Dave

@Mean Old Lady The etiquette boils down to, "look don't touch."

@SP Fishes isn't more than one fish. Fishes is more than one kind of fish.

@Ms. Billie M. Spaight I was on the mth team in high school. You don't have to be particularly good at math, you just have to like a girl who is on the math team. But, maybe that doesn't count.

@LB Definitely, they are not wanted, and not needed.

@Patrick I think of fire hats as black, not red. Not in NY. Like you, I did not want it to be the other one.

@Patrick Video game clues are, almost by definition, very niche. None of them make much sense if you don't play the games.

@K Barrett The mini gave a plug to the guy ruining the country. It was awful.

@Ιασων Definitely not a language. The 'alternate spelling' sorts of clues always feel cheap and forced.

@Allison Knightly They have been missing for years in the android app!

@Jack McCullough I've heard both L Sat and L S A T. I think L Sat was becoming more common when I took it in the 90s. Maybe a reflection of M Cat?

@Barry Ancona Why not say nothing or else give a helpful answer rather than an annoying 'read the comments'?

@G.T. Maybe it depends on industry. I mine you normally slack a person or group. You might DM someone in Slack, but IMing would be unusual.

@The X-Phile Because it is obnoxious to have to press three times for a single character over and over and over again.

@Red Carpet Nope. Grumpy is correct. Th UI on this puzzle is awful.

@Captain Kidnap Remember, "Watch out where the huskies go" Sage advice!

@Bill There is no question that there is a genocide going on. The entire world knows it.

@Barry Ancona Then it's an English word for food from the south of Mexico. There's nothing 'Tex' about it.

@Steve L Two obscure people. It's poor cluing.

@Emma S Sure, that's why I said it might be an industry convention. Where I've used Slack, people say "Slack" to mean either a group message or an individual one. A "DM" refers to an individual message within Slack. But no-one I know would say "IM" for an individual message in Slack.

@Nancy J. The concept might be interesting as a different sort of game, but isn't Connections meant to be a word game? There are far too many possible words per picture.

@Nor Not at all. @B notes that the Times regularly has crosses that make no sense in novelty puzzles. Entering a dash is painful and clunky on an Android phone. It requires three times as many presses as 'line'.

@Dave Barry, X-Phile 'Headless Body in Topless Bar" is a famous headline because the headline is clever, not because of the underlying event. "Nixon resigns" is an important event, but there is nothing clever about the headline. The event is memorable, not the headline.

@Nancy J. Or perhaps, "Boycott these"

@John You shouldn't have to run the alphabet to force a fill. It's a poor cross.

@Doggydoc The terms assault and battery are related. They are most definitely not the same thing. An assault is a threat. A battery is physical harm. If you threaten a punch, but don't do it - that's only assault. If you sneak up and hit someone without them seeing you, that's only battery. Aiding and abetting are also different. Aid means to give help; abet means to incite.

@Jez Not doing the puzzle on my Android phone

@Mango 45A - those words are all adjectives, so adj. I got 9D on crosses. No idea where it comes from.

@SV Agreed war criminals have no place in the puzzle.

@Andrzej They are heads beacuse of the pun on the academic role. Heads are like deans.