a) I (the author) am making reference to the impact of bouncers with IRC in OpenStack projects. The error, if there is one, is perhaps that both my posting and the one I reference in the first paragraph are trying to generalize from experience in OpenStack that is not normal. In OpenStack the channels are _not_ &#x27;mostly idling&#x27; and that is entirely the problem.<p>b) It&#x27;s true that when I started using IRC about 15 years or so ago, I was coming to the game a bit late, at least relative to other internet services I&#x27;d used and the age of IRC. I hope since then that I&#x27;ve managed to catch on, but maybe not.