Sorry Dave, I Can't Do That

-----Original Message-----
From: Medical Libraries Discussion List
Subject: CHAT: I am not a robot. I am not a robot.

Today's message when I tried to email some PubMed results to my email:

We are having trouble verifying that you are not a robot. Please try again later or sign in to your MyNCBI account....

Me, yelling at computer: "I AM signed in to MyNCBI account!"

-----End of Original Message-----

One of our MEDLIB-L colleagues who should probably remain nameless asked me to write something to commemorate this moment. What I ended coming up with sounds a lot like a Reduced Shakespeare Company rap song with a little Weird Al Yankovic thrown in, plus an obligatory semi-obscure reference. Two of them, actually, neither of which is the reference to the patron saint of librarians which all of us already know. No, the rhyme scheme is neither consistent nor perfect. Released under Creative Commons--do with it what you want, send me any improvements, and if anyone does an actual rap video, I want to see it.

By Fred King, sometimes known as the Rapper Z39.50

Presented with trepidation and apologies to the folks at NCBI:

This morning when I logged into NCBI
A little surprise came into my eye
I did my search then emailed the results
And got a message that increased my pulse:

We think that you're a robot
We think you're a machine
You've got a search to go, but
You know we are not keen

To send out spam of Medline citations
To mailboxes out across the nations
Log into your account, that's what it's for
Then send your results to the desk next door.

(But I'm in my account I can see it in green
There's my name, top right of the screen)
But for what we want to do, it doesn't really matter
Our motive is to drive you as mad as a hatter.

Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, you know I can't.

So I gave up on my search, went to catalog
Some books piled in a huge backlog
But the system was down so I called for help
And what the phone said made me whimper and yelp:

Our menu has changed, listen all the way through
Then select the option that you think will help you
If you push the wrong button then you will be lost
Our phone tree was designed at the lowest cost.

Your call's important to us, that we know
So just sit there like you have nowhere to go
We'll answer your call but we don't know when
'Cause we thin our support staff every now and then.

Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, you know I can't.

Then a journal wanted passwords, you know that's not right
It's IP-validated so I geared up for a fight
Their subscription office finally answered the phone
But what I heard just made me groan:

It will take a few days to fix your subscription
So your readers will have to turn to paperback fiction
We can't fix it now, we don't have the means
Our support person works in the Philippines.

Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, you know I can't.

So I gave up on my day and headed home
I caught the train, thanked Saint Jerome
But the train was still, and I heard through the howls
"We're waiting for our box of lemon scented towels."

Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, I can't do that.
Sorry Dave, you know I can't.

Released under Creative Commons: (1) You are free to reproduce and distribute these works at will without asking my permission. If you make millions of dollars off them, I'd appreciate it if you'd throw a few dollars my way. (B) Attribute them to me, Fred King, if feasible. (iii) If you make improvements, please send them to me at phred (at) phred (dot) us.