BLUEMOMENT

are the google and yahoo "bot"s that have gained membership of this esteemed establishment?
How do we use them, or are they here to steal from us?

The software has a list of recognised bots that it gives a special status to. One effect of this is that they show up as members when they are visiting. They are indexing the content for their respective owners and should not bother members in any way.

Ah, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean that they're not out to get you...

Those "bots" seem to spend more time on BM than I do, and that's saying something. More often than not, one or both of them are logged in when I poke my nose in to see what's going on.