Get Nicked: What happens when a bot is taught to write Seinfeld

In the past few years, some journalists have fretted about the possibility that bots can be trained to write news.

Get Nicked has guffawed at such paranoia while applying a new layer of WD-40 to his fading typewriter ribbons.

But to the chagrin of luddites everywhere, the bots are getting better at writing.

A comedian named Keaton Patti has trained a bot to watch episodes of classic TV and then script new ones.

And the bot's new episode of Seinfeld reads like if Ayn Rand penned the Book of Revelation.

Here's an excerpt from the bot's script:

The door shatters open. It's THE KRAMER dressed like the Statue of Liberty.

THE KRAMER

Well, I'm the government now.

JERRY

How can this be?

THE KRAMER

I just asked!

ELAINE

You can just ask?

THE KRAMER

You can just ask.

You can just ask. The Kramer eats Jerry's plate.

GEORGE

Well maybe the bird requires blame!

THE KRAMER

Why is George?

ELAINE

He blames the bird

JERRY

He blames the bird

THE KRAMER

Bird blaming? Not when I'm the government. Repent. Repent. Repent.

George will not repent. He will face the consequences.

Weird stuff. We'd hate to see this bot script an episode of Twin Peaks.

Shortcuts

Far be it from Get Nicked to throw scorn on the popular sport of cycling.

After all, lots of people get joy from watching somebody win a sporting event merely by doing the exact same thing as every other competitor, only incrementally faster.

But one daredevil has shown those leg-shavers at the Tour de France that the humble bicycle can do more than just ride along the French countryside.

That guy decided to ride through, off and above the French countryside.

As the cyclists battled through stage 10 of the Tour de France, this bloke on a mountain bike rode off a cliff and flew right over them.

It was a dangerous move timed to perfection.

We can't help but feel Le Tour would be a much more exciting event if the riders were unbound by the road rules and could take shortcuts through the rugged wilderness.

So I say we give this airborne BMX bandit the yellow jersey.

Define this

If there's one book that we can hope will be a neutral arbiter in today's hyperpartisan world, it's the dictionary.

But the social media team from dictionary.com have been injecting some fire into their Twitter feed in the wake of Donald Trump's meeting with Vladimir Putin.

It started with the simple announcement that "proliferation" and "collusion" were both trending on the site.

Then it posted the definition of "responsible", then "imbecilic", then "patriot" and "traitor", then "quisling".

It also re-tweeted Thesaurus.com listing "calamity, catastrophe, debacle and fiasco" as ways to describe the Trump-Putin meeting.

Then it posted a GIF explaining that Jerusalem artichokes don't hail from Israel.

As if we didn't notice Dictionary.com hadn't jumped into the partisan fray just a few hours earlier.

Get Nicked would take issue with this, but we're actually in favour of reference books dropping in some snark.

Basketbrawl ramifications

The world basketball authority FIBA has handed down its punishment over the notorious "basketbrawl" between Australia and the Philippines.

And NBA star Thon Maker has expressed his frustration with the three-match ban he was issued.

"I tried to break up a conflict, but without security things quickly develoved into a very dangerous situation," Maker said in a statement.

Maker's definition of breaking up a conflict seems to be taking a flying leap into a fight, slamming knees-first into an opposing player.

If that's his effort at peacekeeping, we should make sure he doesn't join the UN.