Tony's favorite "sport" is a spectator event known as the $\textit{Super Mega Ultra Galactic Thumbwrestling Championship}$ (SMUG TWC). During the $2008$ SMUG TWC, $2008$ professional thumb-wrestlers who have dedicated their lives to earning lithe, powerful thumbs, compete to earn the highest title of $\textit{Thumbzilla}$. The SMUG TWC is designed so that, in the end, any set of three participants can share a banana split while telling FOX$^\text{TM}$ television reporters about a bout between some pair of the three contestants. Given that there are exactly two contestants in each bout, let $m$ be the minimum number of bouts necessary to complete the SMUG TWC (so that the contestants can enjoy their banana splits and chat with reporters). Compute $m$.

Let's think step by step and output the final answer within \boxed{}.
user