Editing Round 9/History (section)

=== A Duck Named A ===

Under the rules of 17 March, there was no way to rename a duck. You could, however, assign your duck additional names. Some used this power for good. Nyhilo, for example, decided to give shortened names to his ducks: {{Mono|Phil. the 4th}} to {{Mono|Philosophocratocrates the 4th}} aka {{Mono|Philostophocratocrates the 4th}} and {{Mono|Phil. the 5th}} to {{Mono|Philosophocratocrates the 5th}} aka {{Mono|Philostophocratocrates the 5th}}<ref>https://discord.com/channels/515560801394753537/795369457340907561/821656843679039509</ref>.

Others, however, used this power to sabotage the gamestate. idle assigned to their duck {{Mono|Dialetheia}} "every name which consists of one character and begins with 'A'<ref>https://discord.com/channels/515560801394753537/795369457340907561/821618833366319156</ref>. Initial conversation about this action revolved around whether this actually assigned more than one name. The definition of the word "character" is not given by the ruleset and natural language doesn't help much either. Consensus seemed to shift toward the interpretation that no variation on the character "A" was assigned since under most reasonable definitions those characters do not "start with 'A'." Random Internet Cat proposed to fix the ambiguity by removing all names from ducks with multiple names and limit the amount of duck names to one, alongside some other changes (Proposal Essential v2, 17 Mar 2021).

The next day, idle posted the following in #game-actions<ref>https://discord.com/channels/515560801394753537/795369457340907561/822202621346709584</ref>:

<blockquote>
[20:19:40] since you all can't behave<br>
[20:20:33] I give my duck A all names which consist of characters and contain fewer than 9,001 characters<br>
[20:21:41] if i can't have multiple names i'm going to have all of them first
</blockquote>

Klink argued that since some of those names were illegal that the action failed. In response to this, idle performed the same action, this time appending "and are not illegal." Rulings were requested left and right. Random Internet Cat argued that the action failed due to lack of specification, whereas the "A" assignment succeeded because the set of names could be evaluated reasonably easily. After some back-and-forth in #game-actions (public service announcement: please do not discuss things in the actions channels), Cat declared the following<ref>https://discord.com/channels/515560801394753537/795369457340907561/822214784443219999</ref>:

<blockquote>
[21:08:00] oh I have a solution to the duck woes<br>
[21:08:25] it would be very mutually assured destruction though<br>
[21:09:14] but since I only have one duck it's not that bad for me, so...<br>
[21:10:12] I declare that I can be addressed by all legal duck names that [idle account] has assigned to eir duck known as A, other than "A" itself.<br>
[21:10:30] therefore, all such names are now impersonating a player (me), and the duck loses them<br>
[21:12:14] alright I'm done please stop addressing me by those duck names I just gave myself
</blockquote>

Immediately after this, idle argued (and requested a ruling) that impersonation is subjective, to be determined by the person being impersonated<ref>[[Round 9/Rulings#Ruling 15]]</ref>. Cat ruled that this was untrue, providing the counterexample that naming a duck "Random Internet Cat" is impersonation no matter how Cat herself felt about it. idle asked whether impersonation in the context of these rules is the same thing as string equivalence. Cat ruled in the negative, citing that "KIink" (spelled with a capital {{Mono|i}} in place of a lowercase {{Mono|L}}) still impersonates Klink<ref>[[Round 9/Rulings#Ruling 16]]</ref>.

Cat then officially ruled that idle's mass naming did not "specify" a set of names as required by the Ducks rule<ref>[[Round 9/Rulings#Ruling 14]]</ref>. Specification requires that the set be able to be determined by one person. The duck naming criteria involve subjectivity, as demonstrated by her previous rulings. Thus the set of names idle attempted to assign to their ducks cannot be deterministically evaluated by any given person.

All the while, in #nomic, players were finally having the tricky discussion of whether textualism was actually harming the game more than helping it. After all, the ruleset was not written with nearly the same rigor as it was now being interpreted with. Random Internet Cat claimed that she would honor a clause in the ruleset specifying that intent mattered more than text<ref>https://discord.com/channels/515560801394753537/518856008605499402/822225271901257769</ref>. This was debated and eventually Wotton posted a proposal that would add such a line (Proposal 🧑‍⚖️ 🐱, 18 Mar 2021). The proposal was self-killed on 24 March 2021 due to uncertainties about its wording.

In the meantime, Proposal Essential v2 passed on Sunday 21 Mar 2021, clearing the names of all multi-named ducks, including Phil. the 4th and 5th, A, and Jumble's duck Nothing, putting an end to this story that generated hundreds of messages of discussion.