une petite expérience
by Iain Archer

>I think I follow. So it's FreeAgent's fault. But if so, why don't all
>of Chuckler's responses start new threads? 

Now that, my dear Tim, is why I have asked you all into the library tonight. While 
you were all playing croquet this afternoon, I made une petite expérience. On an old 
machine, I have the same version of Turnpike as Chuckler. And on that machine, I 
opened the same message that she received and responded to, and I went through 
the motions of replying to it. Et voilà, when I put it in the outbox, the extra space, 
he was still there.

Now Chuckler was clever. She knew that the missing space would only kill the thread 
if it met an Agent. And who would notice one poor little extra space, or suspect 
anything if it disappeared? So she bided her time, waiting like a spider at the centre 
of her web, until a message came along with two contiguous spaces in its subject 
line. And then, she carefully crafted her answer so that you, an Agent user, would 
be tempted to reply to it. And when you did so, pouf! for you the thread is no more, 
and your mind is a little deranged, and your trust in your mail reader is just a little 
damaged.

[stunned silence]

A few enquiries at Companies House and the Family Records Centre then soon 
confirmed my suspicion, that Chuckler is a scion of the Turnpike empire, and a sworn 
enemy of the FreeAgents. When you eliminate the ridiculous, the truth is obvious. 
And now, ladies and gentleman, if you will excuse me, I have a train to catch.