"virtual factitious disorder", pseuicide", and "bimbot"

[Joel S. Berson]

John, does "hobot" mean the factitious, virtual "ho" who offers sex 
via the Internet to young males?  Or something entirely different?

Joel

At 7/2/2014 08:39 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:

>In 2012 I coined "hobot."  Not many people know this. It's a specialized
>form of robot for the young male demographic.
>
>JL
>
>
>On Wed, Jul 2, 2014 at 8:16 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > Subject:      "virtual factitious disorder", pseuicide", and "bimbot"
> >
> > 
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > All are words used in a review of "VIRTUAL UNREALITY: Just Because
> > the Internet Told You, How Do You Know It's True?",  by Charles Seife
> > (Viking).  $26.95.  I suspect these words are also present in the
> > book itself, but I have not bought it yet.
> >
> > "virtual factitious disorder" -- a severe disease, publicized on the
> > world wide web, possessed by a person who does not exist.  Also known
> > as "Munchausen by Internet".
> >
> > "pseuicide" -- suicide of a non-existent person suffering from an
> > incurable virtual factitious disorder.
> >
> > "bimbot" -- a fake woman created online to entice men.
> >
> >  From the NYTimes review, now at http://tinyurl.com/q67odoe :
> >
> > "Then there are sock puppeteers who fabricate phony personas to
> > acquire authority or sympathy. It has become so common for bloggers
> > to fabricate young people with terrible diseases, the author notes,
> > that this syndrome now has a name: "virtual factitious disorder" or
> > "Munchausen by Internet."
> >
> > "Mr. Seife sums up how these stories tend to go: "Create a sock
> > puppet or two, give it a tragic problem that will garner sympathy,
> > and then commit 'pseuicide.' It's almost guaranteed to cause a big stir."
> >
> > "Mr. Seife also dilates here upon scam artists, photo manipulators,
> > flash trading on the stock market, the promulgation of "bimbots"
> > (fake online women created to lure lonely men) and the primordial
> > idiocy of sites like Foursquare, which encourage you to tell people
> > where you are in order to earn meaningless badges."
> >
> > Joel
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
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> >
>
>
>
>--
>"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
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