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### 3.2 People

The most important command available to the discerning IRC user is `/ignore`. It’s the big equalizer online: If people aggravate you, just ignore them.

This is of course a crude all-or-nothing solution. Fear not, `rcirc` offers alternatives: You can “brighten” your buddies and “dim” certain other nicks that you don’t want to ignore altogether.

`/ignore`

  This command toggles the ignore status of a nick, if you provide one. If you don’t provide a nick, the command lists all the nicks you are ignoring. All messages by ignored nicks are—you guessed it—ignored. Since only “operators” can kick people from channels, the ignore command is often the only way to deal with some of the more obnoxious fellows online. Example: `/ignore rudybot`.

`/bright`

  This command toggles the bright status of a nick, if you provide one. If you don’t provide a nick, the command lists all the “brightened” nicks. All messages by brightened nicks are—you guessed it—brightened. Use this for your friends. Example: `/bright rcy`.

`/dim`

  This command toggles the dim status of a nick, if you provide one. If you don’t provide a nick, the command lists all the “dimmed” nicks. All messages by dimmed nicks are—you guessed it—dimmed. Use this for boring people and bots. If you are tracking channel activity, messages by dimmed nicks will not register as activity. Example: `/dim fsbot`.

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