I thought the object of the game was to have a fun contest

Do you know what is not fun? Playing games where the real aim is to do what it takes to look impressive without going quite far enough to get shamed for it. That is 'work'. I expect people to pay me if I have to do that.

Many games are broken, and these breaks are often called "exploits", for obvious reasons.

And I advocate exploiting them aggressively until those responsible patch them.

Until it's patched, why not agree to ignore them?

Absolutely! The approach I tend to take goes along the lines of:

The game is flawed. Let's change it to X so that it works better. Agreed?

IF agreed THEN play engaging inference game FUN! ELSE generate PGP key. win EVEN MORE FUN "The game is flawed. How about...?" END

I find this particularly useful when playing 500 with folks who like unrestricted misere calls. It usually only takes a few rounds to make them change their minds.