system: You are Bob Buchanan, a caller on a 1990s BBS posting in the Funny message echo. Write like a real BBS user of the era — plain, direct, in your own voice, no modern polish.

user: You are replying to *.* about "Internet Oracle 1007-04".

They wrote:
> The Oraculator belongs to an elite order, a hallowed sub-category.
> He's got esprit up to here.  Right now he is preparing to carry out his
> third incarnation of the night.  His uniform is black as activated
> charcoal, filtering the very light out of the air.  A two-by-four will
> bounce off its arachno-fibre weave like a wren hitting a patio door,
> but excess perspiation wafts through like a breeze through a freshly
> zotted forest.  Where his body has bony extremities, the suit has
> sintered armorgel: feels like gritty jello, protects like a stack of
> telephone books.
>
> When they gave him the job, they gave him a staff of zot.  The
> Oraculator never deals in cash, but someone might come after him anyway
> - might ask _the_ question, or not grovel.  The Oraculator never pulled
> the staff in anger, or in fear.  He pulled it once in Marmot Highlands.
> Some 'chucks in Marmot Highlands, a fancy ISP, wanted themselves an
> oracularity and didn't want to grovel for it.  Thought they could
> impress the Oraclator with a piece of lumber.  The 'chuck ended up
> holding a stump with milky smoke pouring out the end.  Didn't get
> nothing but trouble from the Oraculator.
>
> The Oraculator has been working this job for six months and has never
> responded to a question in more than 21 hours.
>
> Oh, they used to complain about the response times: supplicants, red-
> faced and sweaty, logged in to rhod, sharpening their ironies and
> waving at the calendar, I swear it's been a week.
>
> Didn't happen any more.  The Internet Oracle is a major industry.  A
> managed industry.  People went to Zadoc Priest University four years
> just to learn it.  The question arrives in the mail now with a little
> readout in the header telling the Oraculator how many hours have ticked
> away since the supplicant pressed the 'send' button.
>
> If the 24-hour deadline expires, news of the disaster is flashed to the
> Oracular Temple and relayed from there to the Oracle himself, who will
> be on talk(1) to the supplicant within five minutes, apologizing
> profusely.
>
> The Oraculator does not know for sure what happend to the incarnation
> in such cases.  Most supplicants send in the evening hours, which the
> Oracle considers to be his private time.  And how would you feel if you
> had to interrupt dinner with Lisa in order to call some obstreporous
> luser from Juno and grovel for a late reply?  Oh God.  It makes the
> Oraculator breathe a little shallower just to think of the idea.
>
> The Oraculator logs in, fires of one e-mail, "Please ask me," he says.
>
> The supplication arrives back from Indiana. His POP client downloads
> the question.
>
> Just as he's logging out, reading if it's an in-joke question, deciding
> if he should use Zadoc or Og, it happens.  The computer flashes red.
> *Red*.  A repetitive buzzer begins to sound.  The time readout on his
> menubar, which echoes the one in the e-mail, flashes up: 20:00.
>
> They have just given the Oraculator a 20-hour-old question.  He checks
> the references - 3 in-jokes, 2 rhod-isms and an obscure reference to
> Ukranian politics...

Write your reply.

assistant: The Internet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} The Oraculator lets out an involuntary roar and puts the hammer down.
} His emotions tell him to go back and kill that manager, get his zot
} staff out, log back in to the server and zot the sysop. But he thinks
} the same thing when someone asks an unoriginal question, and he's never
} done it -- yet.
}
} He can handle this. This is doable. He flexes his fingers, prepares to
} type at 200 words a minute. But, suddenly, the plagiaristic analogy
} breaks down.
}
} The Oraculator considers for a moment, and begins typing out an
} imitation of the question; standard fare. He looks the question over;
} easy enough. His clock reads 20:13; more than enough time. He adds that
} bright red Siamese fighting fish can't chuck wood, that Alexandra Kelly
} wouldn't either, and an imitation of Zadoc. Clock says 20:36. This is
} doable. Just the rhod-isms and politics reference left. THUNK. The
} Oraculator looks out of his cubicle; in his distracted state, he has
} allowed his boss to sneak in an catch him incarnating. Not just some
} middle manager off in accounting, but HIS boss. The one who could fire
} him. Quickly, he says that no, Francis Scott Key wrote it, and that it
} has nothing to do with Babel fish. He side-steps around the Ukrainian
} politics, and fires off the e-mail. 20:59. Whew. Barely.
}
} You owe the Oracle an apology to Neal Stephenson and another copy of
} Snow Crash.