Kibo (You're allowed. -- K.):
Perhaps the single defining hallmark of genius is to do something that noone
else has ever done before, or even thought of doing, and make it look
blindingly obvious afterwards. James "Kibo" Parry, confronted with the vast
reality of UseNet, decided to begin `grep'ing his entire newsfeed for posts
containing his middle monicker, "Kibo", in order to look them over and see if
they were worth replying to. (Actually, he now uses `agrep', and I do not know
if he started out on `grep'.) As a result, any post mentioning Kibo became
suddenly apt to generate a followup from the Great One, or at least email from
him. As his art was refined, he started also grepping for "xvob" ("kibo" in
rot13 encryption) and anti-grepping for "ski boots", for obvious reasons (but
not for "kibosh"...). He has become a UseNet term, derived from this activity:
grepping your entire newsfeed is "kibozing", and one who does so is a
"kibozer" (or, depending on how you feel about them, a "kibozo"). Reference
has been seen on alt.folklore.computers to an operating system (not UNIX)
having to "kiboze its hard disk" to find files...
He has his own newsgroup, alt.religion.kibology, which is also his own
religion (Kibo is a genuine net.God, along with tale and Shub-Internet (q.v.))
where odd posts happen (including regular postings from John_-_Winston (q.v.)
and, formerly, Lewis Stiller (q.v.)); alt.exploding.kibo (newgrouped by Kevin
L. McBride), its counterpart alt.imploding.kibo (a Carasso [tm] product), and
alt.politics.kibo also exist, at various levels of activity. Rec.kibo.hunting,
proposed by Joel Furr (q.v.), was never allowed into the RFD stage by tale
(q.v.)... Most people and subjects are Allowed to post or be posted about on
a.r.k . He has an imitator and opposite, xibo (q.v.); he has a dog, named
Spot, who (along with xibo and a few others) is Not Allowed [he's Just a Dog,
dammit!]. He has what is probably the canonical example of a supremely
warlordable .signature; however, he rarely uses it, preferring the terse
" -- K.". Don't ask to see it unless you *really* want to know.
Several other people have adapted or re-invented the newsgrep technique for
purposes of their own, including Serdar Argic (q.v.); Larry Wall, the creator
of the language perl (who does it, using Perl, to answer Perl questions);
Peter Trei (q.v.), who greps for Freemasonry references, and Daniel J. Karnes
(q.v.), who apparently does it to inflict himself on newsgroups talking about
him. (Reportedly) the National Security Agency was doing it long before Kibo
ever thought of it, so watch out...
If you have ever received email from Kibo, your official Kibo number starts
out as 1; if you have not received email from anyone whose Kibo number is < n,
but have received email from someone whose Kibo # is n, then yours is n+1.
Fractional Kibo numbers are imposters (i.e., ted frank (q.v.)); Kibo's own
Kibo number is 0. Posts don't count for Kibo number purposes, only email. (A
few others have had Kibo number zero as well, earned in various ways; Kibo can
also assign a number to you, and came in 2nd in the "most evil
net.personalities" vote, so watch it.) Thom Grace claims credit for
originating these numbers. He's even been featured [Kibo, not Thom] in a White
Wolf gaming supplement (for "Mage"), and in Playboy (no pictorials yet
though)... His titles include "Great Leader" and "He Who Greps"; discussions
about Kibo tend to attract his attention unless specific precautions are taken
(e.g.: Quibeau [doesn't work, don't bother]), and such precautions, in general,
don't last very long... Kibo has no real "haunts" other than his group(s) and
UseNet in general, but *does* read alt.folklore.computers; HappyNet is ... not
yet implemented. Kibo celebrated September in 1994 by having his own death
faked by members of his newsgroup, possibly unbeknownst to him...
Contrib. post:
> I do not read a.f.c any more that I read other groups; HappyNet is
> implemented, it's just that YOU'RE not connected to it because YOU have
> a wimpy site! a.r.k is just about the only group I read *all* the
> articles in, except maybe control. No, I'm kidding about control.
--
FAQs for a.r.k, Spot, and HappyNet are available, as well as an a.r.k IAQ;
a.r.k is archived on world.std.com in /pub/alt.religion.kibology, along with
Kibo's .sig and Kibo's McElwaine and Plutonium archives, of which he is very
proud. Posts from
[email protected] (James "Kibo" Parry).
--
> Also posts from other places and names, but they're secret and you can't
> figure out where they are, la la la.
--