koan
= K =
Kool Aid to drink the
kook
[Usenet; originally and more formally, `net.kook']
Term used to describe a regular poster who continually posts
messages with no apparent grounding in reality. Different from a
troll, which implies a sort of sly wink on the part of a
poster who knows better, kooks really believe what they write, to the
extent that they believe anything.
The kook trademark is paranoia and grandiosity. Kooks will often
build up elaborate imaginary support structures, fake corporations
and the like, and continue to act as if those things are real even
after their falsity has been documented in public.
While they may appear harmless, and are usually filtered out by the
other regular participants in a newsgroup or mailing list, they can
still cause problems because the necessity for these measures is
not immediately apparent to newcomers; there are several instances
on record, for example, of journalists writing stories with quotes
from kooks who caught them unaware.
An entertaining web page chronicaling the activities of many
notable kooks can be found at http://www.crank.net/usenet.html.
--The Jargon File version 4.3.1, ed. ESR, autonoded by rescdsk.