Simple IRC bot

#!/usr/bin/env python

import sys
import socket
import string
import random

s=socket.socket( )

# nickfile = "/home/finn/Dropbox/projects/irc/usernames.txt"
nickfile = False

def nickgen():
    if nickfile:
        nicks = open(nickfile).read().split("\n")
        nick = nicks[random.randint(0,len(nicks)-1)]
    else:
        chars = 'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ'
        nick = ""
        for i in range(0,7):
            nick = nick + chars[random.randint(0,len(chars)-1)]
    return nick

def send(msg):
    print ">" + msg
    s.send(msg)


def process(incoming):
    print "<" + incoming
    try:
        line=incoming.split(":")[1].split(" ")
        if line[1] == "PRIVMSG": # Private message
            user = line[0].split('!')[0].split(':')[0]
            message = incoming.split(':',2)[2]
            if message == "\01VERSION\01": # Version
                print "<" + user + " wants to know what version we are"
                send("PRIVMSG " + user + " :__________\r\n")
                send("PRIVMSG " + user + " :< the game >\r\n")
                send("PRIVMSG " + user + " : ----------\r\n")
                send("PRIVMSG " + user + " :        \\   ^__^\r\n")
                send("PRIVMSG " + user + " :         \\  (oo)\\_______\r\n")
                send("PRIVMSG " + user + " :            (__)\\       )\\/\\\r\n")
                send("PRIVMSG " + user + " :                ||----w |\r\n")
                send("PRIVMSG " + user + " :                ||     ||\r\n")
            else:
                if user == "thefinn93":
                    print "Commander sez:" + message
                    send(message + "\r\n")
                else:
                    print "<" + user + ": " + message
                    send("PRIVMSG " + user + " :\02" + message + "\02 to you to!\r\n")

    except:
          print "What the shit just happened??"
HOST="irc.esper.net"
PORT=6667
NICK=nickgen()
IDENT=NICK
REALNAME="durrrpp"
CHANNELS=[]
readbuffer=""

s.connect((HOST, PORT))
send("NICK %s\r\n" % NICK)
send("USER %s %s bla :%s\r\n" % (IDENT, HOST, REALNAME))
for channel in CHANNELS:
    send("JOIN %s\r\n" % channel)

while 1:
    readbuffer=readbuffer+s.recv(1024)
    temp=string.split(readbuffer, "\n")
    readbuffer=temp.pop( )

    for line in temp:
        line=string.rstrip(line)
        process(line)
        if(string.split(line)[0]=="PING"):
            send("PONG %s\r\n" % string.split(line)[1])
        elif line.split(" ")[1] == "MODE":
            send("PRIVMSG thefinn93 :yo\r\n")