Silicon Sycophants

I stumbled upon a study today from 1997 that really resonated titled Silicon Sycophants. In short, it claims that people respond better to flattery, even when they know it is automatically generated by a computer. This dovetails nicely into a long standing precept of mine that goes Language Matters, with the by-law of Have a Voice.

I have recently been playing a game online called Kingdom of Loathing. It has no animation, no colored shiny things, no exciting cutting edge technology. It is made up of simple html and stick figure drawings. What it does have is incredibly witty and clever writing, and that alone was enough to get me hooked.