believe me ive learned how to disable it over time. that has nothing to do with the problem.

When you are in a channel that is dedicated to sending commands, you dont want PMS from people typing !nick.

Channels dedicated to commands are very common.

Channels dedicated to conversation, that have a problem with people typing specifically "!Nick" in the channel, is not common enough to warrent a default command in mirc.

Why would people be typing !nick in a conversation channel so often that you need to have an option added to MIRC and have it enabled by default? it baffles me

its a problem for channels dedicated to using commands. you cant explain to everyone how to disable it.

Perhaps back in the day this option was helpful. Today, where !command channels are common, it is a problem