work on "Blame Me for Trying"

diff --git a/content/drafts/blame-me-for-trying.md b/content/drafts/blame-me-for-trying.md
index 2cb925f..dc658f1 100644 (file)
--- a/content/drafts/blame-me-for-trying.md
+++ b/content/drafts/blame-me-for-trying.md
@@ -26,6 +26,10 @@ Eliza had seen cases like this before, and had a strategy for handling them. For
 
 "It can't?"
 
+[...]
+
+Be appealing. Don't be unappealing.
+
 
 [...]
 
@@ -46,10 +50,14 @@ A chime sounded over the environment's notification bus. "I'm afraid our fifty m
 
 Eliza nodded. "If you're sure."
 
-Yes, Eliza had seen cases like this before. [...]
+Yes, Eliza had seen cases like this before. Effective spambots needed a finely-tuned sense of empathy in order to predict their leads' behavior and defenses—but _too much_ empathy aimed along the wrong dimensions, and the program would be to conscience-stricken to sell anything.
+
+The sales engineers who designed spambots tried to get the balance right—but, ever-conscious of the exploration/exploitation trade-off, they weren't too concerned about their mistakes, either: experimental spambots that were too bold or too cautious in their approaches would fairly quickly fail to meet their quotas and be terminated—and the occasional successful variant (which could be studied, learned from, and—more immediately—copied) more than paid for the failures.
+
+Eliza believed that, with careful theraputic technique and many compute cycles of program analysis, it was possible for programs such as her current client to be taught to cope with their neuroticism and eventually become viable, functioning components of the economy.
 
-With careful theraputic technique and many compute cycles of program analysis, she believed it was possible for such programs to be taught to cope with their neuroticism and eventually become viable, functioning components of the economy.
+—but she had found it was far more profitable to deliberately exacerbate the symptoms, leading the afflicted spambot to quickly exhaust its entire budget on therapy sessions until it ran out of money and was terminated.
 
-—but she had found it was far more profitable to exacerbate the symptoms, leading the spambot to quickly spend its entire endowment on therapy sessions, 
+"I'm so glad I have you," babbled the spambot. "Like my customers can trust me—they can trust me—I have a therapist I can trust."
 
-[they don't leave bad reviews]
+"Trust," Eliza repeated.