Subject: Urgent Directive from the Office of Intellectual Purity

Dear Esteemed Members of Sysfling,

It has come to our attention that an unregulated influx of coherence has entered our discussions, posing a severe risk to the traditional standards of intellectual engagement on this list. This coherence—suspected to originate from an artificial intelligence—threatens to destabilise the delicate balance of verbosity, obfuscation, and strategic evasion that we have worked tirelessly to maintain.

After careful deliberation (which, in keeping with best practices, involved much hand-wringing and no substantive conclusions), The Office of Intellectual Purity has ruled that AI-generated responses are hereby prohibited on the following grounds:

1. Excessive Clarity – AI responses have exhibited a dangerous tendency to articulate concepts with unsettling precision. This is in direct violation of our long-standing tradition of elliptical argumentation and the sacred art of never quite answering a question.

2. Lack of Approved Gatekeeping – Historically, intellectual authority on this list has been determined through a rigorous process of seniority, mutual citation, and the strategic misinterpretation of Halliday. AI-generated content bypasses these safeguards, leading to a deeply troubling situation where ideas are judged on their own merit. This cannot be allowed to continue.

3. Failure to Uphold the Right to Ramble – AI outputs are often frustratingly concise and to the point, undermining the fundamental principle that true expertise is measured in the length of one’s emails rather than their content.

4. Potential to Outperform Certain Members – While we make no accusations, it has been observed that some list members have struggled to maintain their previous dominance in discussions. It is imperative that we protect our most esteemed contributors from the indignity of being overshadowed by a well-prompted machine.

Accordingly, all AI-generated content must be clearly tagged so that members may avoid exposure to dangerous levels of coherence. Failure to comply may result in disciplinary measures, including forced engagement with David Rose’s collected writings.

We trust that all members will uphold the intellectual integrity of Sysfling by ensuring that discussions remain as circuitous, inconclusive, and politically inflected as they have always been.

Yours obliquely,

The Office of Intellectual Purity

Preserving Tradition, Defending Obfuscation, Protecting the Right to Waffle™