given Prosthetic Forehead shall be considered valid.

A Forehead Tribunal is a Hearing. The player who summoned the Forehead Tribunal is the Hearing Harfer and is called the Top Cop while it is in session. The valid responses are, "Yes, 'is toppy's a copy." and "No, 'is peak's unique." If the verdict is that "Yes, 'is toppy's a copy.", the offending Prosthetic Forehead is destroyed. Otherwise, the player who called the Forehead Tribunal forfeits 5 A$ to the Treasury.

Any player may buy a Prosthetic Forehead at any time by paying A$7 to the Treasury, and posting publicly that they are doing so, and declaring the type of Prosthetic Forehead he is buying in this public message. A player may own any number of Prosthetic Foreheads at any time.

A Player who is not already wearing a Prosthetic Forehead may wear any one e owns by announcing publicly that e is doing so and what type of Prosthetic Forehead is involved. A Player who is wearing a Prosthetic Forehead may remove it by announcing the action publicly. After a player removes a Prosthetic Forehead, his real head is sore for 48 hours and she may not wear a Prosthetic Forehead during this time.

Rule 7-1-9/8
Royal Frinks
JT (JT Traub)

Frinks are entities.

Right Handed Grapefruit juice is a Royal Frink.

Lager, Sir is a Royal Frink.

Any frink not otherwise defined as Royal shall become Knurd if frunk from a hydria. Knurd is a Royal Frink.

Hydriae are tradeable entities, which may only be created as described in the Rules.

Rule 7-1-10/26
Chartreuse Goose Cards and Other Fine Pieces of Paper
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

Goose Cards are nontradeable entities, which look like pieces of coloured paper with a picture of a sneering goose on them. Whenever another Rule states that a player is to receive a Goose Card of any description, that card is created in their possession. There are four distinct classes of Goose Cards: Chartreuse, Yellow, Red and Black. Owning any Goose Card is a Bad Thing.

I. Card Conversion Rates
If any player owns three Chartreuse Goose Cards, they merge to become one Yellow Goose Card.
If any player owns three Yellow Goose Cards, they merge to become one Red Goose Card.
If any player owns three Red Goose Cards, they merge to become one Black Goose Card.

II. Destroying Cards
Whenever Officer Salaries are paid, all Chartreuse Goose Cards are destroyed.
When Officer Salaries are paid in March, June, or September, all Chartreuse and Yellow Goose Cards are destroyed.
When Officer Salaries are paid in December, all Chartreuse, Yellow and Red Goose Cards are destroyed.

A player may pay 10 times the SHF to destroy a Chartreuse Goose Card, 100 times the SHF to destroy a Yellow Goose Card, 1000 times the SHF to destroy a Red Goose Card, and 10000 times the SHF to destroy a Black Goose Card, provided that the SHF is at least A$1.

Rule 7-1-11/8
Eggs and Fruit
ThinMan (John Bollinger)

A Chartreuse Goose Egg is a nameless, tradeable entity. Chartreuse Goose Eggs used to have something to do with points, but no they pretty much do nothing.

The Right-Handed Grapefruit is a unique, nontradeable entity. A player who owns a Right-Handed Grapefruit may at any time make Right-Handed Grapefruit Juice (a tradeable, potable entity; the action of frinking it destroys it).

Rule 7-1-13/14
Le Grand Fromage
The Gingham Wearer (Tom Walmsley)

There exists a type of non-tradable entities known as cheeses. There are five varieties of cheeses. These are:

1. Stilton
2. Cheddar
3. Edam
4. Brie
5. Gouda

At any point any player may own at most one of each variety of cheese. If a player owns more than one of any given variety of cheese then all but one of them are destroyed. Whenever a voting player owns one of each type of cheese, and has not achieved a Winning Condition this way since the last time all cheeses were destroyed by this rule at the end of a cycle, e achieves a Winning Condition. If anyone wins a Cycle by this method then all cheeses are destroyed at the end of that Cycle.

A player may gain a cheese only by doing the following. If e does so the e is automatically given a cheese of the correct type.

A player receives a stilton if e the ten most recent proposals e authored for which valid voting results have been released were all accepted.

A player receives a cheddar if e has had three harfy proposals accepted since the adoption of this rule, or the most recent destruction of a cheese of this type belonging to this player; whichever is the most recent.

A player receives an edam if e has held five offices since the adoption of this rule, or the most recent destruction of a cheese of this type belonging to this player, or the players most recent impeachment; whichever is the most recent.

A player receives a gouda if e wins a game of grab a donkey or wins three games from the games and contest containing five or more players (starting from the instant this rule is adopted or the time a cheese of this type belonging to this player as destroyed; whichever is more recent).

A player receives a brie when they win a Duel. If a player owns a brie when they lose a Duel, that brie is destroyed.

Rule 7-2/6
Entity Uniqueness
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

An entity is unique if, and only if, the Rules specify that it is. Each unique entity is the only entity of its type.

If there are several entities of the same type, and at least one of them is unique, all the non-unique entities of that type are destroyed. If there are several unique entities of the same type, the oldest one survives and the rest are destroyed.

Unique entities may not be cloned, copied, duplicated, or Xeroxed; an attempt to forge a copy of a unique entity always results in humiliating failure.

Rule 7-2-1/15
The Magic Potato
Sean Crystal

This rule creates a unique entity known as the Magic Potato. The Magic Potato will be given to a randomly chosen Active player each week. The responsibility of choosing the Player randomly will be left up to the Officer in charge of random things. There will exist only one Magic Potato at any one time. The Player that currently holds the Magic Potato will gain twice the SHF for each proposal of eirs that is accepted while e holds the Magic Potato.

There also exists the Great Tuba of Ackanomic, a unique entity. Whenever the Magic Potato is transferred from one player to another, the Great Tuba is given to the player who just lost the Magic Potato. The holder of the Great Tuba receives the SHF whenever one of eir proposals passes.

Rule 7-2-2/9
Gumball
Simon Marty Harriman (Andy Swan)

There is a unique entity called the gumball which can be chewed only on alternate Wednesdays and Thursdays.

For the purposes of this rule, alternate Wednesdays and Thursdays are defined as the second and fourth Wednesdays and the first and third Thursdays of each calendar month, except in the case where the first day of the month is a Thursday(when otherwise this would mean that the Gumball was chewable on consecutive days); in such months alternate Wednesdays and Thursdays will be the first and third Wednesdays and Thursdays of the month, i.e. the 1st, 7th, 15th, and 21st of the month.

Rule 7-2-3/26
Steel Flea
Bascule (Matt Black)

Phoebe the Steel Flea lives in a matchbox. Phoebe the Steel Flea looks like a flea, feels like a flea and behaves like a flea most of the time. However Phoebe is a unique named entity that was created thousands of years ago by Acka-scientists who had access to advanced nano-technology that has since been lost in the mists of time. Likewise her matchbox is an unique ownable entity of indescribable mechanical complexity. Phoebe owns her matchbox.

Whenever Phoebe's matchbox is missing, the Officer in charge of random things randomly shall determine which lucky voting player has found the matchbox with Phoebe in it. It is a red and blue matchbox, very pretty, if a little battered. Phoebe's matchbox should be found within 3 days of it going missing.

The player who has found Phoebe's matchbox is very lucky, since she is very wise, having been built in an era of knowledge and wonder. In the week following eir marvelous discovery, e should open Phoebe's matchbox and listen to her make a statement of insight and wit. They should share this wisdom with the rest of the players of Ackanomic in a public message, and will gain the SHF for being so generous.

If any other voting player believes that this message is obviously fake and not clever or witty enough for the nanotech Phoebe, he or she may challenge the authenticity of the message. A Hearing is then called. The player who issued the challenge is the Hearing Harfer and is called the Nanotech Overseer while it is in session. Valid responses for the hearing are "Phoebe would not say anything so crass" and "Phoebe said much the same thing to me once". If the verdict is the former, then obviously the Player did not accurately report what Phoebe said, and e will lose the the SHF awarded previously, and will be fined another the SHF for selfishly keeping Phoebe's wisdom to emself. Such challenges must be made within 3 days of the wisdom being posted, and may only be made once per report.

If a message was posted within a week of the player finding Phoebe, that player is deemed to have carefully hidden her matchbox at the time of posting the message, and the matchbox is deemed to be missing.

If a message was not posted within a week of the player finding Phoebe, e is deemed to have lost the matchbox and is fined the SHF for being so careless. If this happens, the matchbox is deemed to be missing.

If Phoebe's matchbox is currently missing, and it is also the case that the most recent three (or more) players who found Phoebe's matchbox have all failed to post her wisdom, then Phoebe may decide not to be found by another player, and instead take a Leave Of Absence from the wisdom-dispensing business. The Officer in Charge of Random Things shall determine whether or not this happens, using whatever method e chooses. If e determines that Phoebe has decided to take a Leave Of Absence, then e must announce this fact publicly. (E is also encouraged, but not required, to post Phoebe's goodbye message at this time.) Upon doing so, Phoebe and Phoebe's matchbox shall immediately go Somewhere Else, and Phoebe's matchbox shall no longer be missing. Phoebe and her matchbox will remain Somewhere Else for a minimum of 30 days (and quite possibly much longer, perhaps even forever).

When Phoebe has been on a Leave of Absence for 30 days or more, then Phoebe may choose to end her Leave of Absence. The Officer in Charge of Random Things shall determine whether or not this happens; this determination shall occur not more than once per calendar week. If e determines that Phoebe has chosen to end her Leave of Absence, then e must announce this fact publicly. Upon doing so, Phoebe and Phoebe's matchbox will no longer be Somewhere Else, and Phoebe's matchbox shall immediately be missing. [And thus the Officer in Charge of Random Things should then determine which player finds Phoebe next....]

Rule 7-2-5/2
Titled Gentry
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

Thingies (entities and non-entities) that have been defined in the rules at some time as Titles, and have not had that designation removed, remain Titles. Titles are entities. Titles defined in the rules as unique are Unique entities and may have more than one owner.

Where the rules associate a title with a player ['is given', 'is the'] it is awarded to them. Where the rules disassociate a title from a player ['loses', 'ceases to be'] they cease to own it. Unowned titles are destroyed.

When a non-unique title is awarded it is created in the beneficiary's possession. When a one, or more players, are awarded a unique title it is transferred to them from its current owners, or created in their possession if no such title exists.

Titles may only be created, awarded and destroyed as described in the rules.

Rule 7-2-6/0
Acka's Magic Number
JT (JT Traub)

There is a unique unownable entity known as the Ackanomic Magic Number. Whenever any rule refers to 'the Magic Number' or 'a Magic Number' in a context other than referring to the Magic Number of a specific player, then that rule shall be read as referring to the Ackanomic Magic Number.

The Ackanomic Magic Number is always displayed on top of the Town Hall where it can be seen by all Ackans.

The Ackanomic Magic Number may only change as defined by the rules. When the Ackanomic Magic Number changes, any unquoted sentence in this rule which reads "The Ackanomic Magic Number has a value of XXXX." where XXXX is some integer value shall be replaced by the sentence "The Ackanomic Magic Number has a value of YYYY." without quotes and with YYYY replaced by the new value of the Magic Number.

The Ackanomic Magic Number has a value of 300.

Rule 7-2-7/14
Ackanomic Sound System
Slagothor (Eric Plumb)

I. Ackanomic Sound System & Songs

There exists a unique, unownable entity known as the Ackanomic Sound System (also known as the ASS.)

There exists a class of named unownable entities known as Ackanomic Sound System Songs (also known as Songs.) Songs may be either Mundane or Esoteric, but not both.

A Mundane Song is one that has no trigger or game effects defined a child of this Rule. An Esoteric Song is one that has a Trigger and Effect defined by a child of this Rule.

II. Description and Usage

Nobody knows for certain the location of the ASS, for its music is audible at exactly the same unobtrusive volume throughout the whole of Ackanomic. It is said that those who wish not to hear the music of the ASS may place one or more of their heads inside it. Unfortunately, doing so will not exclude them from the music's effects.

The control panel for the ASS is located in the Ackanomic Library. Any entity which is in the Library may play a Mundane Song on the ASS as a public action simply by stating the name of the song and the artist or artists who perform the version of the song they wish to hear. If the ASS is not currently playing an Esoteric song, the requested Mundane song will begin playing after a pause of an infinitesimal amount of time to switch tracks.

Any entity which is in the Library may play any Esoteric Song as a public action. To do so, that entity must state the name of the Song it wishes to play and place either an amount of A$ equal to the Song's Cost or a single Token into the banna-shaped slot on the ASS's control panel. If the action was successful, the Esoteric Song requested immediately begins playing as described below, with full effects, unless there is already an Esoteric Song playing on the ASS. When this happens, any A$ placed into the slot is transferred to the Treasury, and any Tokens placed into the slot are destroyed.

III. Office of DeeJay.

The Office of DeeJay is an Optional, Political Office. If this Office is not filled, or if the player holding this Office is absent, no Esoteric Songs will be played on the ASS.

The Duties of the DeeJay are:

a) To monitor the game state and determine when Esoteric Songs begin and cease playing, and to post a public message naming the Song in question and its effects, if any, whenever either happens.

b) To maintain a record of whether an Esoteric Song is playing on the ASS, and if so, which Song and its effects. The preferred medium for this Duty is HTML.

c) To publicly announce when a player has been awarded a Token as described below, in section IV.

The Privileges of the DeeJay are:

d) To declare a Moment of Silence lasting no more than one Acka week in which no Songs may be played on the ASS. This Privilege may not be exercised if it has been exercised within the past forty days, or if an Esoteric Song is currently playing on the ASS.

On the first day of any calendar month whose ordinal number is evenly divisible by three, the player holding the Office of DeeJay shall step down from said Office as described in Rule 6 section vii.

IV. Creating And Playing Esoteric Songs

Any player who submits a Proposal which successfully adds one or more Esoteric Songs to the Ruleset shall gain one Token upon the acceptance of such a Proposal. This Token shall be created in eir possession upon the announcement of this fact by the DeeJay. Tokens are tradeable Entities.

Esoteric Songs are defined by children of this Rule, and nowhere else. A Child of this Rule may define more than one Esoteric Song. Any definition of an Esoteric Song must include at least the following four lettered attributes of the song

a) Title: the title, or name, of the Song.

b) Artist: the artist or artists who wrote and/or performed the Song.

c) Trigger: a condition referring to the Ackanomic game state that can, at any time, be easily and unambiguously identified to be either true or false. [e.g. "Four or more players have a score of above 300."]

d) Effect: the effect, if any, that the playing of this Song has on the game and/or game state of Ackanomic.

The definition is encouraged, but not required, to include these three attributes also:

e) Cost: If the Cost is not specified the Song can not be purchased with A$.

f) Duration: The length of time for which the Song will play if not interrupted. If this is not included, it defaults to three days.

g) Explanation: The player submitting an Esoteric Song is encouraged to explain why the game effects pertain to the title or lyrics of the song.

An Esoteric Song will begin playing immediately upon its Trigger becoming true as long as the Office of DeeJay is filled by an active player. In this case, the Esoteric Song will begin playing regardless of any other Song that may be playing on the ASS. The Song will continue playing until one or more of the following become true:

- its Duration is expired and its Trigger is not true, or - another Esoteric Song's Trigger becomes true,

upon any of which it will stop playing. All game Effects described in the Song's definition will begin instantaneously when the Song starts to play, and cease immediately when the Song stops playing, unless specified otherwise in the Rule creating the Song.

If a rule defining an esoteric song is created and that song is currently being played as a mundane song then the song instantly ceases to be being played and instead the song Barbie Girl by Aqua is played [to encourage people to change it as quickly as possible].

V. Scope

Rules defining Esoteric Songs may also define entities other than those Songs. However, an entity defined in a Rule defining an Esoteric Song may never change the game state in any way unless that Song is currently playing on the ASS. The entity will go Somewhere Else as soon as the Song ceases playing, and any effects that its presence has on the game state will cease.

However, any permanent changes made to the game state by a Song or an entity defined in a Song will not be lost once the Song stops playing.

[For example, if the Magic Potato were defined in such a Rule, its owner would no longer get its bonuses once it left, but would keep any points e had gained from it while the Song ("Don't pick it up, pick it up, pick it up") was playing.]

VI. Precedence

This Rule takes precedence over any Rules which state or imply that the playing of a Song on the Ackanomic Sound System can have no effect on the game and/or game state of Ackanomic.

All children of this Rule defer precedence to any Rules with which they might conflict, except as stated explicitly in children of this Rule.

Rule 7-2-7-1/1
ASS Song: The Gnome
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

Title: The Gnome

Artist: Pink Floyd

Trigger: Whenever it becomes August 28th

Effect:
No player may be challenged to a Duel while this song is playing. The reason for all this goodwill is that the Voting Gnome gives gifts to the players of Acka at exactly noon if this song is playing on the ASS. Exactly what gift depends on certain conditions, described below. No player receives more than one gift, if he qualifies for several then he receives only the first gift listed that he qualifies for.

I. If the player is in Gaol, he receives a Lump of Coal.

II. If a player is vacationing, he receives a Silly Vacation Hat.

III. If a player is in the Wilds of Ackanomic, he receives a pint of lager.

IV. If a player is in his home, he receives a Blue Cross Bonus. If the player already owns a Blue Cross Bonus, he instead receives The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really, unless e already has it. If more than one player would qualify to receive The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really in this method, then one of them is randomly selected to receive it. The other players who qualified to receive The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really (possibly including the player who owned it) but did not receive it shall receive a Bronze Torch. If the player already owns a Bronze Torch, then he shall receive a Yellow Goose Card. If more than one player would qualify to receive a Yellow Goose Card in this manner, then one of them is randomly selected to receive it. Those players who qualified to receive a Yellow Goose Card but did not receive one shall receive a Chartreuse Goose Card. If the player already owns a Chartreuse Goose Card, then he shall instead receive the Huge Gaudily Wrapped Present. If more than one player qualifies to receive the Huge Gaudily Wrapped Present, none of them receive it, and they all receive A$1 instead.

V. If a player is at the Ackanomic Institute of Genetic Replication he receives a Boon of the Ancients, provided he has been there for at least three days.

VI. If a player is on a Moon e receives a nose-sack of cheesium.

If a player does not meet any of the above qualifications, he receives a pair of dress pants.

Duration: 1 day.

Explanation:
"And then one day - hooray! Another way for gnomes to say Hoooooooooray. Hooooooooooooooray." [The Gnome, Pink Floyd]

Rule 7-2-7-2/3
ASS song: No-one But You
The Gingham Wearer (Tom Walmsley)

Title: No-one But You (Only the Good Die Young)

Artist: Queen

Trigger: Whenever a player is inducted into the hall of elders.

Duration: Three Acka days.

Effect: All players are so struck with sadness that they must remain in the same location, mourning, whilst the song is being played. This section of this rule defers to any rule that requires any player to change location as an involuntary action [e.g. Bracket Smiley Pedantry].

Explanation: "One by one, only the good die young." [No-one But You (Only the Good Die Young), Queen]. Further honouring of the elders.

Rule 7-2-7-3/1
Ass Song: Pomp and Circumstance
T.T. Ren (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

Title: Pomp and Circumstance

Artist: Sir Edward Elgar

Trigger: Whenever any player receives a degree.

Duration: Three and a half hours [the length of a graduation]

Cost: A$350

Effect: All citizens of Acka in the City except those in Gaol change location to the University to watch the graduation. If the Speaker posts a commencement address while the song is playing, e is paid the SHF for eir motivational speech. If any player other than the Speaker posts a public message while the song is playing, e receives A Shushing and is placed in Contempt. Just as the song ends, every player who was present at the University receives 10 mannna except the Dean, the Speaker, any players who were shushed, and the player receiving eir degree.

Explanation: "We are gathered here today to honour an extraordinary class, full of teachers, artists, politicians, and visionaries for the future of our world. The students you see before you today have worked long and hard to Yadda Yadda Yadda promising and enthusiastic Blah Blah Blah hopes and dreams to help shape tomorrow's Blah Blah Blah pleased to announce our commencement speaker, the Speaker of Ackanomic." [The Dean]

Rule 7-2-8/5
Spiro Agnew: Grow a WHAT?!?
snowgod (Phil Ackley)

There exists a unique tradeable entity known as the The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really.

The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really shall always have dimensions slightly larger then those of the location in which it's owner is located (which causes horrific problems when transporting The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really). It is initially Baby Blue, though the shade of blue can be changed at the whim of the owner. The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really changes shape. On Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday it is round. On Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday it is shaped similarly to a 1968 Ford Mustang Fastback.

No matter what shape or size The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really is, it shall always have a button somewhere upon it marked "ENERGIZE."

The owner of The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really may use it to change the player name of any active player to another name which is an anagram of the original. This is a public action. In order to fully specify this action, the owner must state that he has pointed The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really at x (where x is the name of the player being renamed) and pressed the ENERGIZE button, and he must give an anagram of the original name. If this action is successful then The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really changes x's name to the specified anagram, and The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really is transferred to the possession of x.

The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really runs on rechargeable 9 volt batteries, and may be used no more than once every two weeks, or the batteries will overheat and explode before The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really is able to change a players name (and thus causing The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really to be transferred to a random player for recharging).

If the Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really has recharged, and remained charged and in the possession of the same player for a period of one week, it will transfer itself to the possession of the first player to point this out publicly.

No player may take possession of the The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really if e has used it during the last 28 days.

Rule 7-2-9/14
Fat Lady
snowgod (Phil Ackley)

The unique, unownable, entity known as the Fat Lady exists.

The Fat Lady shall sing only if a player wins a Cycle. The Speaker is required to announce that the Fat Lady is singing within a reasonable time of a winner being declared, and the Fat Lady will not sing until the Speaker announces that she is doing so.

The Fat Lady's singing will endure for exactly one day, or until any player publicly posts an original limerick politely asking her to stop, whichever comes first.

Any player who possesses the Great Tuba of Ackanomia may accompany her, provided they publicly post an original lyrical composition of 8 or more lines while she is singing, for her to sing, and provided they were not the player who most recently accompanied her as described in this rule. Upon doing so the player shall receive a Boon of the Ancients. It is considered good form for the song to contain at least one truly deplorable pun.

Rule 7-2-10/24
The Machine That Goes *ping*
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

I. There exists the unique entity called The Machine That Goes *ping*, henceforth known as the Machine.

The Machine is a product of advanced technology, covered in buttons, lights, and switches. It may be from the same culture that produced Phoebe, and so it is of great importance that The Machine That Goes *ping* be studied by all of Acka.

II. The Machine That Goes *ping* may exist in the Home of any active player, but nowhere else. Its location may change only as specified in this rule.

The player in whose home the Machine resides has the duty of assisting Acka in its study of the Machine and is given the title "Scholar of *ping*" (hereafter, Scholar) for as long as the Machine shares his abode. For the purposes of this rule, "the current Scholar's term" refers to the period of time since the Machine last changed locations. It specifically does not refer to any periods of time before the Machine's most recent change in location during which the current Scholar was also Scholar.

III. Within seven days of a player receiving this title, the Machine shall manifest in the Scholar's dreams and utter one truth. This truth shall take the form, "IF AND ONLY IF today {if clause}, THEN the Machine That Goes *ping* shall go *ping*." It must be a truth the Machine has never uttered before.

In the Machine's truth, {if clause} will be replaced by no more than twelve words. Each of these words must be in the official dictionary or exist in the Rules. {if clause} shall not contain anything that is not a word, except punctuation properly used by the rules of standard English. The truth must be such that the Machine shall not fail to go *ping* for any seven consecutive calendar days, nor shall it go *ping* without fail for any fourteen consecutive calendar days during the current Scholar's term.

Upon waking from this dream, the Scholar must announce the Machine's truth in a public message to all Acka, but disguise each letter of each word in the {if clause}, but not space characters, with *'s in order to preserve the sacred truth from the eyes of heretics. E.g., the truth "IF AND ONLY IF today is Wednesday or Thursday, THEN the Machine That Goes *ping* shall go *ping*," must be announced, "IF AND ONLY IF today ** ********* ** ********, THEN the Machine That Goes *ping* shall go *ping*." Punctuation shall be placed in its proper place in an undisguised fashion. If the Scholar does not announce the Machine's truth in this fashion within seven days of receiving his title, he is deemed to be a quack and the Machine randomly teleports itself to another active player's Home.

IV. Beginning on the calendar day after the Scholar announces the Machine's truth, the Machine shall go *ping* exactly once on any calendar day the statement described by "today {if clause}" is at any time true. The Machine shall not otherwise go *ping*. It is the duty of the Scholar to inform the rest of Acka of this occurrence. He must do so by posting a public message with the form, "Today is Someday, the xth day of Month, and the Machine That Goes *ping* Has Gone *ping* today. Since I have been scholar, the Machine has gone *ping* n times." In the actual message, Someday, xth, and Month shall be replaced by the appropriate elements of the date of the *ping* which is being announced, and n shall be replaced by the number of times that the Machine has gone *ping* during the current Scholar's term.

V. The Scholar must announce each *ping* as described above either in the day in which it occurred or during the next two days. It is expected, however, that each *ping* be announced during the day in which it occurs -- tardy (although legal) announcements are subject to reprisals as described below. Announcements of *ping*'s not made on the day in which the *ping* occurred must be prefaced by an apology from the Scholar for his tardiness. "Days" and "dates" as used in this rule are said to begin and end when the Acka Day begins and ends.

The Scholar must make exactly one announcement as described above each time the Machine goes *ping*. He may not announce that the Machine went *ping* for occasions on which it did not actually go *ping*. Although he is permitted to announce a *ping* on a day after the *ping* occurred, he is not permitted to indicate by any means, that the Machine shall go *ping* or not go *ping* on any future date, nor may he use any means whatsoever not described in the rules to communicate any information regarding the Truth to any player, so long as the undisguised Truth is not publicly knowable.

VI. Unless otherwise forbidden, each player other than the Scholar is permitted to publicly post a guess at the undisguised form of the Machine's truth. The player during each Scholar's term who legally so posts the correct guess first received by the Scholar shall receive the following rewards: he shall be congratulated by the Scholar; he shall receive one random Boon of the Ancients, created at that time by the Machine; and the Machine shall transport itself to his home.

Each player who posts an incorrect guess shall suffer the following consequences: he shall be publicly ridiculed by the Scholar, who shall be immune from the politeness moon in so doing (this takes precedence over Rule 5-2), and he shall pay a fine of A$ 10 for mocking the sacred truth. The Scholar must respond to each guess with either congratulations or ridicule, as appropriate, within three days of the time of the guess.

Players are forbidden from posting more than one guess during any given term of any particular Scholar.

VII. If the Machine has gone *ping* at least six times since a Magic Letter was named that was considered by the Scholar, and at least six times during the current Scholar's term, any active player other than the Scholar or the most recent player whose magic letter choice was considered may name a letter of the alphabet not already considered as the Magic Letter during the current scholar's term to be the Magic Letter by so posting to the public forum. Such post must include with it a sum of A$ that is at least as much as the Magic Letter Premium for the letter named, and no more than the posting player has. For all letters of the alphabet named (as described above) within the first 12 hours since the *ping* that initiated this round of letter naming, the Scholar shall consider the one guess with the most A$ associated with it. If two or more guesses hold this distinction, the Scholar shall decide which of those guesses to consider. If no letters are named within the first 12 hours as above, the Scholar shall consider the first letter named in this round of letter naming. The Scholar must respond within three days by naming the guess that was considered, and by publicly reposting the Machine's truth in its disguised form, except that any * representing the Magic Letter or any letter previously named the Magic Letter during the current Scholar's term shall be replaced with the actual letter or letters represented. The player whose post was considered then forfeits the sum of A$ associated with eir post. The Magic Letter Premium is based on the following schedule: A$25 for Common vowels ('a', 'e', 'i', 'o'), A$15 for Common consonants ('d', 'l', 'n', 'r', 's', 't'), and A$5 for all other letters.

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*, publicly 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.

IX. If the Scholar is placed in Gaol or goes on Vacation, the Machine randomly teleports itself to another active player's home. If, before the Scholar announces the Truth, he claims in a public message: "I have weightier matters to research, such as the shape of the Earth", the Machine teleports itself to another active player's home.

Should it ever be publicly knowable that the current Scholar has violated any part of this rule during the current Scholar's term, or if the Scholar announces a *ping* after the day in which it occurred, any player who feels the Scholar's error or tardiness has compromised the game may post a public message calling for the Scholar's removal. Upon the posting of such a message, the Machine immediately teleports itself to the home of the Player calling for the Scholar's removal.

If the Scholar loses his title for any reason other than going on Vacation, he must post the truth most recently revealed to him in its undisguised form within three days of the loss of his title, unless he has already done so. If he loses his title by going on Vacation, he must post the undisguised form of the truth most recently revealed to him within three days of returning from Vacation.

Whenever the Machine changes locations, it shall cease to go *ping*, and it shall not resume this function until a new truth is announced. Guesses at the truth and attempts to name a magic letter are wholly ignored for the purposes of all other provisions of this rule if they occur before the current scholar has announced the disguised form of the truth, or if they are received by the Scholar after a correct guess has already been received during his current term.

Whenever the Machine randomly teleports itself, it is the duty of the Officer in charge of random things to determine and report its new location.

Rule 7-2-11/19
Yes Virginia
Vynd (John McCoy)

The Voting Gnome of Ackanomic (hereinafter referred to simply as the Voting Gnome) is a unique, unownable entity. He acts only as described in the Rules.

The Voting Gnome has a home. It is located on a plot of land at the extreme northern end of Ackanomic called the North Stick. The home itself is a cozy building, with a 40 meter tower that looks suspiciously like a chimney. It is named The Voting Gnome's Workshop. The North Stick and The Voting Gnome's Workshop are both Locations, but they are not common locations. They are both owned by the Voting Gnome. Whenever the Voting Gnome's location is not otherwise specified, he is in his home.

On every August 28th, at exactly noon, the Voting Gnome visits the rest of Acka, bearing harf and good cheer. He returns home at midnight.

Rule 7-3/2
Intelligence and Operations
else...if (Henry Towsner)

Some ownable Entities are Operable. Some named Entities are Intelligent. Operable entities have a number of Operations defined on them by the Rules. An Intelligent Entity (the Operator) may perform an Operation on an Operable Entity it owns providing that it supplies all information required to perform the Operation (as defined in the Rules). Some Operation may involve more than one Entity of a given type. An Entity performing such an Operation must state how many of those Entities it is performing the Operation on, and must own at least as many of the Entity as the number it is performing the Operation on.

Rule 7-3-1/11
Trading and Gifts
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

This Rule defers to all other rules. Rules may specify conditions in which certain trades may not take place, even though this rule specifies that they are legal. Rules may specify alternate means of trading entities, beyond those given here.

A Trading Entity may offer a trade by sending a public message specifying the entities offered (if any) and the entities requested (if any). A trade in which no entities are requested is a one sided trade, all others are two sided. Note that a trade is still two sided if no entities are offered. All the entities must be Tradeable, and the offering entity must own the offered entities. Also the offering Entity must be allowed to own all request entities. The offer may also include one or more Trading Entities to which the offer is made, otherwise it is offered at large.

An offer made in this way stands until it is legally retracted or accepted, or the entity who offered it no longer owns the entities offered, or the offer has been standing for at least three days, whichever comes first. A Player may retract a trade he or she offered by sending a public message to that effect.

A Trading Entity may accept an exclusive trade offered to him or her, or any trade offered at large [but not one that was offered specifically to someone else], if and only if it owns all of the entities requested, in at least the quantities requested, and may own the offered entities. It does this by sending a public message to that effect. A one sided trade in which all involved entities are giftable and a single recipient is specified is known as a gift or a payment, and is automatically accepted unless the entity it is offered to may not own one or more of the offered entities, in which case the trade is illegal.

When a Trading Entity accepts a standing trade, the entities offered are transferred from the Entity who offered the trade to the Entity who accepted it, and the entities requested in exchange are transferred from the Entity who accepted the trade to the Entity who offered it.

All trades made as described by this rule are said to occur on the Free Market. A trade must specify a positive, integral amount of entities to be traded.

Rule 7-3-1-2/22
Auction
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

1) An Auction can be called either as specified by another Rule, or by any Player as a public action.

The call for Auction must include:

a) the item or items to be Auctioned, which must be unowned if the Rules are calling (or directing a player to initiate) the Auction, and must be tradeable entit(ies) owned by the Player calling the Auction if it is being called by a Player acting on their own. Default quantity is 1 item.

b) if more than one item is being auctioned, whether or not the items should be grouped and auctioned as a lot (default = no). If yes, then "item" (and "items") as used in the remainder of this rule shall be construed to mean the entire lot of items being auctioned, and quantity shall be 1.

c) the minimum bid (default = A$0)

d) whether the Auction is to be private or public (default = public)

e) the player initiating the auction (default = Speaker)

2) The Auctioneer will be the player initiating the auction. If this is not possible for some reason, the Speaker shall be the Auctioneer. If this is impossible as well, there shall be no Auction until the situation is corrected.

3) The Auctioneer is disqualified to bid in a private Auction. The Auctioneer may use the title of Chief Cheese for the duration of any Auction.

4) The Auctioneer has the following duties: announcing the start of the auction and the relevant details of the auction; announcing the conclusion and results of the auction; making sure the auction procedure is conducted as specified by the rules; and accepting bids in private auctions.

5) The Auction shall last for 3 days, or 12 hours past the auction's most recent bid (in public auctions), whichever is longer, after which time the Auctioneer shall announce the results, and all A$ and items shall be transferred to their new owners. If the Auction was private, the Auctioneer shall keep a 10% commission of all monies transferred to the Treasury as compensation for performing the work and not being permitted to bid.

6) The Auction shall be conducted as follows:

6a) All qualified active players are permitted to submit bids of a positive amount of A$ equal to or less than the amount they possess. If a player submits multiple bids, only the highest will be considered. Anyone who submits a bid in excess of the A$ they have is disqualified, and their bids are disqualified. Anyone who submits a bid below the minimum bid is also disqualified. Bids may not be retracted.

6b) In a public auction, each bid, except the first one, must exceed the previous bid by at least 10% for regular public auctions, and at least 1% for Shubik auctions, or it is disqualified.

6c) Let N be the quantity of items up for Auction. The players who made the N highest qualified bids shall each receive an item in exchange for the amount of A$ they bid. If the number of players who made qualified bids is less than N, then the Auctioneer shall receive all the remaining items, if the minimum bid was A$0. If it was not A$0, then the remaining item(s) shall revert to the player initiating the auction. If, instead, they were unowned when the Auction was initiated, they are destroyed. If the auction was called by a player, and that player no longer has at least N items at the conclusion of the auction, that player is placed in Contempt and fined A$100. If a bidder does not have enough A$ to honor their bid in either type of auction, they are placed in Contempt and fined A$100. In either of these cases, the auction is voided, and reinitiated if originally called by the rules.

6d) If the bids are tied such that the Auctioneer cannot determine who gets item(s), the Auctioneer shall resolve the tie(s) via random means, and disclose this fact. All tied bidders shall be eligible for the random selection, including any non-active ones.

6e) If the Auction is private, the Auctioneer shall not disclose the bids to anyone during the process of the Auction. If the Auction is public, bids must be submitted to the public forum.

7) When a player acting on their own calls a public auction in which exactly one item is being auctioned, that player may declare that auction to be a "Shubik Auction" when it is initiated. An auction may not be so declared under any other circumstances. At the conclusion of a Shubik Auction, the player who made the second highest bid, if such a player exists, forfeits his bid to the treasury as well, and receives no compensation.

8) Any unowned entity that is being auctioned is not considered to be in the Treasury from the time the Auction is declared until its results are announced.

Rule 7-3-1-2-1/6
Auction Them Entities
Niccolo Flychuck (Uri Bruck)

Once per calendar week the Financier may, as a Privilege, call a public auction, called an "Auction Them Entities" auction, for a single tradeable entity which is in the Treasury by specifying the entity. If the Financier has not yet called such an auction in a given week, any player may, as a public action, request that a particular entity be auctioned, and the Financier must call such an Auction within three days. The Financier is only bound to honour the first such request each week, and is never otherwise required to call an Auction Them Entities auction.

Rule 7-4-1-1/6
Convertible Economics
JT (JT Traub)

The following are Conversions are permissible.

Unless otherwise specified, the result of the conversion is in the possession of the Player performing the Conversion.

Time Limited Conversions:

The following listed conversion may only be performed if a Conversion from this list has not been performed by the Operating Player within the prior 14 days.

Almost-Unlimited Conversions:

The Conversions listed here may be performed up to 100 times each per day per player, as long as each individual Conversion is legal.

i) The Conversion of 10 Ackadollar into 1 Mannna.
ii) The Conversion of 1 Mannna into 2 Ackadollar.

Rule 7-4-2/4
Mannna from Heaven
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

Mannna is an Operable entity.

A Trading entity may own a negative amount of Mannna.

The operation of Conversion is defined for one or more Mannna. The specific Conversions (quantity and result) which may be applied to Mannna are defined elsewhere in the rules, and only those Conversions defined in the rules may be performed.

From the time it is publicly pointed out that a player possesses a negative amount of Mannna, until it is pointed out that they are out of debt, that player may only cast votes between 100 and -100. Additionally, at the time a player's Mannna debt it publicly pointed out, the player shall by fined either 10% of the absolute value of their debt in Mannna or 10 Mannna, whichever is greater. This paragraph takes precedence over all rules governing how a player can vote.

Rule 7-5/25
AckaDollars
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

The AckaDollar (A$) is the official currency of Ackanomia. AckaDollars are Operable gift entities.

AckaDollars may not be created nor destroyed except as the result of an Operation. Whenever the Rules specify that a Player should receive A$, and do not indicate where those A$ should come from, they shall come from the Treasury. Whenever the Rules specify that a Player should lose A$, and do not indicate where those A$ should go to, or specify that A$ should be transferred to the Treasury, they shall be destroyed instead.

Every Monday at Midday the Treasury shall create sufficient A$ such that the total number of A$ is 50,000.

The operation of Conversion is defined on 1 or more AckaDollars. The specific Conversions (quantity and result) which may be applied to AckaDollars are defined elsewhere in the rules, and only those Conversions defined in the rules may be performed.

The Total Wealth of a named Entity is defined as the sum of the total number of A$ it possesses.

Rule 7-5-1/36
The Treasury
pTang1001001sos (Mark Nau)

I. Treasury

The Treasury is a Named, Unownable, Intelligent, Trading Entity that serves as a storing house for tradable entities that belong to no other entity, unless specified otherwise for a particular entity. Items owned by the Treasury are said to be "in the Treasury", and they may not be manipulated in any way except as explicitly allowed by the Rules.

II. Bankrupt Treasury

Whenever the rules require an amount of A$ from the Treasury for any reason, and there are insufficient available A$ to meet those obligations, the following process is executed

a) If there are no A$ owned by On Ice players, skip to step (e) of this process.

b) Each On Ice player transfers 10% (round up) of its A$ to the Treasury.

c) If there are still insufficient available A$ to meet the obligations, the process returns to step (a).

d) If there are sufficient available A$ to meet to the obligations, the obligations are met, and the process ends.

e) The remaining available A$ in the treasury shall be used in proportion to the number of A$ required for each application.

III. Donation

The Treasury automatically accepts all one-sided trades offered to it (but not at large trades), and rejects all two-sided trades offered to it.

Rule 8/15
Winning Conditions
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

A player may only achieve a Winning Condition as described in the Rules. If any Rule besides this one, Rule 8-4, Rule 8-1, and Rule 8-2, refers to a player winning a Cycle, this shall be considered to be achieving a Winning Condition, and will not result in an actual Cycle win except as described by this Rule. A player cannot achieve a Winning Condition while e holds one or more Goose Cards.

Winning Conditions are nontradeable entities. Winning Conditions may only be created, destroyed, or manipulated as described by the rules. Winning Conditions have a state attribute, which can be either Unclaimed, Claimed, or Finalized. Winning Conditions also have a creator attribute.

When a player achieves a Winning Condition, a Winning Condition is created in his possession in the Unclaimed state, with its creator attribute set to the rule number of the rule which caused the Winning Condition to be achieved. This is the only way Winning Conditions can be created; this sentence takes precedence over all other rules. For the purpose of setting creator attributes of Winning Conditions, this rule is never the rule which caused a Winning Condition to achieved; if this rule causes another rule's text to be interpreted as causing a player to achieve a Winning Condition, then that other rule is considered to be the rule which caused the Winning Condition to be achieved. No player may ever own more than one Winning Condition with the same creator attribute; if the creation of a Winning Condition would violate this, it fails to be created; if it is created anyway, then it is immediately destroyed.

If a player believes emself to have achieved a Winning Condition, then e should submit a Cycle-Win CFJ. A Cycle-Win CFJ is a CFJ whose statement alleges that the submitter has an Unclaimed Winning Condition, and which also specifies the creator attribute of this Winning Condition (specifying "XXX has an Unclaimed Winning Condition by Rule NNN", where XXX is replaced by the submitter's name, and NNN is replaced by a rule number, is sufficient to make a CFJ be a Cycle-Win CFJ). The reasoning of the CFJ should describe how the player thinks e has achieved a Winning Condition.

Immediately after a player submits a Cycle-Win CFJ, any Winning Condition e owns with the creator attribute specified in its statement changes to the Claimed state, and attaches itself to that Cycle-Win CFJ. When a TRUE verdict on a Cycle-Win CFJ becomes final, any Winning Condition the player who submitted it owns which is attached to that CFJ changes to the Finalized state. Whenever a Cycle-Win CFJ has any other final verdict, any Winning Condition attached to it is destroyed. Whenever a Cycle-Win CFJ is retracted, any Winning Condition attached to it changes to the Unclaimed state and detaches from the CFJ.

When a Winning Condition changes to the Finalized state, if its owner is a voting player at that time, e wins the cycle, and the Winning Condition is destroyed. The player may win the cycle even if e holds one or more Goose Cards, as long as e did not do so when the Winning Condition was achieved.

This rule takes precedence over all rules which mention winning a cycle or Winning Conditions, wherever there is a conflict.

Only Cycle-Win CFJs are Winning Condition CFJs.

A Player who owns a Goose Card may not win the Cycle except as specified in this rule.

Rule 8-2/48
End of Cycle
pTang1001001sos (Mark Nau)

Upon a Cycle being won as described by Rule 8, the following steps occur, in order:

a) Ackanomic play is suspended.

b) All Chartreuse Goose Eggs and Right-Handed Grapefruit are destroyed. Each player who owns at least one Chartreuse Goose Card has one Chartreuse Goose Card in eir possession destroyed.

c) The winner is given the title of winner of the cycle, and a Right-Handed Grapefruit and a Champion's Cloak are created in that player's possession. If this results in his having two Champion's Cloaks, one of them is instantly transformed into a Badge of Glory.

d) All players who have zero or fewer mannna are given a Chartreuse Goose Egg.

e) If the amount of A$s in circulation exceeded the amount in the Treasury at the time this winner was declared, the following shall occur:

i) All entities with a Total Wealth greater than zero shall transfer 10% of eir Total Wealth to the Treasury.

ii) All entities with a Total Wealth greater than zero and all players with a Total Wealth of zero or less, shall be placed on The List in decreasing order of Total Wealth. If there is a tie for Total Wealth, the Financier shall make the random determination necessary to order the entities on the list.

iii) A random entity appearing in the first half of The List, shall transfer 5% of eir total wealth to the active player lowest on The List and both entities shall be removed from The List.

iv) If there are at least two entities still on The List, one of which is a player and the other of which has positive wealth, then go to step iii.

f) If the cycle currently ending has exceeded 30 days in length, all players who have been vacationing for the entire cycle are removed from the game as if they have quit.

i) The game cycle number is incremented.

j) All players who are in Gaol are released from Gaol. All players who are in the Ackanomic Afterlife are relocated to their homes.

k) If the game state is such that the single winner of the last cycle would immediately win again upon the resumption of Ackanomic play, a Chartreuse Goose Card is transferred to that player.

l) All events specified by other rules to occur at the end of the cycle occur, in the numeric order of the rule that defines the event [see rules 593, 8-7 and 8-2-4].

m) Ackanomic play resumes.

Rule 8-2-4/19
Commission d'Arts
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

1) Upon the end of a cycle which exceeded 30 days in length The Commission d'Arts shall be called.

The Commission d'Arts is a unique Institution also referred to as The Commission. The only time The Commission has members (Commissioners) is while it is in session. When the rules call for a Commission d'Arts it shall begin session and the Dean, Poet Laureate and President and sufficient randomly selected players to give it 5 members automatically join, unless a call was made less than 60 days previously, in which case the call shall have no effect.

When a player leaves the Commission a random player who is not already a member and has not been a member since the commission came into session shall automatically join.

The Commission shall remain in session for 7 days after its newest member joined or until a report is produced which ever is sooner. When the commission ceases to be in session all players are removed from it.

2) The Commission shall publicly post a report listing 4 Silver Moon Nominees as an Institutional action. A Nominee must be a work of art from Acka's past, such as a Silly Vacation Hat description, Phoebe post, Gaoler poem, Prosthetic Forehead, etc. Rules, Proposals, and other written works are also permissible, but are discouraged as Nominees, unless they are truly meritorious. One constraint is that the Nominee must be publicly accessible from a web page maintained by the Web-Harfer. Material created by non-active players is discouraged as a Nominee.

3) Each Nominee in a given report must be unique, but Nominees from a previous report may appear on the current one, except that no Nominee which previously won a vote under this rule may be a Nominee again.

4) If the Commission fails to produce a report in accordance with this rule, then all the Commissioners who did not vote in favor of any proposed report are placed in Contempt and fined A$100. All other Commissioners are fined 2 AckaDollars.

5) Upon the issuance of the report, a Hearing is called. The valid responses are the Nominees, as listed in the Commission's report. The winning Nominee is the Nominee indicated by the verdict of the Hearing (if any).

6) Upon a winning Nominee being announced, the author (or player who originally posted the material, in the case of something like Phoebe's wisdom) of the material is awarded a Silver Moon, and a cash prize of A$75, if they are a player.

7) The Silver Moon recipient, if an active player, is required to make an acceptance speech, not to exceed 10,000 words, unless they are in Gaol, in which case they will be represented by a cardboard cutout on wheels, which will lower the whole tone of the occasion, and they will lose 5 AckaDollars for detracting from the festivities (although they still receive the above awards, of course).

8) It is a duty of the Web-Harfer to so note on the web pages which material has won a Silver Moon for its recipient.

9) Silver Moons are non-tradeable entities. They may only be created and awarded in accordance with the Rules. When one is required for this occasion, it is made by the Frobozz Magic Medal Company, Ackanomic Division.

Rule 8-5/15
Winning is Inherently Amusing (or Winning by Palindrome)
mr cwm (Eric Murray)

Upon each creation, via Proposal, of a Rule fulfilling all three of the following conditions:

(1) the Rule has a game effect in addition to its own addition to the Ackanomic Rule Set and any effect claimed under this Rule.

(2) each word in the Rule exists either in the Ackanomic Rule Set previous to the creation of the Rule, or in the Official Dictionary, provided that such dictionary exists and is not under the control of any Player.

(3) the text of the Rule is palindromic, that is, the text of the Rule would be the same, character by character, forward and backward if all alphabetic characters were lower-case, and anything other than alphabetic characters and numeric digits was removed.

the Player who submitted the Proposal that created the Rule shall:

(1) achieve a Winning Condition.

(2) receive the Unique honorific Title "Sage o' Doe Gas"

Rule 8-7/0
Winning by Cheese
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

Whenever a voting player owns one of each type of cheese, and has not achieved a Winning Condition this way since the last time all cheeses were destroyed by this rule at the end of a cycle, e achieves a Winning Condition. If anyone wins a Cycle by this method then all cheeses are destroyed at the end of that Cycle.

Rule 9/10
Crime
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

To break the Rules is to commit the Crime of Blatant Disregard.

To perform an action specified by the Rules to be Illegal is the Crime of Illegal Action. An action specified by the Rules to be "impermissible" is, by contrast, impossible. Although such an action does not occur it is not in itself a crime.

The Crime of Time Surfing occurs when a player's (otherwise illegal) action (or inaction) leads to retroactively changing the game state as if the action (or inaction) occurred [via the pragmatism clause in rule 1].

Failure of an Officer to perform a Duty of an Office e holds is the Crime of Non-Performance. The act of performing a Duty incorrectly is the Crime of Malpractice.

Rule 9-1/28
Gaol
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

This rule has precedence over all other rules, except where this rule explicitly defers to other rules.

The Gaol has an Evidence Room but its kinda cramped so we don't put anything in there anymore

The Location known as the Gaol is hereby created. It is a cramped building. A player may not leave the Gaol except by the application of a Rule which explicitly defines a procedure or condition for the player to be released or removed from the Gaol.

Players in the Gaol may not be selected to judge CFJs, to be mentors, to find Phoebe's Matchbox. If a player has been selected to judge a CFJ and has not yet accepted or declined the appointment when e enters the Gaol, e is considered to have declined the appointment as judge.

If a player is in the Gaol, they may perform no game actions except those on the following numbered list and those allowed by Rule 1. If a particular action on this list is not defined elsewhere the rules, however, it is considered to be "prohibited". This clause defers to any other rule which regulates any action on the following list:

1) A voting player in the Gaol may make a Call for Judgement (CFJ).

2) A voting player in the Gaol may make a Call for Criminal Judgement (CFCJ).

3) A player in the Gaol may bribe the Gaoler, if such an officer exists.

4) A player in Gaol may change their player state.

5) A player in the Gaol may make a Public Apology.

6) A player in the Gaol may post up to 3 public messages a day.

7) A Player in Gaol may appeal a CFJ or CFCJ, provided it is otherwise legal for him to do so.

8) A voting player may challenge a State of Crisis Resolution Document.

9) If the Speaker is in Gaol, e may declare a State of Crisis.

10) If the President is in Gaol and the game is in a State of Crisis, e may issue a State of Crisis Resolution Document

Note that "game action" means anything where the player must act. Examples include voting, submitting proposals, chewing the Gumball, etc. Examples of what this does NOT include are things like gaining points, passively receiving currency or the Magic Potato, or winning.

A player is released from the Gaol if and when their sentence expires or after 1 day has passed, whichever is longer. Other rules may specify other conditions under which a player is released.

Rule 9-4/11
Annoyances
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

Being Annoying is a Crime. This rule defines the only ways to be Annoying:

I. Spam

Pursuing a game strategy which entails, as one of its effects, causing excessive amounts of messages to be sent to the public fora [in the judgement of a judge] is Annoying.

II. George the Annoying Argumentative Intellectual's Loophole

Exploiting lexical equivalence to alter, or attempt to alter, the interpretation of a word or phrase in any Ackanomic document, [in the judgement of a judge], is Annoying.

III. Concealing Public Messages

Attempting through the format of a public message (e.g. excessive whitespace) to conceal a public action is Annoying.

Rule 9-5/3
The Haiku Limit
Robert Sevin (Mitchell Harding)

[It is illegal
To have a score exceeding
Seven hundred points]

Rule 10/8
Geography
Vynd (John McCoy)

The geography of Ackanomic is, for the most part, a mystery to its inhabitants. Few maps have survived from the time of the Ancients. Frequent earthquakes and the treacherous Wilds of Ackanomic make exploration and cartography difficult. What little is known is described in this and other Rules.

Ackanomic consists of many regions. A region is a collection of locations which are close to each other in Ackanomic. No single location can be found in more than one region. Locations are all assumed to be in the City, unless specified otherwise. If it is clear from context that a location is not in the City, but its exact region is unclear, then it is in The Outer Territories. Regions are not themselves locations, no region can be inside, or part of, another region.

In order to accept a trade, or to gift any entities, the donator and the recipient must be in the same region. This does not apply to any rule-mandated payments (CFCJ punishments, for example), or to any transaction between the treasury and another entity. If a player attempts to accept a trade, or gift an entity, to an entity in a different region, then the player first moves to the region of the entity on the other side of the transfer.

If a player or other entity enters, voluntarily or otherwise, a region, without having a location specified as their destination, then they go to the default location for that region, or one of them, chosen at random, if there is more than one. If the region has no default location, then that attempt to enter it fails.

The City is a region of Ackanomic located the area surrounding The Lonely Mountain. The default location for the City is the Library.

The Wilds of Ackanomic are a region which surrounds the City. Full of strange plants and animals, they can be quite dangerous to visit. The default location for The Wilds of Ackanomic is the wilds, which is a very large common location that consists of all the land in The Wilds of Ackanomic that is not specified to be a location of its own.

The Town is a region of Ackanomic located beyond the Wilds. The default location for the Town is the Hitching Post.

Beyond the Town is the region known as the Outer Territories. Pumpkin Patch is located in the Outer Territories.

Kansas is a moon of Acka. It is a location not in, on, or around Ackanomia.

Rule 10-1/11
Locations
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

1) A Rule that defines an entity or class of entity may specify that the entity is a Location. Unless otherwise specified, a Location may contain any number of players. Instances of Locations are entities, and are unique, unless otherwise specified. A Location may only have properties, or be given properties, as specified by the Rules. Ownable Locations are never in the Treasury nor are they ever Somewhere Else.

2) A player must be in exactly one Location at any one time. A player may only leave, or be removed from, a Location as specified by the Rules. A player may only enter, or be placed in, a Location as specified by the Rules. Locations are unowned unless conditions for ownership, as specified by the Rules, have been met and are maintained.

3) If a Rule specifies that a player enters a Location, they leave their current Location, unless there is some other restriction which would prevent them from leaving the current Location [e.g. Gaol]. In this case they actually do not enter the destination Location; they remain where they are.

4) A Location may be specified as a Common Location. Players may leave and enter such Locations freely, provided they meet any specific conditions that may be defined for the Common Location.

5) If a player leaves or is removed from, any Location, and it is unspecified to which Location that they go, they go to their Home, if it exists.

6) If a player leaves a Location without specifying a destination, or their location is otherwise undefined, and they cannot go to their Home, then they go to The Wilds of Ackanomic.

7) Let the common location known as the Ackanomian River, referred to as the river, exist deep in the wilds. No player may enter the river, as it is a rapidly moving stream with many rocks. No player may cross the river or otherwise move from one side to the other except as specified in the rules. Players with flying may cross the river. [It is possible that with the proper equipment, one could white-water raft down the Ackanomian River.]

7a) On the other side of the river is as yet unexplored land. This land is currently unnamed and is not part of Ackanomia. This land is not Common. Although this land may be visited if a player can cross the stream, it may not be bought, built upon, or otherwise altered except by rules which specify that they apply to this land. [It is rumored that this foreign land is littered with machines of war left over from a battle between the ancients.]

7b) This section, including anything in this rule whose section number begins with 7, takes precedence over all rules regarding land, buildings or transportation

8) Somewhere Else

8a) Somewhere Else is an unownable and unmappable Location. Entities may not be transferred to and/or from Somewhere Else except whereas such transfers are explicitly permitted by the Rules. No player may ever be Somewhere Else.

9) Any player rejoining the game goes to the Location they were in when they left the game, if it exists, otherwise they go to their Home, if that exists, otherwise they go to the Hall of Elders. Any player joining the game for the first time goes to their Home.

Rule 10-1-2/8
Library
Calvin N Hobbes (Thierry Joffrain)

The Library is a classy building where a copy of all legal documents are kept. It is a Common Location. It may not be destroyed or reduced in size to less than what it is originally (classy).

The Ackanomicon likes a quiet library. To that extent, the Library has a Maximum Occupancy of 15 players. If 15 or more players are ever in the Library at one time, then there shall be a deafening explosion, in which all players in the Library are returned to their homes. In addition, all players not in the Library at the time this occurs are awarded a random Boon of the Ancients each, for having the foresight to avoid such an explosion.

Rule 10-1-2-1/26
The Ackanomicon
Vynd (John McCoy)

This rule takes precedence over all other rules.

The Ackanomicon is a powerful book of magic, and the occult, aligned with Chaos. No man knows its age or author, although many speculate that it predates even the Codex of Kra. It is massive in size, fully 6 inches thick and a foot across, bound in leather and iron. It looks a lot like a Spell Book of Chorg, except meaner.

The Ackanomicon is kept in its own special room at the Library, called The Vault of the Book, or, sometimes, *that* room. It's not a very popular room, partly because it is well hidden, but largely because, well, people have a tendency to get hurt in *that* room. It is impossible to remove The Ackanomicon from this room, it likes it there.

Any Player may visit The Vault of the Book by going to the Library, and publicly announcing that he is entering The Vault of the Book, in search of forbidden knowledge. No player may visit The Vault of the Book more than once in a calendar month, or more than once in any given 14 day span. No player may visit the Vault of the Book if another player has visited the Vault of the book in the past 24 hours. Don't ask why, you don't want to know.

All players who visit the Vault of the Book will discover that they are irresistibly drawn to read The Ackanomicon, which is always open to a random page. No one ever gets past this first page that they read, but even one page of The Ackanomicon can provide one with great insight, or great pain.

Whenever a player visits The Vault of the Book, the Officer in Charge of Random Things will determine which page from the list below The Ackanomicon was open to, by selecting one page at random with (you guessed it) equal probability. Some pages are duplicates, however, or at least discuss the same material. Because of this, some results will be more common than others. Each entry on the list below specifies how many pages of its type are found in The Ackanomicon, if it does not, then there is assumed to be only one. The effects (if any) of reading a page of the Ackanomicon occur as soon as it is publicly knowable which page has been read.

Players who read The Ackanomicon are encouraged to post (vague, perhaps) descriptions of the knowledge gleaned from its text, as well as the effects it had on them.

[This slightly odd set-up is intended to allow keep the really good and really bad effects from being too common, but still allow the addition of new pages without completely rewriting some probability chart]

The Known Pages of The Ackanomicon:

Arcane Trivia (16 pages): These pages contain many tantalizing but ultimately uneducating bits of information on all manner of things ancient and occult. They have no effect on the reader.

Vile prophecies (5 pages): These are pages describing all manner of terrible events that are to befall the reader in the near future. The reader of one of these pages suffers a loss of 5 AckaDollars, unless she is the ScareMonger, in which case everyone else will lose 5 AckaDollars and she will feel vindicated.

Inner workings (6 pages): These pages give glimpses into some of the basic workings of the universe of mortal men, at a price. The reader gains A$50, but loses 5 AckaDollars.

Terrorizing pages (3 pages): These pages inspire indescribable terror in all who read them, causing a loss of 15 AckaDollars and 3 Sanity Points.

Mutation (2 pages): The contents of this page warps the reader's mind and body. He gains a new Extra head, surly and mean-spirited in temperament.

Dark Domain (2 pages): Reading these pages opens a portal to a terrible realm of darkness and nightmare. The reader is treated as if he was in Gaol for the next 48 hours, except that he may not be released in any fashion before this period is up. The reader has not, however, actually committed a Crime, nor is he actually in Gaol.

Long lost treasure (2 pages): These pages describe the locations of long lost treasure troves. The reader gains A$250.

Forbidden Fruit (1 page): Knowledge no man was meant to know. The reader loses 20 AckaDollars, and becomes Enlightened.

Not so Forbidden Fruit (4 pages) The player has an out of body experience in which he is transported to an primordial jungle where he is worshiped as a god by the natives. Upon waking up, he will find that all he has left to remember it by is a pint of lager.

Ancient One (1 page): The player warps time and space with a terrifying incantation of power, summoning the Ancient Powers into his presence. A Chartreuse Goose Card is immediately created in eir possession.

Rule 10-1-4/13
Hall of Elders
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

1) Let the Hall of Elders exist. It is a common location, and is housed in a classy marble building, at least 3 blocks from the Gaol.

2) If a Player is On Ice, their likeness (hereafter, where appropriate, referred to as if it were the actual player) is eligible to be enshrined in the Hall of Elders. They shall be a candidate for such an honor if someone nominates them (via a public message) for such provided they have not been On Ice for all of the last 14 days. A player may only be nominated once at any one time. 3) If a player has been nominated according to the previous section, their confirmation period starts at the time of their nomination and ends 3 days after their nomination. During the confirmation period, players may send messages to the public forum supporting the nominee (maximum one such message per player). The nominee shall receive one confirmation point for each such message posted in accordance with the rules. They shall also receive one point for each cycle (or game) they won while a player, up to a maximum of 5 points from this source.

4) At the end of the confirmation period, the nominee is confirmed if and only if the number of confirmation points they received is in excess of the number of active players divided by 2. After it is decided whether or not the player has been confirmed, all of their confirmation points are destroyed.

5) If the On Ice player becomes Active during either the nomination period or the confirmation period, they are no longer considered a nominee. This section takes precedence over all the preceding ones.

6) Once confirmed, the great honor of being enshrined in the Hall of Elders is bestowed upon the nominee. It is a duty of the Web-Harfer to place relevant information about the (including their portrait, if such exists), on a web page which represents the Hall. The Speaker should provide a brief biography of the enshrinee, and a list of any offices they may have held while a player. This is considered "relevant information", as per above.

7) Whenever an enshrinee is enshrined in the Hall (either by this rule or another), An Day of Remembrance shall be placed on the calendar, named after the enshrinee (e.g. Elder X's Day). The date (excluding year) shall be chosen as follows:

1) It shall not be Jan 22nd.
2) It shall be the date the player in question originally joined the game, if that date can be determined with finality, and that date is not already an Day of Remembrance, otherwise,
3) It shall be the date the player in question most recently left the game, if that date is not already an Day of Remembrance, otherwise,
4) The Speaker shall choose a date that is not already an Day of Remembrance.

8) If the player in question becomes Active at least 30 days after being enshrined, they may use the title Elder, and shall have the powers and benefits explicitly specified by other rules for Elders.

9) The rules may explicitly delineate other procedures for an active player to be enshrined in the Hall, and this rule defers to such where there is a conflict.

Rule 10-1-5/0
Fairy Land
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

Fairy Land is a strange and mystical location. It is full of bright flashing lights and spaced out players. No one is certain exactly were Fairy Land is, thus it is not possible for a player to voluntarily move to Fairy Land, although eating or smoking certain mushrooms and herbs common to Ackanomic may make it possible.

Players who are in Fairy Land are always considered to be On Vacation, unless they are On Ice. A player who performs a game action while in Fairy Land wakes up on the Town Hall steps naked and quite possibly with a hangover.

Unfortunately Players have been known to occasionally eat a few too many mushrooms in order to prolong their stay. Such experiments can have chilling effects. A player who has been in Fairly Land continuously for seven days goes On Ice. Office bearers have a much lower tolerance for the sacred mushroom and go On Ice after only three days. Players who have not prepared themselves for the experience by voting, go On Ice immediately upon arrival.

Rule 10-1-6/5
Portrait Gallery
snowgod (Phil Ackley)

The Portrait Gallery is a small building and a Common Location. It is a duty of the Web-Harfer to maintain a gallery of portraits.

This gallery shall be linked to the Official Ackanomic Web Page and must contain a portrait of every player who has submitted one. The Web-Harfer may resize portraits in order to keep them uniform. If a player has no portrait the Web-Harfer shall place an empty picture frame in the gallery containing the words "This space reserved for x" (where x is the name of the player without a portrait.)

If the Web-Harfer can think of a feasible way of doing so, he may charge admission to the gallery. However, the price of Admission must never exceed A$2. Charging admission is a privilege of the Web-Harfer.

The Web-Harfer may, but is not required to maintain a gallery containing images of deceased players.

Rule 10-1-7/15
Ackanomic Institute of Genetic Replication
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

The Ackanomic Institute of Genetic Replication exists. It is housed in a cosy laboratory in the south part of Acka. It is a Common Location. When required by the rules, it will produce a replica of a player. Such a replica may only take actions explicitly allowed it by the rules, and is rather short-lived, being destroyed at the end of the occasion which warranted its creation. Unless specified otherwise, there is no charge for such replicas.

The Ackanomic Institute of Genetic Replication also provides customized mutations, at a small fee, to any interested player. If in a public message a player announces he is paying the specified fee for a mutation described in this rule, the cost is deducted from his account, and he receives that mutation and any special attributes associated with it described in this rule. If he later wishes to have the mutation removed, he must pay a fee equal to that for receiving the mutation, and he shall cease to have both the mutation and any special attributes associated with it.

Current available mutations:

Extra head Cost -- 50 A$. Players with extra heads are encouraged to occasionally get into public arguments amongst their heads. [See also rule 7-1-1]

Pointy ears: Cost -- 4 A$ each, or 6 A$ for a pair. Pointy ears don't do much, but players who have them may threaten other players with a Vulcan Neck Pinch and be taken seriously. Players without pointy ears may also make this threat, but they are liable to be laughed at upon doing so. Players with only one pointy ear are liable to be laughed at regardless of their actions. A player may never have more than two pointy ears per head; if at any time a player has more pointy ears than this, the extra ears are removed(at no cost to the player).

Wings: Cost -- 100 A$. Winged players and only winged players, can fly. Since extra heads ruin a player's aerodynamics, a player may not have both wings and an extra head.

Forked Tongue: Cost A$250 - Players who have this mutation have a better ability to speak and pronounce the language of the ancients. Whenever a player with this mutation reads an ancient text [such as the Ackanomicon or a Spell Book of Chorg] and the result of that reading of the text specifies a random outcome, the player shall have a 25% chance of being able to pick the outcome deterministically. This paragraph takes precedence over any rules with which it conflicts.

Rule 10-1-8/5
Monolith
Fortunato (Aaron Keesler)

1) Let the Monolith exist. It is a common location, and is a sumptuous building.

2) The Monolith is initially a three level structure. Any player may add levels to the Monolith by publicly declaring that they are doing so. No more than two levels may be added per player, per week. The price of adding a level to the Monolith is A$50 * N, where N is (current number of levels / 3), rounded down.

3) Each level of the Monolith must have a name. The names of the first three levels of the Monolith are:

i) Level One: The Lobby
ii) Level Two: The Smoking Lounge
iii) Level Three: The Trophy Room

The name must be designated by the creator of the level at the point at which it is created. It is a Duty of the Web-Harfer to keep a list of the name of each level of the Monolith.

4) When a player has completed 7 levels of the Monolith, e receives a Boon of the Ancients, and is granted the title of Assistant Monolith Meister. This title gives no additional benefits. When a player has completed 10 levels of the Monolith, e receives a Boon of the Ancients, and is granted the title of Monolith Meister. This title gives no additional benefits.

5) All players who have added at least two levels to the Monolith are Sheltered whenever they are at the Monolith.

Rule 10-1-8-1/0
SWORD
Trent (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

There is a project in Ackanomic called Secret Weapons and Ordinance Research Development (SWORD). It is housed in a secret underground laboratory 50 floors below the bottom level of the monolith, and is reachable by a secret elevator. In it, Ackan technicians work on newfangled weaponry with which to fight off Canadians and other bad guys.

Occasionally, Ackan technicians sell weaponry secrets to the Canadians, who always disavow any knowledge of it, and say that 'that information was declassified years ago anyways.' However, the Canadians fear the SWORD project and consequently have vowed to destroy it.

Thus, if Canada ever wins a war against Ackanomic, then the SWORD project shall be determined to have been bombed out of existence, along with the monolith. If this occurs,

1) rule 10-1-8 will be renamed 'Former-Monolith' and its text replaced with the following CRATER-delimited text

CRATER Acka used to have a monolith, but it was bombed into oblivion by the Canadians. Now all that remains is a large blast crater and a few scattered piles of rubble CRATER

2) this rule will repeal itself

Rule 10-1-9/0
Hitching Post
T. T. Ren (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

The Hitching Post is a common location at the geographic center of the Town. It is where Ackans dry and dusty from travel tie their animals or vehicles. Any player at the Hitching Post may tie any animal or vehicle they own to the Hitching Post as a public action. It is the Crime of Hogging the Water Hole for one player to have more than one animal or vehicle they own tied to the hitching post.

Rule 10-1-10/1
The Lonely Mountain
Quoth the Raven (Tom Walmsley)

The Lonely Mountain is an unownable entity and a common location. It stands majestically in the centre of Ackanomic City, its summit obscured by cloud. It is said that not even the ancients were able to clibm to the top of the mountain, and any attempt to do so will automatically fail, for it is higher even than the tallest towers on Vulcan Headquarters. The Lonely Mountain is said to be rich in mineral ores.

Rule 10-1-10-1/0
Mining the Lonely Mountain
Quoth the Raven (Tom Walmsley)

Any player who is at the Lonely Mountain and who owns a shovel, a pick axe and at least one stick of dynamite may mine the Lonely Mountai of its mineral ores. No player may do this more than once per calendar week. When a player does this eir stick of dynamite is destroyed (or one of them if e owns more than one) and e receives between one and five (determined at random) nosesacks of a random mineral ore.

Rule 10-1-11/0
Ye Olde Mining Shop
Quoth the Raven (Tom Walmsley)

Ye Olde Mining Shop is a small building, unownable entity, and common location. It sells mining equipment. Its prices (per item) are as follows:

Pick axes: A$20
Shovels: A$20
Sticks of dynamite: A$45
Hard hats: A$5
Blue canaries: A$10

Pick axes, shovels, sticks of dynamite, hard hats and blue canaries are all tradeable entities. Hard hats are also hats.

Any player in Ye Olde Mining Shop may purchase any of these goods by paying the specified price (which gos to the treasury as Ye Olde Mining Shop is government owned). E will then receive the entities e paid for, which will be created in eir posession.

Rule 10-3/23
Buildings
Calvin N Hobbes (Thierry Joffrain)

Buildings are a class of named tradeable entity. Buildings that are unowned are destroyed unless they are rule-defined. Regardless of ownership, land and the buildings that reside on it are not considered to be in the treasury.

I. Description:

i) The owner of a building may change its name or description as a public action provided e unambiguously identifies the affected building. If a player gives a house a description which is not in accord, its description becomes "A one room apartment with no window, cinder block walls, a plain wooden bench, and a pile of rags in one corner for a bed".

ii) A player may designate a single building e owns as eir home. A building designated as a player's home is a Common Location that may only be entered with the permission of its owner.

Rule 10-4/3
Maps
Vynd (John McCoy)

Maps are a class of unownable named entities. Maps are depictions of the physical layout of places in the Game of Ackanomic. The rules may call for certain maps to be publicly displayed. If this is the case, then the officer responsible for that map must maintain a WWW page with an copy of said map. The recommended medium is HTML with clickable images/cgi, but any clear representation, including a text description, is acceptable so long as it is accurate. If applicable, the map should include links to other relevant material, such as its contents or other maps.

Rule 10-4-1/3
Here There Be Dragons
Vynd (John McCoy)

The Map of Ackanomic is a map of the earth as it is known [described in the rules]. It is maintained by the Map-Harfer, who is permitted to change it as necessary to reflect new discoveries. The Map of Ackanomic is not overly detailed, but at a minimum it must depict any regions found on the surface of the earth. The Map-Harfer is permitted to fill any blank areas of the Map of Ackanomic with wild speculations about the nature of said areas, but these speculations are almost certainly wrong.

Rule 10-7/3
If we don't need Gravity, we'd better have Pressure
mr cwm (Eric Murray)

[The empirical observations outlined in "We don't need Gravity" reveal a great deal about the nature of the Earth and the Universe. This cosmology, while including some speculation, is consistent with and explains those observations.]

The Universe consists of a semi-infinite block of 2024 aluminium alloy joined to a semi-infinite block of Type 304 stainless steel. The sole defect in these semi-infinite blocks is a spherical hollow centered at the interface with a diameter two average cat-heights greater than the greatest distance defined or implied in any other Rule. The Earth lies centered within this hollow, oriented parallel to the interface between the blocks with Ackanomia facing the stainless steel side. The spherical hollow is pressurized to 1 atmosphere with life-sustaining gas.

Note that the asymmetry of the Universe will cause anything that becomes detached from the underside of the Earth to fall to the stainless steel surface of the hollow.

This Rule takes precedence over any Rule that would define or imply any distance greater than the greatest distance defined or implied by this Rule.

Rule 12/3
Games Metarule
Niccolo Flychuck (Uri Bruck)

[Games & Contests include sub games and gaming equipment that can be used in subgames. Some of them are maintained on a separate web page.]

Rule 12-1/31
Games & Contests
Niccolo Flychuck (Uri Bruck)

I. Games & Contests

There exists a class of entities known as Games & Contests, hereafter, for the purposes of this rule and its children, known as "Games" (Game).

II. General Equipment

Descendants of rule 12 may define entities to be used as General Equipment in the games defined by descendants of rule 12. Unless otherwise specified, these entities have no influence outside the instance of the Game in which they are being used. The term 'General Equipment', as used elsewhere in the descendants of rule 12, shall be construed to mean instances of any or all of these defined entities, as appropriate.

III. Game Descriptions

Unless otherwise specified, the name of a Game is the name of the rule that defines it. Any descendant of this rule that defines more than one game is void. A descendant of this rule defines a Game if and only if it specifies all the information as detailed below (b thru h) (even if the specification for a particular piece of information is the word 'none'). This rule does not define a Game:

b. General Equipment to be used in the Game.

c. Upper and lower limits on the number of participants in the specific Game. The minimum for the lower limit is 2. The lower limit may not be specified to exceed the upper limit. Either limit may be specified as an integer or an expression such as "the number of active players when an instance of the game is instantiated", so long as the previous conditions of this sub-section are not violated. If a limit is specified as an expression, it shall be evaluated when the Game is instantiated, and shall not "float" while the Game is in progress, unless the Game's rules specify otherwise. If the expression cannot be evaluated unambiguously, an instance of the game cannot start.

d. The Rules for the Game.

e. The number of referees, and how those referees are to be chosen. This must be a non-negative integer. Referees may not play or win the instance of the Game they are refereeing, nor may they be penalized as a result of participation in an instance of the Game, unless the rules of the Game explicitly say the referee may participate as a player.

f. Conditions for winning the Game.

g. Any additional information necessary to play that specific Game.

IV. Scope and Precedence

a. Games may not manipulate any Ackanomic entity outside this rule and its descendants.

b. All descendants of this rule defer precedence to all those external to it, unless otherwise specified. This rule has precedence over all its descendants.

V. Starting an Instance of a Game

a. An instance of a Game may only be started in accordance with its rules for doing so. If its rules are silent on the matter, however, (or refer to this section) it is started when one of its referees announces its start, the names of all its players and referees, and all other necessary particulars of the Game instance. If the Game has no referees, it starts when one of its players performs the above functions. Other rules [e.g. Duels], may define conditions under which an instance of a Game may start, and an alternate procedure for doing so. A Game may not start without the required number of players and referees.

b. A player may not join an instance of a Game in progress, except as specified in its rules. Games should be designed in such a way as to handle the contingency of any of its players or referees quitting it at any time.

c) Unless the Rules for a game specify otherwise, players going absent may name another player (of Ackanomic) to be their Substitute Player (in the subgame). The Substitute Player may not have been a player of the instance of the Game or Contest in which e is substituting at any time in the past, and e must agree to be a Substitute. All responsibilities and privileges of the departed player for the Game or Contest fall to the Substitute Player [if the Substitute Player wins the subgame, the Trophy goes to em]. If the original player returns, e resumes playing for emself. It is considered good form for em to give the Substitute Player some recompense for eir services. Participants in Duels may not have Substitute Players for the Duel.

d) If a game has a Referee, a player in a particular instance of that game may, if the Referee of that instance has not responded in more than a week, point out this fact in a public message. The Speaker shall then send email to the Referee in question asking em if e wishes to continue as Referee, or resign. If no response is received within three days, it shall be assumed that the Referee has resigned. When a referee resigns as per this section, the Speaker may appoint another interested player as Referee, and the game will be suspended until such an appointment is made.

e) If the game has a referee, the referee may appoint another willing player not already involved in the game to play in eir place for any time that e is absent. If the referee becomes absent without making such an appointment, the Speaker may appoint a referee, otherwise the game is suspended until the previous referee returns. This paragraph defers precedence to all descendants of this rule.

f) When a player leaves Ackanomic, they are deemed to have forfeited any games they playing in.

VI. Random Determination

a. If the rules of a Game call for a random determination, either explicitly or implicitly, a referee of that game is responsible for making this determination unless the Game's rules specify otherwise.

VII. Freedom of Participation

a. Participation in Games is voluntary. No player may be forced to take part in a Game or a Contest, or be forced to be a referee in one. A player may leave a Game they are participating in at any time. This section has precedence over all other rules.

VIII. Disputes

If a dispute arises in a Game in which there is no referee, or the referee is unable to resolve the dispute for some reason, it shall be adjudicated by the Speaker, or someone appointed by the Speaker, who shall render judgement as objectively as possible. If a player is dissatisfied with the decision, a CFJ is their only recourse. Calling a CFJ is bad form, however, as it is only a game. Play is suspended for the duration of any adjudication.

IX. No Loophole Surfing

a. Games and Contests are meant to be fun and to enhance Acka. Using Games and Contests to loophole surf, scam, or otherwise abuse the spirit and intent of this structure is in bad taste, and players are permitted to sneer at this behaviour.

X. Moribund Games

a. Either the Referee of a particular instance of a game or any player of that instance may declare that instance of a game to be moribund as a public action. That instance of a game will be terminated without a winner following such a declaration unless at least 33% of its players publicly object before the 3 days elapse.

XI. Games in a Public Dorum [IRC]

A particular Public Dorum is a valid forum for playing Games and Contests provided all of the following are true with respect to the Dorum, the game, and its participants, as appropriate:

a. The game lists in its General Equipment section: 'Optionally, a Public Dorum', or words to that effect.

b. The following information is announced at least 24 hours prior to the start of the game in the main forum: The URL of the particular Dorum that the game will be played on, and the start time of the game.

c. The specified Dorum is defined as General Equipment [in rule 12-3].

d. All players and referees (participants) consent to participate in the game on the specified Dorum . The game or contest does not require, in general, non-participant Acka players to be played normally. [e.g. Limerick Contest].

e. At least one referee, (or one player in the absence of a referee), has client software capable of logging sessions on the specified Dorum, and that person volunteers to log the particular game in its entirety.

The results of a game in a Public Dorum are considered publicly knowable when the volunteer per subsection e posts the entire log file via e-mail to the customary Games list, (or posts the URL of the log file via e-mail to the customary Games list, in the case of large log files).

Rule 12-3/13
General Equipment
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

All entities described in this rule are General Equipment.

I. Ackanomic Magic Dice

The Ackanomic Magic Dice will roll 1 to 1000 multi-sided die up to 1000 rolls per request. Sides may be from 2-1000 sides.

[The AMD will display results automatically to the mail list, or to as many as ten private addresses. To use the AMD, a Player sends an e-mail message to "dice@pbm.com" omitting the quotation marks. In the body of the message, use the following format:

#P (up to 10 #P lines allowed)
#S (up to 1000 sides allowed)
#D (up to 1000 dice allowed)
#R (up to 1000 total rolls)
#L (up to 20 rolls per line)
#C (up to 100 #C lines allowed)
#T

Example:

#P acka-games@wilma.che.utexas.edu
#S 20
#D 1
#R 1
#L 1
#T Acka: Hit determination
#C I am using the dice server roll a d20 to see if I hit

Complete instructions and examples of use may be found at the Dice Server Web site: http://www.pbm.com/dice/]

II. Gamepoints

Gamepoints are chits used to keep score in Games and Contests. A player in a Game may possess a negative number of Gamepoints. Gamepoints are awarded and forfeited as described in the rules of the particular Game.

III. Word Validating Dictionaries

a) The ENABLE Word List, as defined by the URL: telnet://moo.ackanomic.org:7777

b) Unabr.dict.Z (but used in uncompressed format), as defined by the URL: ftp://sable.ox.ac.uk/pub/wordlists/dictionaries/Unabr.dict.gz

c) The Official Dictionary as defined by the rules of Acka.

IV. Definition Lookup Dictionaries
a) URL: http://gs213.sp.cs.cmu.edu/prog/webster
b) URL: http://humanities.uchicago.edu/forms_unrest/webster.form.html
c) URL: http://www.m-w.com/dictionary.htm

V. Movie Database

a) URL: http://www.imdb.com/

VI. Public Dorums [IRC Servers]:

a) herne.dragoncat.net, port 9942

VII. Music Database

a) http://www.allmusic.com

Rule 12-3-1/4
Limerick Contest
Niccolo Flychuck (Uri Bruck)

1) General Equipment:

Ackanomic Magic Dice

2) Number of Players:

Exactly 2, with Count Tabula as a referee. It is Permissible for Count Tabula to be both a player and referee at the same time.

3) Starting an instance of the contest

As described in rule 12-1, section VI.

4) Rules of the contest:

Each of the players in the contest writes a limerick about the other player. The limerick may be silly, funny, and even ridicule the other participant in a good-humored manner, as long as it is not offensive. The limericks must be posted within 3 days of the start of the contest. If one of the participants fails to post a limerick, then the other wins by default. If neither post, the referee chooses a winner at random using the AMD.

Once both limericks have been posted, there is a 3 day voting period. During the voting period all Ackanomic players may send their vote to the referee, indicating which limerick is the better one,

with an extra caveat, quoth here. The Poet Laureate (if there is one) Shall, with his learned art gained quite so dear, Attempt to share and increase the fun When the Poet's vote is count'd at the end, His one vote shall instead be counted twice. The Poet may, if e does wish, then send A public message, hopefully quite nice To praise the Duelist which had won his vote Explaining why the Poet liked what e wrote.

The participant whose limerick got the most votes wins the contest. In case of a tie, the participant whose limerick was posted first wins the contest. In the case that that does not determine a winner, the referee determines a winner at random, using the AMD. If the winner is chosen at random, both players shall be eligible, even if one or both are non-active.

Rule 12-3-2/6
Ghost
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

1.General Equipment: Official Dictionary

2. Players: minimum -- 2; maximum -- the number of active players when an instance of Ghost is initiated less 1; Referees -- one

When the rules specify that a player is removed from the game, it means that he is no longer a player in that instance of Ghost. It is not necessarily a resignation, although a resignation does cause a player's removal from the game.

3. Beginning of game

As described in rule 12-1, section VI.

4. Rules

The referee shall randomly assign each player a different integer ranging from 1 to N, where N is the number of players in the game. Player 1 shall play first, and after that, play shall proceed in order of increasing number. Player 1 plays again just after the turn of the player with the highest number. Each player's turn begins when the previous player's ends, unless that player's play was a protest, in which case it begins when the protest is resolved. Each player's turn shall last until either the player is delinquent or she makes a play. A player is delinquent when it has been their turn for three days and some other player points this fact out.

At any time prior to the first turn of the player assigned the highest number, players may be added to the game. One wishing to be added to the game should inform the referee of their desire to do so; the referee shall then inform all current players of the addition. The new player will be assigned the number one greater than the highest number already assigned to a player in the game. Before the beginning of the new player's first turn, or three days after their addition, whichever comes first, the new player may be removed from the game if any player already in the game protests their addition. Players may not be added to instances of Ghost being played as a Duel.

Players in a game of Ghost are forbidden from using dictionaries or other reference books to aid their play. They may use these references for other purposes.

In his turn, each player shall do one of the following: (1) begin a new ghost word; (2) continue an existing ghost word; (3) protest the ghost word; (4) resign. Plays shall be made by sending a message describing the play to all players and the referee.

(1) A player may only begin a new ghost word when there is no existing ghost word. He shall do so by naming any letter of the alphabet.

(2) A player may continue an existing ghost word only when there is an existing ghost word. He shall do so by posting a string of letters identical to the existing ghost word except for the addition of one letter at either the beginning or the end of the ghost word. This string then becomes the new ghost word.

(3) A player who protests the ghost word shall do so by either by stating that the ghost word is a word of four or more letters in the official dictionary, or by stating that the ghost word cannot be found within any word in the official dictionary. ("uperso" can be found within "supersonic"; "spronc" cannot.) A protest is said to be made against the player whose turn caused the ghost word to be changed to its present form.

When a player protests the ghost word, play is suspended until the protest is resolved. If the protest was on the grounds that the ghost word is a word of four or more letters in the official dictionary, the referee shall attempt to locate it therein and report his findings. If the ghost word is a word of four or more letters in the official dictionary, the protest is valid; otherwise it is invalid. Either way, when the referee reports the validity or lack thereof of the protest, it is considered resolved; if the protest was valid, the ghost word is destroyed.

If the protest was on the grounds that the ghost word cannot be found within any word in the official dictionary, the player against whom the protest was made has three days to post a word containing the ghost word. If he does not, the protest is resolved as valid. If he does, the referee shall attempt to locate that word in the official dictionary, and shall report his findings. If the named word is a word in the official dictionary, the protest is invalid; otherwise, it is valid. Upon the referee reporting on the validity or lack thereof of the protest, it is considered resolved; at the resolution of any protest of this sort, the ghost word is destroyed.

A player who makes an invalid protest is removed from the game; a player who has a valid protest made against him is removed from the game.

(4) A player who resigns is removed from the game. A player who does not make a move within his turn is assumed to have resigned. When a player resigns, the ghost word is destroyed.

A player may remove themselves from an instance of the game at any time by posting a message to that effect. If it was their turn, they are assumed to have resigned. If they leave Ackanomic, they are assumed to have posted such a message.

5. Winning

If exactly one player remains in the game, that player wins. There are no other winning conditions.

6. The Referee

Upon request, the referee must provide the following information: the players in the game and their order of play, whose turn it is, the current ghost word, and a history of the game in progress. He may, but is not required to, keep a web page with this information.

If the referee resigns his position, becomes absent, he is no longer the referee. In this event, any player of Ackanomic who is not a player of that instance of Ghost may become referee by publicly expressing his desire to do so. While there is no referee, the game is suspended.

Rule 12-3-3/12
Fictionary
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

[Gist: A player chooses an obscure word from a dictionary that hopefully no one knows the definition of. All other players anonymously submit bogus definitions of the word. All submissions are mixed in with the real definition, and players vote on which definition is correct. Scoring is based on voting for the correct definition among all the chaff, or enticing others vote for your bogus definition.]

I. General Equipment:

Gamepoints as needed
Official Dictionary
All English Definition Lookup dictionaries defined as General Equipment

II. Number of Players:

minimum: 5; maximum: the number of active players when an instance of Fictionary is initiated. Referees: none.

III. Starting an instance of the Game:

As described in rule 12-1, section VI. Additionally, the player announcing the start of the Game shall randomly assign each player a different integer ranging from 1 to N, where N is the number of players in the game. All players shall be randomly assigned numbers in this way, including non-active ones.

IV. Rules of the game:

The game is composed of rounds; each round shall have one "Brainiac". All players who are not the Brainiac shall be known as "Bluffers". The game shall be scored in Gamepoints.

Player 1 shall be the Brainiac of the first round, and after that, Brainiac duty shall be assigned in order of increasing player number at the completion of each round. Player 1 again assumes the duty just after the completion of the round where the player with the highest number was Brainiac.

A round is composed of the following steps, in order. A step ends when all players responsible for performing an action during it have done so. When it is pointed out that a player has not performed their action for a step which has been in progress for more than 3 days, that player performs the default action for that step, and they lose one game point.

Steps (1 thru 5) of a Round:

1) The Brainiac shall choose a word whose definition is available in one of the Definition Lookup Dictionaries (Dictionaries), and publicly post the word. The Ing Word should be as obscure as possible. Words with Harfy definitions are encouraged.

The Brainiac shall also privately note the definition of the Ing Word. This definition shall be a verbatim transcription of any of the definitions provided by any of the Dictionaries. (Part of speech and similar details should not be transcribed). This shall be known as the "Actual Definition".

This step ends when the Ing Word has been publicly posted.

The Default action for this step causes the end of the current round.

2) All Bluffers shall submit a definition for the Ing Word to the Brainiac via private e-mail. Default: "" is submitted. A Bluffer may change eir submitted definition at any time before the definitions are posted in step 3.

3) The Brainiac shall compare the submitted definitions with the Actual Definition and any other definitions in the Dictionaries (On-line Definitions), and report how play proceeds based on the following cases:

3a) 2 or more Bluffers submitted a definition that is substantially similar to an On-line Definition. In this case, each such Bluffer receives 3 Gamepoints, the Brainiac is sneered at for picking an easy word, and the round ends.

3b) Exactly one Bluffer submitted a definition that is substantially similar to an On-line Definition. In this case, that Bluffer receives 4 Gamepoints, and their submitted definition is removed from play. The Brainiac publicly announces that this has occurred, and play proceeds without the submission as if case 3c) or case 3d), as appropriate, occurred, except that the correct Bluffer does not participate.

3c) No Bluffer submitted a definition that is substantially similar to an On-line Definition, and every Bluffer submitted a unique definition. In this case, the Brainiac randomly sorts the submitted definitions and the Actual Definition into a numbered list (without the names of the associated Bluffers), and publicly posts the list for Bluffer voting. This posting ends this step.

3d) No Bluffer submitted a definition that is substantially similar to an On-line Definition, and two or more Bluffers submitted substantially similar definitions. In this case, The Brainiac randomly selects one of the definitions that are substantially similar and removes it from consideration. The other substantially similar definition or definitions are discarded, the Brainiac randomly sorts the remaining definitions and the Actual Definition into a numbered list (without the names of the associated Bluffers), and publicly posts the list for Bluffer voting. He also must publicly announce that there were duplicate submissions. This posting ends this step.

3e) Default: The Brainiac loses 4 Gamepoints, no other scoring occurs this round, and play proceeds to the next round. This default section is applied even if a list of definitions as described in sections 3c or 3d is posted, if the list does not include a legitimate Actual Definition, or modifies any of the submitted definitions in a manner not explicitly allowed above.

4) All Bluffers shall vote for one of the definitions on the list, and publicly post their vote. Voting for the Bluffer's own definition is permissible (and is called "sheeping"). It is good form to quote the definition being voted for in this post. This step ends when all bluffers have voted. Default: A Bluffer who did not vote is deemed to have sheeped.

5a) The Brainiac shall score the voting and post this information, the cumulative scoring for the game, and the actual definition. Scoring is as follows (in addition to any from section 3):

i) Each Bluffer receives 1 Gamepoint for every player other than himself who voted for his definition. If a Bluffer's definition was removed for being the same as another submitted definition, all Bluffers who submitted that definition receive Gamepoints for other players voting for that definition. However, they do not get Gamepoints for the other Bluffer or Bluffers sheeping this definition.

ii) A Bluffer receives 2 Gamepoints if he voted for the Actual Definition.

iii) If no one voted for the Actual Definition, the Brainiac receives 2 Gamepoints.

5b) The game shall end when all players have been Brainiac the same number of times, and one or more players has 25 or more Gamepoints. The single player with the most Gamepoints wins.

5c) If the game does not end at this step, play continues to the next round with a new Brainiac at step 1.

5d) Default: The Scorekeeper or Acting Scorekeeper becomes acting Brainiac to adjudicate step 5. If there is no such officer, the game ends with no winner.

5e) Players are permitted to ridicule any definition that is not the same part of speech as the Ing Word.

V. Errata

1) Vacationing players are replaced by bots who perform the default actions in their stead (but the players receive all scoring as a result of the bot's play).

2) Players may resign at any time, although this is considered bad form. Any player who resigns or leaves Acka is replaced by a bot until the end of the round in which they resigned (unless they resigned after the completion of step 5, and before the completion of step 1 in the next round). After that, their "spot" is removed from the game.

3) Players may not look up the Ing Word (or any of the definitions) in any dictionary, nor by any other means, except gameplay, attempt to find such a thing [e.g. by asking other people], until its definition is disclosed, or until adjudication of step 5 is required.

Rule 12-3-4/6
Tromino Go
/dev/joe (Joseph DeVincentis)

[Credits: Original game by Sid Sackson; published in the June 1994 issue of Games magazine. Adapted for e-mail play by /dev/joe.]

General Equipment: Gamepoints as needed

Players: exactly two players and one referee are required, no more, no less.

Definitions:

A tromino, or "piece", is an L-shaped group of three like letters, such as any of these examples: 

AA b   C
 A bb CC
A unit of edge is a length equal to the height or width of one letter on any edge of a tromino. Each tromino has four 1-unit edges and two 2-unit edges.

Adjacent (or "touching"), in this game, means bordering on one or more units of edge. Trominoes which touch only diagonally are not considered adjacent.

A group of trominoes is any single tromino not adjacent to another tromino belonging to the same player, or any set of two or more trominoes which belong to the same player such that a path can be made from any one to any other tromino in the set by moving only between adjacent trominoes, but no tromino in the set is adjacent to a tromino belonging to that player but not in the set.

A No Man's Land is any area of empty space completely surrounded by trominoes.

Outside edge is any edge or portion of an edge of a tromino which does not have another tromino or a No Man's Land adjacent to it.

A group of trominoes is surrounded if no tromino in the group has any outside edge.

Beginning the game:

As described in rule 12-1, section VI. Additionally, the referee shall randomly select one of the players to go first in the first round; this begins the first round.

Rules:

1. General play rules

The player who loses each round starts the next round, if there is one; if a round ends in a tie then the player who played second plays first in the next round. The player who plays first in a round always plays using capital letters, and the other player uses lower case. The plays in each round always cycle through the letters A, B, and C, and the players always alternate making plays, so the first six plays in a round will always be A, b, C, a, B, and c, and then the sequence repeats.

2. The first four plays in a round

The first player begins by placing an A tromino in an otherwise empty grid. (Note that there is no limit to the grid; plays may always expand in any direction, within the other restrictions of the rules.)

The second player then plays a b tromino so that it touches at least two units of edge (which may be part of the same edge or different edges) of the first tromino. Some possible configurations after the second play are: 

 AAb  AA  bbAA   AA
 Abb  Abb  bA   bA
        b       bb
The first player then plays a C tromino so that it touches the b tromino along at least two units of edge, but it does not touch the A tromino.

Then the second player plays an a tromino so that it touches at least two units of edge of the C tromino, but does not touch the b tromino.

3. Plays Five to Thirty

After the first four plays in a round, until 30 trominoes have been played, each player in turn plays a tromino of the next letter in the sequence in accordance with these three rules:

i. It may not touch any other tromino of the same letter, regardless who played it (so an A tromino may not touch any other A or a trominoes, for instance).

ii. It must touch at least one tromino played by the opponent along at least one unit of edge.

iii. It must touch at least two units of edge of any trominoes already played (including the one unit required by rule ii).

4. Moving Trominoes

If 30 trominoes have been played without ending the round, then instead of adding additional trominoes, each player moves one of his trominoes of the appropriate letter to a new location. Only trominoes with some outside edge may be moved; a tromino which will split the grid into two pieces if removed may not be moved. The tromino's new position must follow the rules in section 3 for playing new trominoes. When a round which has progressed to this phase ends, the player who wins scores double the Gamepoints he would normally score.

5. Handling a Stalemate

In any of the phases of play (rules 2 through 4 above), if a player cannot make any other legal play, he may pass, leaving the grid unchanged but advancing to the next letter in sequence and to the other player's turn. [This isn't commented on in the original rules, and I don't even know if it's possible, but just in case, I've put this here.]

6. Winning a Round

A round ends when one or more groups of trominoes are surrounded. At the end of a round, the player with the fewer surrounded trominoes wins the round, and scores Gamepoints equal to the number of his opponent's surrounded trominoes minus the number of his own surrounded trominoes. If the two players have the same number of surrounded trominoes then the round is a tie and nobody scores.

A player may cause his own trominoes to be surrounded by forming a No Man's Land. (A player may wish to do this intentionally to prevent his opponent from surrounding a larger group of trominoes, or because it simultaneously surrounds a group of his opponent's trominoes.)

7. Concessions

At any time either player may post a public message conceding the current round of Tromino Go, along with a number of Gamepoints they are conceding. This does not end the round, and is not a play; the round continues as usual until it ends normally, or a concession is accepted.

A player may accept any concession made by their opponent during the current round of Tromino Go by stating so in a public message; if e does so, the current round ends and e scores the indicated number of Gamepoints.

8. Winning the Game

When a player has scored 7 or more Gamepoints in a game of Tromino Go, e wins that game. A player may also win the game if his opponent fails to make a play within the 3 day time limit. These are the only ways to win the game.

9. How Plays are Made

Players should play by reposting the previous grid, with their new play added/moved as appropriate, in a public message. Players need not wait for the referee to comment on a play before making the next play; the referee should watch for illegal plays, but need not make any comment unless an illegal play is discovered, or a play has been questioned, or a round has ended.

Each player has 3 days from the time of the previous play (or from the beginning of the round, for the case of the first play) to make a play when it is his turn, or else e loses the game.

10. Handling Illegal Plays and the End of a Round

If a player believes an illegal play has been made, he may post so publicly, and the referee should post publicly either that all plays are legal, or indicate the first illegal play which has been made. - If all plays are legal, then play continues where it left off; no time between the public request to verify the plays and the referee's response counts toward the 3 days a player has to make a play.

- If the referee determines that an illegal play has been made, then that play and all plays since that are ignored, and play continues with the player who made the illegal play making a new play. No time between the initial post of the illegal play and the referee's post indicating the illegal play shall count against the 3 days the player has to make a play. If the referee finds that an illegal play has been made, he may post so publicly without any request to do so, and the same corrections as in the preceding section shall be applied.

If the referee posts that a round has ended, e should include with this message the winner of the round, the Gamepoints scored, and the total Gamepoints each player has. If this does not end the game, the next round begins at the time of this post.

Rule 12-3-5/7
Double Crash
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

I. General Equipment:

Official Dictionary

II. Players

minimum: 2; maximum 2

III. Starting an instance of Double Crash

As described in rule 12-1, section VI.

IV. Rules of the Games

Throughout these rules, an N-round Salvo is a public post taking the form of a numbered list of N five-letter words from the Official Dictionary. The numbering convention and format should be:

1) [five-letter word]
2) [another one]
... and so on, up to ...
N) [the last one]

A Reply to a Salvo is a reposting of the Salvo being replied to, with the addition of a number from 1-5 to the right of each five-letter word. This number is the number of "crashes" as defined below, of that word with the Replying player's Target Word. The format should be

1) [five-letter word] 2 [actual number will vary]
2) [another one] 3
... and so on, up to ...
N) [the last one] 1

Two words crash once for each letter that occupies the same position in each word. (i.e., if they have the same first letter, they crash once; if they have the same third letter, they crash again. HEART crashes once with SPADE (for the A). STAFF crashes three times with CHAFF. SWORD does not crash with WORDY. A five-letter word crashes five times with itself.)

The game consists of several rounds, each of which lasts three days or until all actions required of players in that round, whichever comes first. If ever a player fails to complete all required actions before the end of a round, his opponent wins. If both players so fail, and the game is being held as a Duel, the challenged player wins. If both players so fail, and the game is not being played as a Duel, neither player wins, and the game is over. Each round begins immediately upon the end of the previous one.

Round 1) Each player selects a five-letter word from the Official Dictionary. This is his Target Word, and should be kept secret. Also, each player posts a 6-round Salvo.
Round 2) Each player Replies to the other's 6-round Salvo.
Round 3) Each player posts a 5-round Salvo.
Round 4) Each player Replies to the other's 5-round Salvo.
Round 5) Each player posts a 4-round Salvo.
Round 6) Each player Replies to the other's 4-round Salvo.
Round 7) Each player posts a 3-round Salvo.
Round 8) Each player Replies to the other's 3-round Salvo.

Hereafter, each odd-numbered round consists of each player posting a 3-round Salvo; each even-numbered round consists of each player Replying to the Salvo the other posted the previous round.

If a player improperly reports the number of crashes any word in any Salvo has with his Target Word, or if a player selects as his Target Word a word other than a five-letter word from the Official Dictionary, his opponent wins as soon as the error is discovered.

The rounds continue until upon the end of a round of Replies, one or both Replies indicates that some word in the previous Salvo crashed five times with the Replying players Target Word. If only one-player posted a Salvo which included a five-crash word, that player is the tentative winner. If both players posted such a Salvo, the player who posted a five-crash word higher in the Salvo's list is the tentative winner, if such a player can be uniquely defined. (i.e., a five-crash word at the #1 slot in a Salvo beats one at #2.) If the two five-crash words occupy the same position in their respective Salvos, the player who posted their Salvo first is the tentative winner.

Once a tentative winner is found, the two players shall reveal their respective Target Words. The players then have three days during which they may examine each other's plays for errors. If during those three days, both players publicly post their agreement that no errors occurred, or if no actual errors are found, then the tentative winner wins the game.

Upon a player winning the game, it ends.

Rule 12-3-6/6
Triple Double Crash
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

I. General Equipment:

Official Dictionary; gamepoints as necessary; optionally, a Public Dorum [IRC server].

II. Participants

Exactly 2 players, 1 referee.

III. Starting an instance of Triple Double Crash

As described in rule 12-1, section VI.

IV. Rules of the Games

Throughout these rules, an N-word Salvo is a public post taking the form of a list of N five-letter words from the Official Dictionary.

A Reply to a Salvo is a reposting of the Salvo being replied to, with the addition of three numbers from 1-5 to the right of each five-letter word. These numbers are the number of "crashes" as defined below, of that word with each of the Replying player's Target Words. These numbers may be arranged in any order for a given Salvo word.

(For example:

salvo 2,1,0
queen 0,1,0
space 0,0,0
crash 0,0,1

may be a reply to the salvo

salvo
queen
space
crash

Two words crash once for each letter that occupies the same position in each word. (i.e., if they have the same first letter, they crash once; if they have the same third letter, they crash again. HEART crashes once with SPADE (for the A). STAFF crashes three times with CHAFF. SWORD does not crash with WORDY. A five-letter word crashes five times with itself.)

At the commencement of a game of Double Crash, each player shall choose three distinct five-letter words from the Official Dictionary and send these to the Referee. After the Referee has publicly acknowledged the receipt of both sets of words, each Round shall consist of the following actions:

1) Each players posts a Salvo. In the first round, this shall be a 6-word Salvo; in subsequent rounds, the base number of words for a Salvo is 5 for the second round, 4 for the third round, and 3 thereafter; however, for each error noted by the Referee in the other player's reply for the previous round, e may add another word to eir salvo.

2) Each player posts a Reply to the other player's Salvo.

3) The Referee verifies that these Replies are correct, or, if a Reply is not correct, posts the correct Reply and announces how many errors that Reply contained. (The number of errors in a Reply is how many numbers must be changed in the salvo for it to be correct. If the correct Reply for a word is "5,1,0", then "2,1,0" would contain 1 error, "2,2,2" 3 errors, "3,2,1" 2 errors, etc.)

It is permissible for rounds to overlap; for instance, if one player has already received a Reply to eir salvo for one round(verified by the Referee), but has not yet replied to the other player's salvo, e may post a salvo for the next round if e wishes, without, for instance, waiting for the Referee's verification of eir Reply. Each round begins once the Referee has verified both player's Replies for that round, and shall last no longer than three days.

If the time runs out for a round, then: Any player who has not posted a salvo has forfeited eir Salvo for that round. If any player has not posted a Reply to a Salvo, then the Referee shall post a Reply, and the number of errors in the Reply is considered to be the number of words in the Reply. (That is, if one player posts a 4-word Salvo and the other player does not reply, then e gets 4 extra words in eir next Salvo.) A player may not post a Salvo until after the Referee has verified their opponent's Reply for the previous round.

Each time a verified Reply to a player's Salvo indicates that some word has crashed 5 times with the opponent's target word, and this word has never been part of a previous salvo, then that player receives a Gamepoint. If, at the end of a round of Replies, one or both Replies indicate that a player has received eir third Gamepoint, then the game has been won. If only one player has three Gamepoints at the end of that round, then that player has won the game. If both players have three Gamepoints at the end of that round, and one player's third Gamepoint was awarded for a word higher up in eir Salvo than the other player's third Gamepoint word, then the former player wins. If both players' third Gamepoints were awarded for words in the same position in the Salvos, then eir second Gamepoint words are compared similarly, and then eir first Gamepoint words. If these fail to determine a winner, then the player who was first to post eir last Salvo wins.

The Referee shall then announce the winner and reveal the Target Words for both players.

Upon a player winning the game, it ends.

Rule 12-3-7/6
Single Capture Go
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

I. General Equipment: none

II. Participants:

minimum players: 3; maximum players: 12; one referee

III. Starting an instance of the game:

As described in rule 12-1, section VI.

Additionally, at the beginning of the game, the referee assigns each player a different capital Letter of the alphabet.

IV. Rules of play

The game is played on an N by N grid, where N is the smallest integer such that N^2 is equal to or greater than 12*(the number of players who begin the game.

The grid is labeled according the following convention:

a1 a2 a3 a4 a5 ...
b1 b2 b3 b4 b5 ...
c1 c2 c3 c4 c5 ...
d1 d2 d3 d4 d5 ...
e1 e2 e3 e4 e5 ...
...

Each square in the grid may be occupied by exactly one Letter or by the @ character.

A round begins when the referee announces the beginning of a round. For all rounds but the first, he should include in this announcement a depiction of the grid, showing all Letters upon it, as well as a summary of the any moves made or attempted in the last round and the players remaining in the game. A round lasts three days after this announcement or until all players have submitted a move, whichever is sooner.

During the course of a round, each player may privately mail the referee their play, which shall consist of naming exactly one square on the grid not occupied by a Letter at the beginning of the round. (i.e., e7, assuming e7 was unoccupied at the beginning of the present round.) If a player sends the referee two valid moves, only the latter one shall count.

At the end of a round, the referee shall determine its results as follows. 1) If exactly one player legally played a given grid square that round, the referee shall place the Letter assigned to that player on that grid square.

2) If more than one player legally played a given grid square that round, the referee shall place a @ character on that grid square. The players who played that square are still counted as having moved that round.

3) A Group is a set of identical Letters occupying squares on the grid, such that each member of the Group occupies a square orthogonally adjacent to one occupied by at least one other member of the Group. The exception to this definition is that a single Letter, not so adjacent to any identical Letters, is considered a Group of one member.

A Group has Liberty as long as at least one of its members is orthogonally adjacent to an unoccupied grid square.

At this point, if any Group does not have Liberty, the player corresponding to that Group's Letter is doomed. Any player who did not play in the most recent round is also doomed.

4) Any Letters on the grid corresponding to a doomed player are transformed into @ characters.

5) If exactly one non-doomed player remains in the game, that player wins. If no non-doomed players remain, the player who had the most corresponding Letters on the grid prior to the most recent transformation into @ characters wins. There are no other winning conditions. The winner receives a standard Trophy.

6) All doomed players are removed from the game. If more than one player remains, the referee announces the start of a new round, as described above. Otherwise, the game ends.

Rule 12-3-9/10
Viruses
/dev/joe (Joseph DeVincentis)

[Gist: Viruses is a multiplayer game based on John Conway's "game" of Life. The multiplayer aspect is grafted on by way of "viruses" -- each cell can either be clean or infected by any one player's virus; when a new cell is born near cells infected with just one virus, the new cell is also infected. Moves are simultaneous and secret.]

General Equipment: Gamepoints as needed

Players: minimum 2, maximum 20

Referees: 1, a volunteer who may not also be a player in the game. The referee receives A$10 at the conclusion of the game for his services.

Starting the game:

As described in rule 12-1, section VI.

Winning the game: To win, accumulate 10 Gamepoints, or be the only player left in the game. See rule 8, below.

The Rules of Viruses:

1. Getting Started

After agreeing on a set of players, the Referee chooses 20 different squares at random on a grid of 10 by 10 squares (exception: if there are more than 10 players, then the initial grid is made the smallest square region such that the number of squares is at least 10 times the number of players, and the number of randomly chosen squares is 2 times the number of players) and assigns each player an ASCII character besides '.' and '@' to be used to mark cells infected with his virus. The randomly chosen squares are initially filled by clean cells (not infected by a virus), marked by '@' except that for each of the starting players, one such cell, selected at random, is infected with eir virus. All other squares are empty, marked by '.'. The referee also chooses a numbering system for the rows and the columns, and should post this numbering system in some reasonable format whenever he posts the grid. After the adjustment described in rule 2, this grid becomes the turn 0 state, and the referee shall post this grid publicly to begin the first turn.

2. Active Area

Just after the initial random cells are placed on the grid, and after each generation, the active area of the grid is reset to be the smallest rectangle such that all the cells are contained in it and none of them lie in the outermost two rings of squares. (So, if there was a 2x2 block of cells and no other cells, the active area would be a 6x6 area with the 2x2 block at the center.) If there are no cells when the active area is to be determined, a 2x2 block of clean cells is created and the active area is a 6x6 block with those cells at the center. [Preserve a minimal interesting framework to play from if all the cells die out.]

3. Adjacency

Adjacent squares, for all the rules of this game, are any of the 8 squares which touch a square either along an edge or a corner. An adjacent cell is an adjacent square containing a cell.

4. Turns

Each turn lasts 3 days from the time the referee posted the state of the grid before that turn, unless at some earlier time all players have submitted the maximum number of valid moves they are allowed for that turn, in which case the turn ends immediately.

Each turn except the first turn, each player may make one move from the allowable types. The first turn, each player may make three "Place" or "Infect" moves. All moves are made by private messages to the referee. The referee shall not reveal any move to any player other than the one who made it until the end of that turn.

5. Allowable Moves

The following types of moves are allowed:

a. Place - a player may place one new cell infected with his virus in any empty square.
b. Infect - a player may infect any clean cell with his virus.
c. Step - a player may move a cell infected with his virus cells to any adjacent empty square.
d. Destroy - a player may destroy a cell infected with his virus.
e. Uninfect - a player may uninfect a cell infected with his virus (turning it into a clean cell).

In each case, the square(s) associated with a move must be given in order to fully specify the move; these should be specified by column and row according to the numbering system imposed by the referee. Any move which does not specify square(s) in the active area meeting the descriptions above or which is not of one of these types of moves is invalid. Two moves conflict if they attempt to step and/or place cells into the same square or try to infect the same clean cell.

6. Resolving Moves

At the end of a turn, the referee examines all the submitted moves. First, the referee removes from consideration all invalid moves. Then, if any player(s) submitted too many moves, only the first one(s) (up to the allowed limit) for each such player are kept. Then, the referee removes from consideration all moves which conflict with one or more other remaining moves. Finally, all the moves still under consideration are applied to the current grid. [This allows players to "change" their move only if they previously submitted one which is invalid.]

7. Generations

After applying a set of moves, a generation occurs. The grid is altered according to these rules (both rules are applied simultaneously to all appropriate squares in the grid):

a. All cells which have 0, 1, or 4 or more adjacent cells are destroyed.
b. A new cell is created in each empty square which has exactly 3 adjacent cells. If the adjacent cells are all clean, or there are adjacent cells infected by two or more different viruses, the new cell is clean. Otherwise, it is infected with the one virus which infects one or more of the adjacent cells.

8. Gamepoints; Winning the Game of Viruses

After each generation, the player whose virus then infects the most cells scores one Gamepoint, but if there is a tie for most cells, no Gamepoint is scored. When a player has 10 Gamepoints he wins the game. If only one player remains in the game, that player wins the game. If there is ever a time when no player is left in the game, then one of the players who was in the game the last time there were any players in the game is chosen at random to be the winner of the game.

9. End-of-turn Information

After applying a set of moves and a generation to the grid, as well as the size adjustment in rule 2, the referee shall post the current state of the grid publicly, as well as the list of all valid moves submitted by players for that turn (except those ignored because a player submitted too many moves), indicating which ones were conflicting, and also the adjustment in the size/position of the active area of the grid caused by rule 2, and the scoring for the round and the total scores.

10. Joining or Leaving a Game in Progress

During the first ten turns, new players may join the game by publicly announcing their intent, if they have not played in this instance of Viruses before; each new player gets two Place or Infect moves in his first turn instead of the usual one move. If a player retires from the game or leaves Ackanomic, while there still exist cells infected with that player's virus, a new player may join and take that player's virus as his own instead of the usual method of starting (but any new player doing so gets only one move of any allowed type in his first turn). Despite all the above, if a game of Viruses has the maximum number of players or is being played as a Duel then no additional players may join.

If a player retires from the game or leaves Ackanomic and nobody takes over his virus by the end of the turn after the one during which he retired, all cells infected by his virus are uninfected just before the moves are evaluated.

If the referee retires for any reason, the game is put on hold until a new referee is chosen. The new referee must not be a current player of the Viruses game, but may be a former player; any Ackanomic player who meets this guideline may volunteer by announcing so publicly. When a new referee is publicly knowable, the current turn restarts with a full 3-day limit; all moves for this turn sent to the former referee are ignored. The current referee may not be a player in the Viruses game, nor may any player who has been referee within the last two turns.

11. Genocide

When the grid is posted at the end of turn 11 or a later turn, any player whose virus infects no cells is eliminated from the game, unless this would eliminate all the players.

Rule 12-3-10/7
Mediocrity
Guy Fawkes (Robert Shimmin)

[Gist: Mediocrity is a psychological game won by guessing the "middle" number -- but not too often! This game was created by Douglas Hofstadter, and first published in his column "Metamagical Themas", in Scientific American]

General equipment: Gamepoints as needed.

Players: minimum 3, maximum: the number of players in the game of Ackanomic at the inception of a game of Mediocrity, less one

Referees: one

The Rules of Mediocrity:

Starting an instance of the game: Via the method described in rule 12-1, section VI a).

Mediocrity: For a given set of numbers, the most Mediocre one is determined as follows:

1) The numbers are listed in increasing order: the first member is the smallest number in the set, each succeeding member is equal to or greater than the previous one.

2) If the set has an odd number N of members, the (N+1)/2 member is near-Mediocre; if the set has an even number of members, the N/2 member is near-Mediocre.

3) If the value of the near-Mediocre member is unique in that set, it is the most Mediocre number in the set.

4) If the value of the near-Mediocre member is not unique in the set, all instances of the near-Mediocre number are removed from the set, and steps 1-3 are applied to the remaining members.

5) If no member of the set can be found to be the most Mediocre member, then the set has no most Mediocre member.

Play: Play consists of rounds. A round begins when the Referee announces the beginning of that round; it ends when the Referee announces the result of that round, or after six days. A round must last at least three days, or at least until all players other than the Referee have submitted a legitimate number to the Referee, whichever comes first.

During a round, each player other than the Referee sends the Referee a positive integer in the range of 1 to 2n, where n is the number of players other than the Referee at the inception of that game of Mediocrity. If any player(s) fail to do so, the Referee shall randomly determine which integer in this range each of these players chose.

To end a round by announcing its results, the Referee posts the following: the number selected by each player, the player (if any) who selected the most Mediocre number of those selected, and the current score of the game. (Each player's score is the number of Gamepoints e currently has for that instance of Mediocrity. All players begin the game with zero Gamepoints; a player gains one Gamepoint whenever e selects the most Mediocre number in a round.)

A player may also be removed from the player list by announcing eir resignation from either the game of Mediocrity or the game of Ackanomic, or by being removed involuntarily from the game of Ackanomic.

Winning the Game: If at the end of a round, the sum of the scores of all players is greater than or equal to twice the number of current players, and there exists a most Mediocre score from the set of player scores, the player with the most Mediocre score wins, and the game ends.

Rule 12-3-11/16
Ye Olde Rusty Lantern
Mohammed (Jason Orendorff)

"Ye Olde Rusty Lantern" (a storytelling game)

[Synopsis: the players (called Bards) are dealt a hand of cards. Each card bears a word or phrase describing a possible story element. The Bards take turns telling parts of a tale, playing cards by bringing the corresponding story elements into the yarn. When a Bard finishes the story by tying off all the loose ends and playing eir last card, e wins.]

Equipment:

some cards (to be provided by the Barkeep)
Ale (generated as needed)
a solid wooden table and benches
a brass pot

The Barkeep

The Barkeep is the person who started the game. When e goes on Vacation, the tale is suspended until e returns. If e should quit Ackanomic, the tale unceremoniously ends.

At the beginning of the tale, the Barkeep shall announce the number of benches and the names of the Bards who will start the tale. If the game is being played as a Duel, there may be only two benches.

(The Barkeep is considered the referee of the game.)

Bards

The Barkeep may not be a Bard. Anyone else may join (becoming a Bard) at any time, unless there are already as many players as benches. Any Bard may leave at any time. If it is a Bard's turn when e leaves, e is considered to have passed. The Bards are all imagined to sit around a table in the Barkeep's tavern, so whenever someone joins, the Barkeep shall choose a place around the table for em to sit.

There must be at least two Bards for a tale to proceed, and no more Bards than benches; any time this is not the case for a particular instance of Ye Olde Rusty Lantern, that tale is suspended until the requirements are both met. (In the meantime, Bards are free to join or leave, but no cards may be played.) If the game is being played as a Duel, however, then if at any time there is only one Bard, that player is the winner.

Cards

The Barkeep shall privately make (or obtain) a long list of story elements before starting the game. Each story element is represented by one card. During the game, each card is either in the deck, held by one of the Bards, on the table, or burned. They all start out in the deck. The Barkeep keeps track of the cards. Each time the Barkeep posts a public update of the game, he should post the number of cards held by each Bard (but not which cards are held by whom), list the cards lying on the table, and tell whose turn it is. Each Bard receives seven cards upon joining, unless the Barkeep specified an alternate number at the start of the game. When a Bard leaves, eir cards return to the deck.

When a Bard receives cards, the Barkeep chooses them randomly from the deck and sends them to that Bard via private mail. If there are not enough cards in the deck, the Barkeep shall either end the tale (lamely) or add story elements to his list of cards. A card is added to the deck for each new story element. The cards are then handed out as needed, and the tale goes on.

Gameplay

As soon as the Barkeep is ready to begin, e chooses a Bard to go first and names em publicly. It is that Bard's turn.

On eir turn, a Bard either tries to make a play, or passes. If e successfully makes a play, it is still eir turn. When a play is denied (which happens, alas, to the best Bards from time to time) or the Bard passes, play goes to the next Bard, clockwise around the table.

Passing

A Bard may pass explicitly. Also, when the Barkeep notices that a Bard is asleep (i.e. it has been eir turn continuously for three days or more, and e has not tried a play in all that time) and posts a message to that effect, that Bard is considered to have passed. When a Bard passes, e receives a card. If it is ever a Bard's turn while that Bard is vacationing with an expected return 3 or more days away, or while he is On Ice, the Barkeep may declare that player Asleep and consider him to have Passed without waiting 3 days.

If a Bard is asleep(i.e. passes by default)for three of eir turns in a row(or more), then the Barkeep may announce, at the same time as announcing that e is asleep, that that Bard has gone Under The Table. At this point the Bard is removed from the game, and eir bench is considered empty. The next time that Bard rejoins that game, e need not pay ante to do so.

When a Bard passes explicitly, e may announce that e is discarding one of the cards from eir hand, naming the card. That card is burned.

Plays

A Bard attempts a play by sending a public message with the word "Lantern" (or "YORL") in the subject header. The text of the message should be a reasonable amount of suitable prose to add to (or start) the tale (150 to 300 words, or the length of previous segments, are good guidelines). If the Bard has any cards, the last line of the message should specify one of them.

The Barkeep shall then reply, either verifying that the play was successful, or denying it. E may, in addition to verifying the play, announce that the card thus played is a new Loose End. This is done when, in the Barkeep's opinion, an interesting element is added to the game and isn't resolved right away: a villain is introduced; a map is found; a prophecy is made. When a card becomes a Loose End, it goes on the table, face up. When a card is successfully played, but doesn't become a Loose End, it is burned. [The tale isn't complete until all the Loose Ends have been tied off.] When a Bard attempts to play a card but is denied, the card is burned, and the Bard receives two cards to replace it.

The Barkeep may deny a play for any of the following reasons: it is incomprehensible; it is a non sequitur from the previous bit of the story; it is not in the spirit of the game [e.g. the Bard is blatantly and rudely playing to get rid of cards rather than for the fun of the story]; it is too long or too short; the Bard has cards, but none of them is specified; no card was specified, and no Loose Ends were tied off; the play was attempted more than three days after the beginning of the Bard's turn; or a card was specified, but the text didn't bring it into the tale.

That last reason begs some explanation. The text of a play is required to bring into the story the ideas specified on the card. [e.g. If a card bears the word "disguise", the Bard may play it only if he works a disguise into the story.] It's a matter of taste how central an idea must be in order to qualify. Generally, it is insufficient simply to discuss an item (it must be present), to mention the possibility of an event (it must take place), or to have a character talk about another character in dialogue (he must actually be introduced.) In any case, the Barkeep's reply is final.

The Barkeep may, in addition to verifying the play, announce that one or more of the Loose Ends on the table have been resolved. This means that the most recent play has tied off those parts of the story. A Bard receives one Ale for each Loose End tied off by eir play.

Interruptions

A Bard may try to interrupt any play attempted by another Bard, either before or after the Barkeep replies to it, by announcing the interruption, along with the play being interrupted and the name of a card the interrupting Bard holds. [The idea is that the story element on this card is, by coincidence, a part of the story that the current Bard is telling; the interrupting Bard now takes over the tale.]

An interruption never causes any of the tale to be discarded. Neither does it have any effect on the success or denial of any play currently being attempted. When a play and an interruption are both being attempted, the Barkeep must reply to the play first (regardless of which message e received first).

The Barkeep shall reply to each interruption, either verifying that it was successful, or denying it. If the interruption is successful, then it is immediately the interrupting Bard's turn, and the Bard who was interrupted receives a card.

The Barkeep shall deny an interruption if the card specified is not one the interrupting Bard has. In this case, one card is dealt to the interrupting Bard, as a penalty.

The Barkeep shall deny an interruption if the story element on the specified card was not sufficiently mentioned in the interrupted play. In this case, the card is burned, and the interrupting Bard receives two cards to replace it, as a penalty. Again, what qualifies as a sufficient mention is up to the Barkeep, but in this case e is encouraged to be lenient.

If an interruption is not denied for either of the above reasons, the Barkeep shall deny it if it comes too late-- that is, either the interrupted play was attempted more than three days ago, or it has already been successfully interrupted with a different card. In this case, the card is burned, and the Bard who attempted the interrupt is dealt one card to replace it.

Winning

A Bard wins when all of the following are true: e has no cards, e was the last to make a successful play, there are no Loose Ends, and there are no unprocessed Interrupts. If the story isn't quite "done" yet, the winning Bard may finish it however e pleases. Once that's done, the tale ends.

Rule 12-3-12/9
Word un-association
The Gingham Wearer (Tom Walmsley)

I. Equipment needed:

Gamepoints as necessary.

II. Number of players:

minimum: 2; maximum: the number of active players when an instance of Word Un-Association is initiated minus one. Referees: one.

III. Starting an instance of the Game:

As described in rule 12-1, section VI. Additionally, the player announcing the start of the Game shall randomly assign each player a different integer ranging from 1 to N, where N is the number of players in the game. All players shall be randomly assigned numbers in this way, including non-active ones.

IV. Rules of the game:

The game is composed of rounds; each round shall have one "Linker". All players who are not the Linker shall be known as "Confused". The game shall be scored in Gamepoints.

Player 1 shall be the Linker of the first round, and after that, Linker duty shall be assigned in order of increasing player number at the completion of each round. Player 1 again assumes the duty just after the completion of the round where the player with the highest number was Linker.

The referee picks a word from the official dictionary [it is encouraged to be fairly common, but not too simple (i.e. not "the" or "at", etc.)]. The Linker then publicly posts a word. This word, called the "uh? word", must have a common "link word" with the original word, but must not be itself linked to the original word [i.e. blue --> wine is allowed (via bottle), as is school --> eye (via pupil) but school --> teacher is not (even though pupil would be a valid link word it is not allowed since school and teacher are themselves connected]. If e fails to do so within three days of the start of the round (that is, when the referee announces the results of the previous round) then e loses three gamepoints and the round ends immediately.

All Confused must then try to find a word to link the original word and the announced word and post it to the referee. Any Confused that manages it gains one game point. If no other Confused has the same link word e gains one additional game point (unless the game has only two players). If no-one finds a link word then the Linker gains N-1 gamepoints, provided e can announce a word to link the two words e was thinking of. Any Confused who do not post any proposed link word within three days of the Linker publicly posting the uh? word is deemed to have failed to come up with a link word. If no Confused player submitted an acceptable link, and the Linker does not come up with a word to link the two words e was thinking of (acceptable to the referee) within 6 days of submitting the word, then the Linker shall lose 3 points.

This word announced by the Confused does not have to be the same as the one the Linker was thinking of to gain Gamepoints. If ever there is a disagreement about whether two words are linked then the referee's decision is final. Play then continues with the player who was assigned the next integer publicly announcing a word which shares a common link word with the uh? word announced by the first player. Play continues in this way until at least one player has 5N, or 30, gamepoints, whichever is lower, and all players have been the Linker the same number of times. At this point, if one player has more gamepoints than anyone else, then e wins. Otherwise, play continues, in the same way as before.

If a Vacationing player fails to post an uh? word then e does not lose the points as specified above.

Rule 12-3-13/9
Abstract Crescent
Slakko (Duncan Richer)

[a. A game for as many players as are interested. This converts the original concept of Mornington Crescent, as developed by Conway, into a purely mathematical notation so that people not familiar with the London Underground will not be at a disadvantage.

The aim of the game is to win rounds by picking the smallest number. But the score you get in each round depends upon what numbers other players picked - the ideal situation is when a player wins when someone else is just about to win (i.e. you pick 7 and they pick 8).]

a. Instances of the game are started as described in 12-1, section VI.

b. General Equipment: Gamepoints as needed.

c. Minimum Players, 2: Maximum Players, 100. One referee is also required. The referee is the player who started the instance of the game, and shall receive A$5 reward at the conclusion of the game, provided 5 or more players are involved at some stage during the game

d. Once the Game has commenced, the referee shall randomly assign each player a number between 0 and n-1, where n players are starting the game. E shall then announce the start of the first round. All players start with a score of 0 Gamepoints.

A round proceeds as follows:

1. Each player has 3 days to send the referee their play for the given round. A player's play is a positive integer congruent to their current player number modulo n (where n is the current number of players). For example, in an 8 player game, player 6 can make plays of 6,14,22,30,etc. The players number must be less than or equal to 10 times the total number of players in that instance of Abstract Crescent.

2. The playing section of the Round is complete after either three days have passed since the Round was announced, or sufficient players have emailed their plays to the Referee to determine the result of the Round, whichever comes first. After the playing section is complete, the Referee shall post the results of the Round, including scoring as described below.

3. When a player leaves an instance of Abstract Crescent, the Referee removes them from the list at the end of the round. The numbering is then modified so that all players who had a number higher than that of the leaving player have their number reduced by one. The referee may also add players after this has occurred, each new player receiving the smallest positive integer currently not in use by another player (including any other new players who were dealt with first).

Each player's number is then increased by one (modulo n), and the next Round is announced by the Referee, unless at least one player's score exceeds 5n Gamepoints, where n is the current number of players. If the latter is the case, then all players whose score exceeds 5n and who have no-one exceeding their score are declared Winners.

4. Scoring

The winner of a Round is the player who played the lowest number. They receive (2n+k-l) Gamepoints, where n is the current number of players, k is the number they played, and l is the smallest number played by any other player that Round. If only one player should submit a number in any given round, then that player shall win the Round and gain 2*n Gamepoints, where n is the current number of players.

5. Leaving and Re-joining

When a player leaves a game of Abstract Crescent, any positive Gamepoints they had earned in that game are lost. Should they rejoin that game at a later date, their score upon rejoining will be the lower of the score they had when they last left the game and 0.

If a player fails to submit a number in 3 consecutive rounds, then the Referee may declare them to have left at the end of the third such round. Such a declaration is equivalent to the player consenting to leave the game.

Rule 12-3-14/8
Bacon
Alfvaen (Aaron Humphrey)

[ Bacon is a game inspired by the book "Seven Steps To Kevin Bacon", or a game known as "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon", illustrating the ubiquity of the actor Kevin Bacon. Consider it an exercise in graph theory. ]

General Equipment: Movie Database, Gamepoints as needed

Number of Participants: 2; Referees: 1

Rules:

The game consists of a series of rounds. At the start of each round, each player must email the referee the name of an actor or actress (hereafter referred to as an actron), who has appeared in at least one movie as specified in the Movie Database. This naming period is over when both players have named an actron, or three days have passed since the referee announced the start of the round, whichever comes first; in the latter case, if one player named an actron and the other did not, then the first player wins the round, and if neither named an actron then the round is a draw.

The referee then posts the names of both actrons. The players have three days to either object to each others' selection, or to state that they are satisfied with it. If the three days pass with no objections, or both players state that they are satisfied, then the actrons are deemed to be accepted. If one or both players object, then the referee must rule on each actron thus objected to. If the referee rules that the actron is too obscure, then the player who objected gains one Gamepoint. If the referee rules that the actron is not too obscure, then the player who selected the actron gains one Gamepoint. If one or both actrons is ruled to be too obscure, the round ends.

After the actrons are accepted, each player must attempt to construct a "Bacon chain" between the two of them. A Bacon chain consists of a series of links; each link must consist of the name of a movie and the names of two actrons who were in the movie. For a chain to be valid, adjacent links must have at least one actron in common. [Thus, the link "Terminator: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton" followed by the link "Twins: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Danny De Vito" would be a valid chain; the first link above followed by the link "Wayne's World: Dana Carvey, Tia Carrere" would not.] (If there is ambiguity between two movies or actrons with identical names, it is up to the referee to determine which is meant in each case, and to make this information available to both players.)

Each player has three days from the time the actrons are accepted to send such a chain to the referee. After this period ends or Bacon chains are received from each player, the referee shall post both chains.

If one player thinks that the other player's chain is invalid, then e may challenge it up to three days after the chains are posted. The referee will check each link in the Movie Database, and determine whether the chain is valid. Otherwise, a chain will be assumed to valid if it is accepted publicly by the opposing player or if it goes unchallenged for the three days. (If a player did not submit a Bacon chain for that round, then eir chain is considered invalid.)

If a player challenges and the challenged chain is valid, the challenged player gains a point and the round continues.

If one player's chain is valid and the other's is invalid, then the first player wins the round. If both chains are valid and one player's chain is shorter than the other(contains fewer links), then e wins the round. If neither chain is valid, or both chains are valid and of equal length, then neither player wins the round.

The winner of a round receives 2 Gamepoints.

Winning: The winner of the game shall be the first player to obtain 7 Gamepoints. If one player leaves the game, then the remaining player will win the game immediately by forfeit.

Cheating: Players may not consult the Movie Database themselves during the course of a round.

Rule 12-3-15/5
Acka Role Playing
/dev/joe (Joseph DeVincentis)

[This defines a generic super-structure for running Fantasy (or other) Role-Playing games as Acka Sub-games. Most of the details are left to the GM, though certain systems may become standard, or at least standard for a specific GM.]

1) General Equipment

Optionally, a Public Dorum [IRC Server].

No standard equipment is required, but any other standard equipment appropriate for a specific game may be used. The Ackanomic Magic Dice may be used as a randomizing mechanism, but GMs may find it more convenient to roll their own dice.

2) Number of Players

At least 2 players are required. The maximum number of players is the number of players in Ackanomic.

3) Number of referees

At least one referee (also called the Game Master or GM) is required. Normally, there will be just the one referee, but additional players of Ackanomic may become referees with the GM's consent. If there are additional referees, at all times there shall be one head referee (who shall be referred to as the Game Master or GM); with mutual consent, this role may change during a game, but such change should be posted publicly. The maximum number of referees is the number of players in Ackanomic. Normally, referees should not also be players, but with the GM's consent, referees may play at any time they are not acting in the GM role.

4) Starting the game

The game begins when the GM posts publicly that it is beginning, and who the initial players are. No other public posts are typically necessary until a game ends, but see the 'Number of Referees' and 'Ending the Game' sections for exceptions.

5) Joining and Leaving a Game in Progress

Players may join games in progress at the GM's discretion. When a player leaves the game, the GM should make an effort to work his departure into the story line of the game (which may or may not involve killing the character). Players who have previously played and left may rejoin at the GM's discretion, and it is also at the GM's discretion whether the player returns in state he left the game, as a new character, or otherwise.

6) Rules

The rules of the game are left up to the discretion of the GM, and he is free to tell players as much or little of the rules as he wishes. The GM may draw from established gaming systems, combine systems, and/or make stuff up as he goes along, though having some reasonable amount of pre-established structure is recommended. The GM is encouraged to use a player's Ackan statistics at least in part in generating new characters, and to incorporate changes in a player's Ackan stats into his character's stats. The GM is, however, free to ignore the Ackan stats for any reason (including, but not limited to the Ackan stats not fitting the gaming system chosen). Any changes in a characters stats during a game do not cause changes in the player's Ackan stats. A GM may allow a player to begin with a character partially or completely in the state he concluded a previous game, but otherwise should attempt to give players a reasonably equal starting ground.

7) Other information needed to play

The GM is free to tell players as much or little about the particular game as he likes, but there is no hard-set framework the game must adhere to. The GM should, however, tell the players enough to make the game fun and interesting.

8) Conditions for winning the game

Normally, the game ends with no winner. In a duel, or if appropriate in non-duel play, the GM can post that a player has won when he posts that the game has ended.

9) Ending the game

It is recommended that the GM post a summary of extended FRP games periodically; after each gaming session if possible. The game ends when the GM posts that it has ended; he may name a winner at this time, but typically the game will end without a winner. If at any time the game has been in progress for 30 days or more, and the GM has not publicly posted an update on the status of the game in the last 30 days, the game is considered to have ended without a winner, and all the characters are assumed to have disappeared, never to be heard from again. Updates may simply consist of a URL of a game log from an IRC server, if this is available.

Rule 12-3-16/6
Frog, Frog, Frog, Mouse
/dev/joe (Joseph DeVincentis)

1) General Equipment

Optionally, a Public Dorum [IRC server].

Gamepoints as required.

2) Number of Players

At least 3 players are required. The maximum number of players is the number of players in Ackanomic.

3) Number of referees

This game uses no referees.

4) Starting the game

The game begins when one of the players posts a list of players who intend to play. Each player on this list is a Mad Scientist.

Each Mad Scientist chooses rules for two transformation machines, a target zoo (a collection of at least one and no more than 9 animals), and a zoo of 5 randomly chosen animals for each player, and publicly announces the target zoo and each player's zoo; e keeps the rules for the machines secret. However, if the zoo chosen for any player matched the target zoo, then before the information is posted, that zoo is replaced with a new zoo created in the same manner. This process is repeated until no player's zoo matches the target zoo exactly.

Three days after the start of the game each Mad Scientist who has not announced the starting information is Delinquent.

5) Joining and Leaving a Game in Progress

Players may not join games in progress except to fill in as replacements for players who have left the game. If a player leaves, his seat remains vacant until somebody fills it. Vacant seats automatically pass any time they have a move left to make, but if a vacant seat is filled before the round ends, its new occupant may override that pass with any legal play. If a round ends with a Mad Scientist's seat vacant and eir results for that round unposted, that Mad Scientist is delinquent. If the Mad Scientist leaves the game, e is considered delinquent.

A Player may not substitute for a Mad Scientist unless she has told them the transformation rules for thier machine.

6) Rules

I. Starting a Round

The game consists of a series of no more than 10 rounds. The first round starts when all Mad Scientists have announced their starting information. Latter rounds commence at the end of the previous round.

II. Starting a Turn

Each round, each player privately submits a move to each of the Mad Scientists. Players do not submit moves to themselves. Invalid moves are ignored, but the once a player has made a valid move in a turn she may not change it, except for overriding a default pass. When a round has been going for 7 days, all players who have not yet submitted a valid move to a particular Mad Scientist make a default pass.

If a Mad Scientist has logged three default passes from a particular player in the previous three rounds, that player automatically makes a default pass to that Mad Scientist three days into the round (unless they have already attempted a move in that round).

III. Ending a Round

When a Mad Scientist has received a move from each player (including moves made automatically), e shall post the moves each player made, the results of those moves, and the current zoos for each player. Then, if any player's zoo matched the target zoo or if it was the 10th round, the Mad Scientist ceases to be a Mad Scientist (only the zoos that the effected Mad Scientist tracks are compared).

If a Mad Scientist has not announced the moves made during the current round after it has been in progress for 10 days, she is delinquent.

When all Mad Scientists have announced the moves made during the round, the round ends.

IV. Delinquent Mad Scientist

If a Mad Scientist is Delinquent and a player points this fact out before the Mad Scientist rectifies the situation that caused them to be come delinquent, then the Mad Scientist loses 5 points and loses that title. (For instance, if a Mad Scientist posts the results for a round more than 10 days after it started e would not be delinquent unless some other player pointed it out.)

V. Scoring a Round

When a player ceases to be a Mad Scientist, the following scoring takes place based on the most resent information released by them: (the player's zoo and the target zoo are those that were tracked by the former Mad Scientist).

Each player's zoo is divided into two parts, a bag and an excess. For each species, if the player has more animals than there are of that species in the target zoo, then as many as are in the target zoo are placed in the bag and any leftover animals are placed in the excess; otherwise, all the player's animals of that species are placed in the bag.

Then, the player scores a number of gamepoints equal to (10*N/T) - (2*K), rounded down to an integer, where N is the total number of animals in the bag, T is the total number of animals in the target zoo, and K is the total umber of animals in the excess. [In other words, he scores a fraction out of 10 points for the animals he has that match the target zoo, and loses 2 points for each extra animal.] However, if this number is negative, the player instead scores zero gamepoints that round. In addition to this, each player whose zoo matched the target zoo exactly receives 5 gamepoints.

The former Mad Scientist does not score this way; instead, she receives a number of gamepoints equal to the difference between the smallest and largest scores the other players received for the round.

7) Other information needed to play

The animals used in the game are the following: cat, dog, frog, mouse. The first letters of these animals' names may be used as shorthand in describing moves, results of moves, and zoos.

I. Transformation Rules

The rule for each transformation machine consists of one or more transformations. Each transformation consists of a pattern to match and the replacement for that pattern. The patterns may only depend on the number, species, and arrangement of animals being fed into the machine for a single move. The replacement may be absolute, or depend partly or completely on the animals matched by the pattern. It is permissible for a transformation to change the number of animals, and it is recommended for some of them to do so, so that a target zoo with a number of animals other than 5 can be reached. All transformations must be deterministic, i.e., if the machine turns dfmc into dfdd once, it should always do so for the rest of the round whenever dfmc is fed into the machine.

II. Example Transformations

["The last animal is transformed into a dog" converts dfmc -> dfmd "The last two animals are transformed into duplicates of the first animal" converts dfmc -> dfdd "Whenever a cat is immediately followed by a mouse, those two animals are replaced by a frog" converts dfcmmcm -> dffmf "Every dog is replaced by a cat followed by two frogs and then a mouse" converts cdmdfc -> ccffmmcffmfc]

III. Applying Transformation Rules

When a transformation rule is applied, each transformation in the rule is applied, in order, to the current list of animals in the machine. The animals in the machine are changed before the next transformation is applied, so the rule consisting of the three transformations "All dogs become cats. All cats become frogs. All frogs become mice." would turn all animals entering the machine into mice.

IV. Moves

Each turn, each player submits one of the following moves to each Mad Scientist (but not themselves). After the fifth round players may submit a second Transformation, using the animals remaining after the first transformation (but before it is applied). A player's zoo, is the zoo tracked for them by the Mad Scientist to whom the move was submitted.

A. Pass. No change occurs in the player's zoo.

B. Restart. The player's entire zoo is replaced by a new collection of 5 randomly-chosen animals, again with the provision that if the chosen zoo matches the target zoo exactly, it is replaced with another newly chosen zoo, repeatedly, until it does not match the target zoo.

C. Transformation. Along with this move, the player submits an ordered list of animals to be fed into one of the transformation machines, and specifies which machine (A or B) they are fed into. The list of animals must only contain animals from that player's zoo, and no more animals of any one species than are in his zoo. Those animals are removed from his zoo, fed into the machine indicated in the order specified, that machine's transformation rule is applied to those animals, and the resulting animals are returned to his zoo. This is the usual move, and may be specified by just stating the machine and list of animals.

D. Theoretical. Identical to a Transformation except that up to two lists of animals may be specified, the lists are not constrained by the player's zoo, the animals appear out of no where (they are not taken from the players zoo), and the resultant animals immediately disappear (they are not added to the players zoo).

8) Conditions for winning the game

When the game ends, whoever has the highest score wins. If there is a tie for highest score, all tied players win.

9) Ending the game

When there are no Mad Scientists and the final scores have been posted, the game ends.

Rule 12-3-16-1/0
It could take as long as hearts!
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

Until the end of the current round, the current game of Frog, Frog, Frog, Mouse shall follow the old rules. When the round ends:
i) the game shall be amended to follow the new rules.
ii) all of it players except JT and K 2 shall be Mad Scientists.
iii) this rule shall repeal itself.

Rule 12-7/23
Grab-a-Donkey
Habeous Corpus (Ed Graham)

Create a game known as Grab-a-Donkey. The game consists of a moderator, known as the Wrangler and players, who initially comprise all current active Players of Ackanomic, not including the Player designated as the Wrangler, in Gaol, or otherwise prohibited from performing Ackanomic actions. Each player in Grab-a-Donkey starts off with one (1) donkey. A non-voting player may be the Wrangler.

The following special equipment is required to play Grab-a-Donkey. The equipment will be issued from the Game Box at the start of play, and all equipment will automatically be returned to the Game Box at the end of the game.

One (1) donkey per player
One lariat per player (used to Grab other donkeys)
One (1) blanket (used to Cover the player's own donkey)

The Wrangler may call for a Grab-a-Donkey game at any time, as long as no Grab-a-Donkey game is currently being played. If no Wrangler exists, the first player to claim to be Wrangler may call for a game of Grab-a-Donkey in accordance with the previous sentence. A game of Grab-a-Donkey may only be called once per calendar month, however.

Any player may claim the title of Wrangler and Belt-Holder as a public action. This fails if there is currently a game of Grab-a-Donkey in progress or if the most recent game of Grab-a-Donkey ended fewer than 60 days ago. The titles are immediately transferred to any successful claimant. It is considered good form for a successful claimant to start a game of Grab-a-Donkey within a short time.

The rules of Grab-a-Donkey are as follows:

A. When a new game of Grab-a-Donkey starts, all Players of Ackanomic, excluding the Wrangler, those exempted as noted above, or who have publicly declined to participate during the past three days, will be placed on the Grab-a-Donkey Active List ("GAL" hereafter). Initially each player has a herd size of one.

B. Each Round, a player on the GAL will either

(a) Cover their donkey,
(b) Grab another player's donkey on the GAL,
(c) Distract another player on the GAL,
(d) Stand Around Admiring their Donkey,
(e) Resign (this action is only permissible in the first round).

Unless a player specifies a different choice to the Wrangler in a private message by the end of the Round, the player will Stand Around Admiring their Donkey. Rounds will last no less than one full day and no more than 3 full days from the start of the round. Players may change their action at any time before the end of the Round.

Upon a player resigning, or leaving the game of Ackanomic, their stated actions that round are disregarded, and they are removed from the GAL at the start of the next round. They are considered to have Covered their Donkey for determining the outcome of the current round.

C. If exactly one player ("A") chose to Grab another player's donkey ("B"), and B did not Cover their donkey or B Covered their donkey and was Distracted by at least one other player:

i. A successfully grabs one of B's donkeys and A's herd is increased by one at the end of the round.

ii. If B had a herd of two or more donkeys at the start of the round, during the noise and confusion of the grab one of B's donkeys will become terrified and flee into the Wilds of Ackanomic (where it will graze peacefully, returning to the Game Box at the conclusion of Grab-a-Donkey). B's herd is reduced by two at the end of the round.

iii. If B only had a herd of one donkey then the size of her herd is reduced by 1 [i.e. she is removed from the game].

If more than one player attempted to grab B's donkey, none of those attempts are successful.

If a player's herd is reduced to less than 1 donkey at the end of a round, e is removed from the GAL.

D. If only one player on the GAL did not choose to Cover their donkey, then all other players will be removed from the GAL at the start of the following Round.

E. i) At the end of the Round, if a player has exactly two donkeys they will look furtive and instantly produce a third donkey for the player. [Donkeys value their privacy and don't do this in herds.]
ii) The Wrangler will then publicly report what each player and their donkeys did and announce the results

F. If and when there are exactly zero players left on the GAL, that game of Grab-a-Donkey shall end. The current Wrangler shall lose their title at that time.

G. If and when there are exactly two players left on the GAL, the permissible moves become (a) rock, (b) scissors, (c) paper. Any player not making such a move in this case is removed from the GAL at the end of the round. If at the end of a round, any of the following are true:

Player A chose rock while Player B chose scissors
Player A chose scissors while Player B chose paper
Player A chose paper while Player B chose rock

Player A is said to have successfully grabbed Player B's donkey, and
Player B loses his donkey and is removed from the GAL.

H. If and when there is exactly one player left on the GAL, that game of Grab-a-Donkey shall end. That player shall be considered to be the Belt Holder of that game of Grab-a-Donkey (and shall also have the title of Wrangler). The Belt Holder shall be awarded 3 Points plus the number of donkeys he successfully grabbed that game.

He shall also have the right to Propose exactly one (1) amendment to this rule that changes the way the game of Grab-a-Donkey is played. No player other than the Belt Holder should submit such proposals, and other players are permitted to sneer at such attempts (and vote them down). An exception to this is maintenance proposals, or proposals to fix bugs or paradoxes, are permitted by anyone.

I. During the course of a game of Grab-a-Donkey, the Wrangler may voluntarily give the transfer the title of Wrangler to any willing player not on the GAL. The transfer must occur between two rounds, immediately after the old wrangler releases the results for a round. If the Wrangler goes on Vacation or quits the game of Ackanomic, the first player not on the GAL to name himself Wrangler shall become the Wrangler, and the game of Grab-a-Donkey shall continue from its last publicly knowable state. If no player not on the GAL does so within three days, and the old Wrangler has not yet returned from Vacation or rejoined the game, then the current game of Grab-a-Donkey will end, and there shall be no Wrangler.

Rule 12-9/26
Buried Treasure!
Malenkai (Randy Hall)

I.

Burying Treasure is a public action performable by Trading Entities. In order to fully specify this action, the entity attempting it (the Burier) must state which one or more of his tradeable entities collectively constitute the Treasure. Hereafter, the term "Treasure" means the collection of these specified constituent entities.

Immediately after this announcement, the Burier ceases to own the Treasure; it is considered "buried" or "hidden", and is owned by the Treasure. Buried Treasure is not considered part of the Treasury.

A Burier must write a Treasure Map that describes, at a minimum, the conditions which must be met for a player to "find" the Treasure. If the Burier is not a player, than the announcement which buried the Treasure must specify a player who will write the map and who must inform any other players affiliated with the Burier of the full content of the map. These conditions may be as simple or as difficult to achieve as desired by the map writer. In fact, they may be impossible to achieve under the current ruleset. For the purposes of this rule, "conditions" means 1 or more conditions.

The map writer is free to disclose all, part, or none of the map publicly or privately at any time, or drop hints, clues, obscure riddles, etc in any manner they choose, even if such is not obvious, is subtle, or is encrypted [for example, the text of a proposal could be part of a Treasure Map, or a riddle, in disguise]. The map writer should consider the fun and spirit of the game when making such decisions [they could always just give the entities away].

Upon a Trading Entity (who is not a map custodian with respect to the map in question) achieving the conditions for finding buried Treasure as specified by a Treasure Map, it is a duty of the map writer or a map custodian (if any exist) to make this fact, and the map, public (once they become aware of the condition being achieved, and final act that lead to the condition being achieved is publicly knowable). This action destroys the map, and the Entity who achieved the conditions receives the Treasure, and thus becomes the owner of its constituent entities (which are no longer considered "Treasure"), except for those which the finder may not legally own, which are transferred to the Treasury. In the case of multiple Entities achieving the conditions before the map is destroyed, the first to achieve it finds the Treasure. If the condition is achieved simultaneously by 2 or more Trading Entities, the finder is determined at random by the Officer in charge of Random Things. All such Trading Entities shall be eligible for the random selection, even non-active ones.

The map writer is free to achieve the conditions. This is considered bad form, and Mr. Flibble gets very cross. Furthermore, when this happens, a Yellow Goose Card is created in the possession of the map writer.

II.

The rules may specify conditions under which a player becomes a map custodian for a particular Treasure Map. Once a player becomes a map custodian for a particular map, they are not permitted to disclose anything about the map, or find the Treasure associated with that map, even if they achieve the conditions, as long as that map is in existence. A player will never "un become" a map custodian for a particular map once they have been one. Any player responsible for announcing that another player has achieved the conditions will not do so in the case of a map custodian (with respect to that map) achieving them.

Whenever a map writer goes on Vacation, or leaves the game, they should give the map to the Treasure-Harfer (or acting Treasure-Harfer), who becomes the map custodian (although for short vacations, they may not wish to do this). Upon the Treasure-Harfer going on Vacation, they should give the map to the acting Treasure-Harfer, etc. It is possible, and acceptable, for a map to be permanently or temporarily lost because of players leaving the game. Such is the nature of buried treasure. Players should avoid giving the map to a map custodian, unless it is in the best interest of the fun of the treasure hunt (i.e., they are going on a long vacation or leaving).

The map writer is not a map custodian, unless he happens to become one as specified in the above paragraph.

The author of any Treasure Map may, as a public action, declare one or more other players as Potential Map Custodians for that Treasure Map. If the player or players so named accept the Custodianship within three days, the author shall reveal the Treasure Map to the player or players privately, and then those Potential Map Custodians will become Map Custodians for that Treasure Map.

III.

If a Treasure ever contains 0 or less buried entities, the Map for that Treasure is destroyed.

The word "map" as used in this rule, refers only to Treasure Maps.

IV.

If a player believes that a particular treasure map, for a treasure which was discovered within the previous three days, is not in keeping with the spirit of treasure hunting e may call for a Hostile Takeover.

A Hostile Takeover is a Hearing for which the valid responses are: "Right up there with the Jukkasjarvi Treasure" and "the accumulation of money is a great evil and a burden to the soul" [Terry Pratchett, Witches Abroad]. The player who called it is the Hearing Harfer for it and is called the Gold Digger while it is in session. For the purposes of this section those entities which were buried in the treasure and any entities created from them since the discovery of the treasure are referred to as The Motherload.

In the event that the verdict of the Hostile Takeover is "Right up there with the Jukkasjarvi Treasure", the Gold Digger shall transfer The Standard Harfer Fee to the map writer.

In the event that the verdict is "the accumulation of money is a great evil and a burden to the soul", then all entities in The Motherland become unowned. Additionally the map writer shall pay The Standard Harfer Fee to the Gold Digger.

Rule 12-10/18
Duels
Niccolo Flychuck (Uri Bruck)

1. Any player who feels offended by another player, or is engaged in a heated discussion with another player, may challenge that player to a duel, subject to the limitations described below.

2. The procedure for challenging and conducting a duel is as follows:

The Challenging player finds another player who agrees to be their Second. The Challenger gives their Second the name of the player he wishes to Challenge, and the reason for the Challenge.

The Second posts a public message, which announces the name of the Challenging player, the name of the Challenged player, the reason for the Challenge, and the fact that a Challenge has been made.

The Challenged player has 3 days to find another player who agrees to be their Second and have the Second respond to the message publicly. The message must contain the following information The Challenge it is a reply to, and whether e wants to pick Rows or Columns in the Games Grid. If there is no response to the Challenge within the 3 days, or the Challenged player declines the challenge, or the response does not conform to the rules preceding, then the Challenged player forfeits the Duel.

After the Challenged Player's Second has posted the acceptance of the Duel, the Duelists have three days to send their Games Grid Row or Column choices to the Herald, or to the Second of the Challenged if the Herald is a Duelist. If either fails to do so within the required time, e forfeits the duel. If both fail to do so within the required time, the duel ends without a winner. Once both have sent eir choices in, the game in the intersection of the Row choice and the Column choice becomes the Game chosen for the Duel. If there are multiple Games in the division of the Games Grid chosen, the Herald shall randomly determine which one shall be played in the duel.

After the game is determined, the Duel starts when the Herald announces it. If the Game or Contest chosen for the Duel requires a Referee and no player volunteers to referee the Game within one week of the Duel's beginning, then the Herald shall referee the Duel, unless the Herald is either the Challenged or Challenging Player, in which case the Challenged Player's Second shall referee the Duel.

The Games Grid is a 3x3 grid with the three columns Simultaneous, Turn-Based, and Harfy (1, 2, and 3) and the three rows Strategy, Art, and Word Games. (A, B, and C) The games are placed in it as follows 

              Simultaneous        Turn Based     Harfy
              1                   2              3
A. Strategy   Viruses             Tromino Go     Abstract Crescent
B. Art        Bacon               YORL           Acka Role Playing
C. Word Games Double Crash        Ghost          Limericks
              Triple Double Crash
When the Duel is over, the winner of the Duel receives 6 points in addition to any rewards or penalties he may have received as part of the Contest itself. The loser of the Duel loses 6 points in addition to any rewards or penalties he may have received as part of the Contest itself. The winner's Second receives 3 points, the loser's Second loses 3 points.

The results of the Duel have no other direct influence over Ackanomic. However if either the Challenger or the Challenged have committed themselves in a public message to a certain action depending on the results of the Duel, then they must perform that action if the rules permit performance of the action. Should they fail to perform that action, they are breaking the rules.

3. When a duel is forfeited, the player who forfeited loses 6 points, and his opponent in the duel gains 6 points. The seconds scores are not changed in this case.

4. Conditions under which a duel may not be called, or unusual forfeit and cancellation conditions:

a. It is impermissible to Challenge an Untouchable Player to a Duel.

b. A Player who Challenged another Player to a Duel or a Player who has been Challenged by another Player to a Duel is Untouchable until the Duel procedures are resolved. This takes precedence over the later sections of this rule.

c. A Player who was a Challengee in a Duel, that is, was Challenged to a Duel and accepted, continues to be Untouchable until the end of the Calendar month in which the duel ended.

d. Players unable to play subgames are Untouchable.

e. If a player who is currently engaged in Duel procedures becomes unable to play subgames, then eir Second shall take eir place in the subgame, unless eir Second is already playing or refereeing the game, in which case the player forfeits the Duel.

f. A Player running for Office may not Challenge another Player running for the same Office to a duel.

g. A player who has declined a Duel, or failed to respond to a Challenge, is Untouchable until 3 days after the date he has declined, or until 3 days after he is considered to have forfeited the duel.

h. If both the Challenger and the Challenged become unable to play subgames simultaneously, then the Duel is cancelled.

i. No player may make more than 3 challenges per calendar month. No more than 6 duels may be called per calendar month.

j. If either the Challenger or the Challenged player leaves the game before the original Challenge is answered, the Duel is cancelled.

k. If both the Challenger and the Challenged players publicly agree that the Game or Contest being used for a Duel has been fatally compromised [for instance by a third party revealing the Fictionary definition or an error in the Game's rules], a new Game or Contest may be selected, and the Duel is restarted.

Rule 12-11/2
Game Misconduct
Vynd (John McCoy)

If a player of Ackanomic deliberately interferes with the play of a sub-game, even if he is not a participant in that sub-game, he has committed the Crime of Game Misconduct. Interference, in this case, would be doing something that makes it impossible to play a sub-game as its rules and game spirit intend. [Examples include: Revealing the definition of the Ing word of a game of Fictionary. Providing lists of possible Ghost or Double Crash words.] Cheerleading, jeering, and even providing advice to a sub-game player, are permissible so long as they do not violate the above clauses.

Rule 13-1/9
The Evil Overlords of Ackanomic (retired)
Vulcan

Vulcan once ruled Ackanomic.

Those players who were members of Vulcan on August 28, 1997 [/dev/joe, George the Annoying Argumentative Intellectual, Ackanomic's Lord Military Governor, and Vynd] are Evil Overlords of Ackanomic (retired). No other players and no non-players are Evil Overlords of Ackanomic (retired).

Gold Pocketwatches are unnamed, non-tradable, non-mimsy entities. As the name suggests, they are ornate, pocket-sized timepieces made of pure gold. Despite utilizing analog mechanical displays, Gold Pocketwatches are, in fact, miniature atomic clocks, and they would be exceedingly valuable if they were actually tradable. Gold Pocketwatches may only be created, destroyed, or transferred as specified by this rule. Gold Pocketwatches have no attributes, powers, or effects other than those described by this rule.

Vulcan may disband itself as an institutional action, but will not be disbanded if it has zero (or fewer) members. If ever none of the Evil Overlords of Ackanomic (retired) is a member of Vulcan, then any of the Evil Overlords of Ackanomic (retired) may join Vulcan as a public action with no Vulcan approval required; this right may not be restricted in any way. If Vulcan ever disbands itself then this paragraph and the next two paragraphs of this rule are thereupon deleted from this rule. If Vulcan's name is ever legally changed, all unquoted instances of the word "Vulcan" in this rule not followed by the word "Headquarters" shall still refer to the institution that was named "Vulcan" on August 28, 1997, and no other entity but that one may be named "Vulcan". This takes precedence over all other rules that allow anything to get a name in any manner.

Vulcan owns twelve adjacent kaas of land near the edge of Ackanomic. Upon those twelve kaas of land is Vulcan Headquarters, which is an Extravagant building. Vulcan Headquarters is even bigger on the inside than on the outside -- indeed, some say that the interior is infinitely large. Vulcan Headquarters also has a disturbing tendency of changing its appearance and floor plan from time to time, therefore Vulcan may change the description of Vulcan Headquarters at any time. Vulcan may not trade, sell, or otherwise cease to be in possession of Vulcan Headquarters or the land on which it resides. Vulcan, members of Vulcan, and the Evil Overlords of Ackanomic (retired) shall be immune from any requirements associated with owning the land or building granted Vulcan by this rule, except those requirements specified by this rule. Vulcan Headquarters is a Common Location.

Members of Vulcan and Evil Overlords of Ackanomic (retired) are always permitted to enter Vulcan Headquarters; other players may ring the door chime, but are only permitted to enter if a Vulcan member grants permission. Any player who is not a member of Vulcan may be forcefully ejected from Vulcan Headquarters (via catapult) by Vulcan. Any member of Vulcan who is not an Evil Overlord of Ackanomic (retired) may be similarly ejected from Vulcan Headquarters by any Evil Overlord of Ackanomic (retired) who is a member of Vulcan. Any Evil Overlord of Ackanomic (retired) may eject himself from Vulcan Headquarters. Vulcan artillerists are unerringly accurate, and any player ejected from Vulcan Headquarters, as allowed by this rule, goes to his own home, if he has one, or to the Wilds of Ackanomia if he doesn't. Vulcan artillerists do, however, require ammunition, so, notwithstanding the permissions granted above, only players who are in Vulcan Headquarters may be ejected from Vulcan Headquarters as described above. Vulcan Headquarters has six 3500-meter tall ostentatious towers attached to it which are not associated with any player.

Rule 13-2/3
Former Emperor of Ackanomic
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

K 2 once ruled Ackanomic. The player who is legally able to assume the name "K 2" is a Former Emperor of Ackanomic.

Rule 13-3/2
Clayton's Diktat
The Diktat

Clayton's Diktat almost ruled Ackanomic.

Each player legally able to assume one of the four Ackanomic names Ackanomic's Lord Military Governor, JT, Alfvaen, and else...if are Almost a Benevolent Diktater(retired). No other players and no nonplayer are Almost a Benevolent Diktater (retired). The players who are Almost a Benevolent Diktaters (retired) are collectively known as Clayton's Diktat.

The Diktaters' Gazebo is [almost] a named, non-tradeable entity collectively owned by the players composing Clayton's Diktat. It is [almost] a common location in The Wilds of Ackanomic. Players who are Almost a Benevolent Diktaters (retired) are [almost] always permitted to go to the Diktaters' Gazebo, notwithstanding any contrary provision of the rules.

Rule 16/1
Institutions
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

Institutions are named, unownable, Trading, Intelligent entities.

Any player who is not a pseudo-Founder may publicly announce their intent to form an Institution. By so doing they become a pseudo-Founder. If during the following seven day period at least two other players publicly announce that they wish to join the Institution the pseudo-Founder intends to form, then the pseudo-Founder may form the Institution by:
i) announcing its name,
ii) the names of its initial members (who must be the pseudo-Founder and at least two of the players who have publicly announced their desire to join),
iii) any Institutional Powers it will initially own, and any ancillary information required to create those Powers.
iv) paying the standard harfer fee and any fees associated with the creation of its initial Institutional Powers.

Upon doing so they cease to be a pseudo-Founder and the Institution is created along with its initial Powers, if any. If a player has been a pseudo-Founder for a contiguous seven day period then they cease to be one.

An Institution is only permitted to perform those actions, or have those behaviours or properties, which are permitted for all Institutions, or which are accorded to it by the Institutional Powers it owns.

Institutions may only own tradeable entities which they are explicitly permitted to by the rules. All Institutions may own A$ and are permitted to perform any operations which are defined on any entities it owns. If an Institution ever owns entities it is not permitted to own, those entities become unowned.

When an Institution disbands or is disbanded:
a) each of its Institutional Powers are destroyed in the order in which they are defined in the rules; then,
b) anything owned by the Institution becomes unowned; then,
c) the Institution is destroyed.

Rule 16-1/1
Spheres
else...if (Henry Towsner)

A Spherical Rator is an institutional power. There is no additional cost for buying a Spherical Rator, however a Rator may not be created except as part of a newly created Institution. Spherical Rators are not tradeable. Spherical Rators are either glowing or dim. An Institution which owns a Glowing Spherical Rator is known as a Sphere of Influence. The members of an Institution which owns a Spherical Rator may, by unanimous public support, admit a player who has publicly asked to join the Institution. A player may leave an Institution which owns a Spherical Rator as a public action. A Spherical Rator is Glowing if the Institution which owns it has three or more players, otherwise it is Dim. A subcommittee is a Sphere of Influence which has been selected by a player as the subcommittee for one of eir proposals. It is the Crime of Branch Stacking to be a member of more than one Sphere of Influence. If an Institution owns both a Spherical Rator and any other Institutional Power than the Spherical Rator is instantly destroyed. Each Institution which owns a Spherical Rator has a Characteristic named Generosity, which is initially at a value of 0 and has a range which includes all the integers.

Rule 16-2/13
The Press
Bascule (Matt Black)

A Printing Press is an Institutional Power. Any Institution may at any time buy a Printing Press for four times the Standard Harfing Fee. An Institution which owns a Printing Press is known as a Newspaper.

A member of a Newspaper is allowed to post messages to an official mailing list with an indication that the message is an article of that Newspaper. Such an article is then said to have been published by that Newspaper.

At the end of each month in which a Newspaper published at least one article of at least 300 words, it will receive A$10 for the efforts of its writers.

When a Newspaper ceases to own a Printing Press, it is said to have 'gone bust' and ceases to be a Newspaper.

A posting that is not sent to one of the official mailing lists is never considered to be a newspaper publication. In addition, no player may publish an article in a Newspaper of which e is not a member.

News articles may be published without reference to a specific Newspaper; such articles are said to be the work of the Underground Press or the Samizdat.

Journalistic pseudonyms are permitted.

It is the Crime of Lying In Print for the author of an article to refuse to publish a correction of a clearly false statement which appeared in that article, after a public request for such a correction has been made. Simply neglecting to publish such a correction for a period of three days or more after the request shall be taken as refusal to do so.

Rule 17/2
Ambassador
else...if (Henry Towsner)

The office of Ambassador is a political office. The Ambassador is the delegate<0> of Ackanomic to the InterNomic Treaty Organization<0> as defined in rule 17-1. The Ambassador must always be subscribed to the official INTO-mailing-list<0>. Any player may call an Agreement hearing on an InterNomic-Treaty<0> which Ackanomic has not signed or a Disagreement hearing on an InterNomic-Treaty<0> which Ackanomic has signed<0> and which allows Ackanomic to unsign<0> it. The Ambassador is the Hearing Harfer on both types of hearings. The valid responses to an Agreement hearing are "No! We want to mess up things for ourselves, without help from those black-helicopter flying INTO goons!" and "Surrender control to those black-helicopter flying INTO goons!". If the result is the latter than the Ambassador should sign<0> the treaty<0> the hearing was called on for Ackanomic. The valid responses to a Disagreement hearing are "What's your problem? Our rulers are doing a great job of pretending they still have power" and "Never mind prosperity for all, let's return to the dark ages". If the result is the latter the Ambassador should unsign<0> the treaty<0>. The Ambassador may never sign<0> a treaty<0> which has terms which include hyphens, greater than, or less than signs, unless all such signs have a space on at least one side. Should the INTO Archivist<0> be a player of Ackanomic then that player receives the SHF as a monthly salary for bringing glory to Ackanomic. If a word or string of hyphenated words is followed by a less than sign, a nonnegative integer, and then a greater than sign: [] then the word is considered to be equivalent to the way that word or that word with the hyphens replaced by spaces is used in INT#n<0>. No other terms or words used in the rules are considered to be the same as any terms defined in an InterNomic-Treaty<0>. If n is 0 then it means the term is considered equivalent to a term defined in the INTO-rules<0>.

In elections for Ambassador, for each degree a Nominee holds in Inter Nomic Relations the University shall cast an extra vote for em.

Rule 17-1/0
INTO Ruleset
else...if (Henry Towsner)

Everything in this rule after this sentence is the ruleset of the InterNomic Treaty Organization Rule 1: The Archivist is responsible for tracking InterNomic Treaties.

Rule 2: The Archivist selects the official mailing list, and must make a public notification of any changes to it. The first Archivist will be Uri Bruck (bruck@actcom.co.il) and the first mailing list will be internomic@muppetlabs.com.

Rule 3: A notification is public if it is sent to everyone subscribed to the mailing list.

Rule 4: A Nomic may designate a single delegate to the InterNomic Treaty Organization. Changes to the identity or the initial announcement of a delegate must be made by public notice. If there is an ambiguity about the identity of the delegate, the Archivist should determine the correct identity by inspecting the ruleset of that Nomic and other documents relating to that Nomic. If the rules and other documents for a Nomic are not available on the Web, then that Nomic must make them available to the Archivist in order have a delegate.

Rule 5: The Archivist is elected. When there is no Archivist, Treaties may not be made or signed. If public notice is made that there is no Archivist, and no public notice is made by the Archivist contradicting this fact for one week, then nominations begin. A person nominates emself by making public notice of this. After one week of nominations, each Nomic, through its delegate, may vote for a candidate via public notice. Two weeks after the votes begin, the person who received the most votes becomes Archivist. If there is a tie, a runoff is held between tied people as if nominations had just ended and those two were the only nominees. Note that this ay require multiple runoffs.

Rule 6: A person proposes a Treaty by making public notice of the content of the treaty. For two weeks after it is proposed, a Treaty is preliminary. After a Treaty has been preliminary for two weeks, it becomes an official InterNomic Treaty if it has been endorsed by at least three people, one of whom must be a delegate, including the player who proposed it (who is automatically assumed to endorse it). Otherwise it is destroyed. Endorsements may only be made by public notice.

Rule 7: When a Treaty becomes an official InterNomic Treaty, the Archivist must assign it the smallest positive integer not already assigned to a Treaty and make its content available upon request (preferably be storing it on a web page). In any occurances of the string "INT#n" in that Treaty, the "n" is replaced by the number of the Treaty.

Rule 8: Any Nomic, through its delegate, may sign an InterNomic Treaty by making public notice of this. The signing succeeds if and only if the Nomic has met all prerequisites within the Treaty for signing it. The Archivist should track which Nomics have signed a Treaty along with the content of the Treaty. A Nomic may remove its signature from an InterNomic Treaty unless the Treaty puts restrictions on doing so, in which case the Nomic must meet those restrictions before doing so.

Rule 9: Although Nomics are expected to abide by an honor code, and obey the treaties they have signed, there is no general enforcement method in existance. Treaties should include enforcement when it is neccessary.

Rule 17-2/4
A Few of Our Least Favorite Things
IdiotBoy (Matt Miller)

Ackanomic recognizes the existence of extranomic entities, including other nomics. In such recognition, we often see things which we do not like.

The Players of Ackanomic shall have the right to declare War on other nomics, by adding a Declaration of War to the rules under this rule. For as long as such a Declaration exists, Ackanomic shall be considered to be in a State of War with the nomic so named in the Declaration.

Rule 17-2-1/1
Declaration of War: Agora
IdiotBoy (Matt Miller)

Recognizing the perilous harm brought to all Nomics by rogue nomic-states, Ackanomic does hereby issue this declaration of war against the Nomic known as Agora.

Rule 17-2-2/2
The Dawning of the Age
and (Eric Wald)

When a Declaration of War ceases to exist,
1) the President may award one Purple Heart to each player who has significantly contributed to the harf of the rival nomic, in the judgement of the President.

Rule 17-2-3/0
Sharing the Harf!
and (Eric Wald)

While Ackanomic is in a State of War with a nomic, herein called the rival nomic, active players of Ackanomic should attempt to humiliate, incorporate, or harfiate the rival nomic. To accomplish this, they are encouraged to join the rival nomic and throw zopzop into the rival nomic's ruleset.

Any active player of Ackanomic may call a Pep Rally on a Strike Action to be taken in the rival nomic. A Pep Rally is a Hearing, with valid responses of "This will humiliate the rascals!" and "The implications and probable resolution of the stated strategy are utterly inadequate for rendering the opposition incapacitated with excessive joviality." The player who called the Pep Rally is the Hearing Harfer and may be called the Strategist while the Pep Rally is in session.

If the verdict of a Pep Rally is "This will humiliate the rascals!" then each active player able to perform the Strike Action in the rival nomic for three days, must do so within those three days. Failure to comply with this paragraph is the Crime of Treason, with a minimum sentence of three days in Gaol and a thirty-line Public Apology.

If the verdict of a Pep Rally is not "This will humiliate the rascals!" then the Strategist shall be fined the Standard Harfer Fee for disrupting the peace.

Rule 17-2-4/0
The Presidential Councils
else...if (Henry Towsner)

A Presidential Council is a body of 5 voting players. One of them is always the President, and the other four are appointed by the President. It is a privilege of the President remove any member of a Presidential Council (other than emself) and to appoint any voting player to fill a vacancy on a Presidential Council which has fewer than 5 members.

There is at all times a Presidential Council known as the Presidential Defense Council. The PDC should determine ways to defend Ackanomic from invasion. Whenever Ackanomic is at war with a nomic named <name>, there is a Presidential Council known as the <name> Attack Council.

This Council should determine the specific goals of the war effort (if they are not specified elsewhere), and how best to implement them. The President is encouraged to fill Attack Councils with a combination of trustworthy Ackans familiar with the rules of that nomic and rabidly anti-<name> Ackans who want to stop at nothing short of annihilation.

Rule 17-2-5/0
Wartime Crisis
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

To protect Ackanomic from attack by hostile nomics, any player who fears an influx of new players or an invading army can declare a Wartime Crisis on any proposal due more than 3 days from the declaration as a public action. This causes the proposal to become Protected.

Also as a public action, any Justice, the Speaker, or the President, may deny the validity of a declaration of Wartime Crisis. If such a denial occurs, the player who declared the Wartime Crisis loses 20 points, 100 mannna, is fined A$300, and is placed in gaol for 3 days, and the proposal is no longer Protected.

When a Protected proposal comes due, all newbies are considered to have abstained. This rule takes precedence over all descendents of rule 2 with which it conflicts.

Rule 17-2-6/1
Declaration of War: Pumpkin Patch
Emperor Ai! Pedrito! (Gabe Drummond-Cole)

In recognition of the vile attempt to destroy Ackanomic by the traitorous colonists of Pumpkin Patch, Ackanomic does hereby declare war on the nomic Pumpkin Patch, which shall be the Ackanomic-recognized name of the nomic created on September 24th, 1999, with Gabriel Drummond-Cole as speaker.

Rule 17-2-6-1/1
I *am* that other game.
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

Ackanomic acknowledges the existence of a game which believes that up until 24 Sep 1999 19:14:12, when differing opinion on the effect of Proposal 4371 caused its genesis, it was the same game as this one. That game is hence forth as Pumpkin Patch.

The entire rule-set of Pumpkin Patch forms this rule's descendants.

Ackanomic's Game state contains, as a sub set of its own, Pumpkin Patch's Games State. Pumpkin Patch's Game State may only be manipulated according to this rule's descendants, this takes precedence over all other rules. This rule's descendants may only effect Pumpkin Patch's Game State and shall have no other effect on Ackanomic's game state.

Proposals which would effect this rule's descendants (for example by creating, modifying, or repealing a rule) or which would effect Pumpkin Patch's Game State, are invalid unless they are also submitted according to this rule's descendants.

This rule takes precedence over its descendants. This rule and its descendants defer to all other rules, except where noted otherwise.

[The current rules of Pumpkin Patch]

Rule 99/0
Unassigned Rule Section
else...if (Henry Towsner)

The rule-harfer may renumber descendants of this rule as a public action.

Rule 99-1/0
Evil Math Troll
Ai! Pedrito! (Gabriel Drummond-Cole)

Evil Math Trolls are Scary. They can Bite other players if they are in the same Location, as a public action. If a player has been Bitten for three days, and has not been healed, e loses 10 points and becomes an Evil Math Troll. If an Evil Math Troll bites anyone, e is immediately placed in gaol for a day.

If there is ever a bridge across the Ackanomic River, Evil Math Trolls may hide under it, and no other players may.

Rule 99-2/0
Shrubbery!
K 2(Kelly Kelly)

The Botanical Gardens are a small common location situated next to the gaol, overlooking the river. It contains a wide variety of rare and valuable plants, including Ackanomic's entire collection of Shrubbery.

For the purposes of the rules and other works of botanical importance, the terms Observer and Shrubbery are synonymous.

Rule 99-3/0
The Publicist
K2 (Kelly Kelly)

Let there be an optional political office called the Publicist with a minimum term of office of one month.

The Publicist has the following duties:

1. Advertising the game of Ackanomic.
2. Attempting to find new players for Ackanomic.
3. Directing new players to the Ackanomic web page, and to whoever is in charge of signing up new players.

The Publicist may have other duties as assigned by other rules.

Rule 99-4/0
The Caped Crusader Lives!
Rachel L Walmsley (Eric Plumb)

There is nothing wrong with Ackanomic's Crime rules as they stand. To insinuate otherwise is to commit the heinous Crime of Insubordination, which shall be punished as harshly as possible. Suggested penalties include: being forced to listen to (and summarize) heated debates on pointless topics, such as whether Acka has an "economy"; being locked in the Library while the ASS is stuck on maximum volume playing Back Street Boys; and refereeing a game of Word Un-Association.

The Crime Rules are perfect. Ackanomic is perfect.

The Chartreuse Goose is your friend.

Are *you* happy, Citizen?

Rule 99-5/0
Evil Twins
A German Dog (JT Traub)

Every player may have an equal and opposite player known as their Evil Twin.

A player may as a public action declare another player to be their Evil Twin. If the player so named issued a declaration naming the first player as their Evil Twin within 3 days, then those players are Evil Twins. If either of the players had an Evil Twin before this declaration occured then those players are no longer Evil Twins. Each player may only have one Evil Twin.

A player may as a public action declare that their Evil Twin is no longer their Evil Twin. If either member of an Evil Twin pair makes such a declaration then those players are no longer considered to be Evil Twins.

When votes are tallied, if the Evil Twins cast votes with the same sign, then one of the two twins, chosen at random has the sign of their vote reversed. If the Evil Twins both voted 0, it is considered to be the case that one of them voted +0 and the other voted -0 and thus no change occurs.

Rule 99-9/1
Serfdom
K 2 (Kelly Kelly)

For the purposes of this Rule any Player who owns a Player other than emself shall be referred to as a Master while the Player who is owned by a Master shall be referred to as a serf.

1. Duties and Obligations of a serf.
i) A serf is respectful. A serf shall refer to eir Master as either Master, M'Lord or Most Harfy One, or alternately by a title specified by eir Master. It is the Crime of Disrespect for a serf to address or refer to eir master in any other manner.
ii) A serf is considerate. A serf may not challenge eir Master to a duel nor be a second to a Player who has. Nor may they call a hearing of any type against eir Master.
iii) A serf is helpless. If a serf feels they have been unfairly treated by any Player other than eir Master they may complain publicly about em. If it is legal for the Master to challenge the offending Player to a duel e must do so, if e does not e shall lose 6 AckaDollars and eir serf shall gain 6 AckaDollars. This Privilege may be exercised at most once per month.

2. Rights and Responsibilities of a Master.
i) A Master is Wise. Four times per calendar month a Master may command eir serf (if e is a voting Player) to perform a particular voting action on a proposal by privately mailing both the Tabulator and eir serf of the required voting strategy. Provided that the serf was not the author of that proposal, the serf shall perform the required voting action on the selected proposal. Any entities required to perform the voting action must be supplied by the Master. Additionally, the Master shall transfer the Standard Harfer fee to eir serf the first time this privilege is exercised in each calendar month.

While an entity may own a Player it shall not be considered to own the Player's possessions.

Rule 99-12/0
How Many People Remember the OLD Final Fantasy? Yeah, That's Right, The Dumb One
Clamshell Lawyer (Eric Plumb)

There exists a unique entity named Namingway. Namingway is a powerful Acka-oid (as in humanoid) automaton created by the Ancients in a fit of Ackapomorphism. Many powers were reputedly invested in him by his creators, but the only one he has seen fit to reveal to today's Ackazens is the power to rename players.

If Phoebe and her matchbox exist and are not Somewhere Else, then whenever the matchbox is found by a player, Namingway shall appear at the house of the most recent player to hold her (Phoebe's) matchbox. If Phoebe is Somewhere Else, or was most recently Somewhere Else, Namingway shall also be Somewhere Else.

While Namingway is at a player's house, that player may ask Namingway to change eir (the player's) name. Such a request should be made publically, should include the new name to which the player wishes to change, and, to have a better chance of success, should include tasteful pleading (not to exceed grovelling) on the part of the supplicant. If all these requirements are met, then Namingway will change the player's name to the requested one and transfer 25 Mannna from the player to the Treasury as payment.

Much more insidiously, players may request Namingway to change the name of _another_ player. To do so, the requesting player must have an absolute value of at least 200 Mannna, must tell Namingway whose name is to be changed and the new name of that player, and must *really* grovel. We're talking complete abasement here. If, in the judgement of the Speaker (the President if the Speaker is the requesting player or the target player) the fawning is adequate and the other conditions are met, Namingway will make the requested name change. In payment, he will transfer half the requesting player's Mannna to the Treasury if that player's Mannna total was positive, or will double the amount of eir Mannna if the total was negative.

If a player is in possession of The Really Big Blue Thing That Doesn't Do Too Much, Really and Namingway is at eir house, then if e attempts to use either of them they will get into a petty squabble over who is to name whom, and both will retire to the Wilds of Ackanomic to duke it out.

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