I don't know about the rest of the world, but we sure are in a bubble here at Hacker News. There seems to be a real disconnect between what people want to build/invest in and what people in the real world actually need and want to pay for. Just as sample of what I've witnessed in the past few years:

  Ask HN: How do you like my file sharing app?
  Ask HN: How do you like my social app for niche <x>?
  Ask HN: How do you like my twitter app?
  Ask HN: How do you like my facebook app?
  Ask HN: How do you like my iphone app?
  Ask HN: How do you like my facebook app that writes twitter apps?
  Ask HN: How do you like my game?
  Ask HN: How do you like my photo sharing app?
  Ask HN: How do you like my video sharing app?
  Ask HN: How do I monetize my free flashcard app?
  Ask HN: How do you like my app that helps other hackers to do <x>?
  Ask HN: How do I get traffic to my freemium app?
  Ask HN: How do I get angels/VCs interested?
  Ask HN: Look what I wrote this weekend!
  Ask HN: Look what I wrote in one night!
  Ask HN: Look what I wrote in 7 seconds!

  Customer 1: How can we sell through Amazon.com?
  Customer 2: How can we reduce inventory by $300 million?
  Customer 3: How can we increase conversion from 2% to 4%?
  Customer 4: How can we use software to reduce energy costs?
  Customer 5: How can we migrate one app into another?
  Customer 6: How can we get our phones to talk to our legacy apps?
  Customer 7: How can we take orders through the internet?
  Customer 8: How can we get our software package to do <x>?
  Customer 9: How can we reduce credit card fraud?
  Customer 10: How can we increase SEO effectiveness?
  Customer 11: How can we connect fulfillment and ecommerce?
  Customer 12: How can we increase revenue?
  Customers 13-200: How can we increase profitability?

This is true hacking news! Discusses a possible new bug in TCP, teaches how TCP works, has links to useful and relevant books on the subject, AND includes remarks about how difficult it is for a newbie to actually make changes to open source software and not get yelled at. I love it!

It's mobile, it's social, and it's local! They managed to hit all the buzzwords in one startup!

A few reasons (as far as I'm concerned)

1. Startups could learn a lot about presentation from this guy. I don't know about anyone else but I was struck by the video's simple, matter of fact style. No flash or funny animations. Just a smart guy showing what his company had done (and then thanking me for my time)

2. People deify Apple too much. Apple's great but you can compete with them if you put some effort into it. Sure most people won't want a wooden iPad cover but some will and it very well may be enough to make a profit off of.

3. Some people might want a wooden iPad cover and this lets them know about it (isn't that the same thing all those "Tell HN" threads do)

For a community centered around startups I think those insights are valuable which is why I up-voted it.

Gaiman does a reasonable job with this argument, but in my mind fails to address the most pernicious thought in the letter:

The question, for me, is even if we only save ONE child from rape or attempted rape, or even just lots of uncomfortable hugs from Creepy Uncle Dave, is that not worth leaving a couple naked bodies out of a comic?

This kind of argument comes up all the time in mostly unsupportable "save the children" heart string--tugging arguments (and others), and it is a dangerous and nasty kind of argument that should always be addressed.

"If we only save ONE child, shouldn't we do X?" is equivalent to "let's just assume that even the tiniest positive outcome has more value than any possible negative ones." This isn't really an argument at all; it's a premise concerning the relative values of various outcomes, masquerading as an argument. Moreover, it's stated in a way intended to shame anyone who disagrees with it.

"Even if we only save ONE child", "even if we only stop ONE terrorist", and their ilk smack of dishonesty and intellectual laziness. Sound public policies require careful consideration; arguments such as these are mental roadblocks, nothing more.

Tl;dr the bot doesn't actually find out the other is an AI, but happens to randomly comment 'You are a robot'. It's all Eliza-style non-sequiturs and canned responses. These bots don't even have internal state that would qualify as 'having found out something'. It's mildly amusing in a funny-coincidence sort of way and nothing more.