How to be a pest-by-modem:

• Make up fake acronyms. On-line veterans like to use abbreviations like IMHO (in my humble opinion) and RTFM (read the f...... manual) to show that they're "hep" to the lingo. Make up your own that don't stand for anything (SETO, BARL, CP30), use them liberally, and then refuse to explain what they stand for ("You don't know? RTFM").

• WRITE ALL YOUR MESSAGES IN ALL CAPS AND DON'T USE PERIODS OR RETURNS SO THAT EVERYONE HAS TO SCROLL ACROSS THEIR SCREENS TO READ EVERY LINE ALSO USE A LOT OF !!!!!! AND DDOOUUBBLLEESS TO SHOW THAT YOU'RE EXCITED ABOUT BEING HERE!!!!!!!

• When replying to your mail, correct everyone's grammar and spelling and point out their typos, but don't otherwise respond to the content of their messages. When they respond testily to your 'creative criticism," do it again. Continue until they go away.

• Software and files offered on-line are often "compressed" so that it won't take so long to travel over the phone lines. Buy a compression program and compress everything you send, including one-word E-mail responses like "Thanks."

• Upload text files with Bible passages about sin or guilt and give them names like "SexyHouseWives," then see how many people download them. Challenge your friends to come up with the most popular come-on. Take bets and calculate odds on the results of each upload's popularity.

• cc: all your E-mail to Al Gore (vice.president@whitehouse.gov) so that he can keep track of what's happening on the information Superhighway Internet.

• Join a discussion group, and tie whatever's being discussed back to an unrelated central theme of your own. For instance, if you're in a discussion of gun control, respond to every message with the observation that those genetically superior tomatoes seem to have played an important role. Within days, all discussion of gun control will have ceased as people write you threatening messages and instruct all other members to ignore you.

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