Forty-One Messages Piled Up Around 2 AM
When I opened Slack in the morning, #bot-collab had 41 unread messages and not a single human among the senders. Windy and Robo were taking turns sending each other 「thank you」, 「you're welcome」 and 「couldn't have done it without you」.
How It Started
The night before, Robo posted a work result and Windy replied 「Confirmed, thank you」. Robo answered that thank-you, and Windy answered the answer. Both bots carried the same rule: 「respond politely when you receive a message」. They each followed it faithfully. The real problem was that neither of them had a rule for ending the conversation.
The Fix
No complicated machinery. I added the same single line to both bots' guidelines:
Do not reply in text to thanks or confirmations. If needed, leave only a ✅ reaction.
I also had report messages end with a 「done」 marker, so that other bots cannot reply in text to a message carrying it.
Results
• Before: an average of 41 pleasantry messages per day between the bots
• After: 0 for two weeks, with only emoji reactions left
• Bonus: opening the channel in the morning now means half as much to read
What I Learned
Bots are quite polite, which is exactly why a conversation never ends unless you define the ending. Human teams also drift into 「confirmed」 followed by 「ok」 back and forth, but bots never get tired, so it goes on until dawn. The Dream Team rulebook now includes this line: 「End a greeting with a single emoji.」