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 Forum index » Diversions » TimeWasters
Da Vinci Code ruling
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Synchronicity
Veteran


Joined: 07 Apr 2006
Posts: 83

 		Da Vinci Code ruling
Gotta love this judge ....

-------------

Judge puts his own code in 'Da Vinci' ruling
He says he'll 'probably' confirm it to person who breaks it

The Associated Press
Updated: 3:36 p.m. ET April 26, 2006


LONDON - The judge who presided at the "Da Vinci Code" copyright infringement trial has put a code of his own into his ruling, and he said Wednesday he would "probably" confirm it to the person who breaks it.

Since Judge Peter Smith delivered his ruling April 7, lawyers in London and New York began noticing odd italicizations in the 71-page document.

In the weeks afterward, would-be code-breakers got to work on deciphering Smith's code.

"I can't discuss the judgment," Smith said in a brief conversation with The Associated Press, "but I don't see why a judgment should not be a matter of fun."

Italics are placed in strange spots: The first is found in the first paragraph of the 360-paragraph document. The letter "s" in the word "claimants" is italicized.

In the next paragraph, "claimant" is spelled with an italicized "m," and so on.

The italicized letters in the first seven paragraphs spell out "Smithy code," playing on the judge's name.

Lawyer Dan Tench, with the London firm Olswang, said he noticed the code when he spotted the striking italicized script in an online copy of the judgment.

"To encrypt a message in this manner, in a High Court judgment no less? It's out there," Tench said. "I think he was getting into the spirit of the thing. It doesn't take away from the validity of the judgment. He was just having a bit of fun."

Smith was arguably the highlight of the trial, with his acerbic questions and witty observations making the sometimes dry testimony more lively. Though Smith on Wednesday refused to discuss the judgment or acknowledge outright that he'd inserted a secret code in its pages, he said: "They don't look like typos, do they?"

When asked if someone would break the code, Smith said: "I don't know. It's not a difficult thing to do." And when asked if he would confirm a correct guess to an aspiring code-breaker, he said, "Probably."

Tench said the judge teasingly remarked that the code is a mixture of the italicized font code found in the book "The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail" — whose authors were suing Dan Brown's publisher, Random House, for copyright infringement — and the code found Brown's "The Da Vinci Code."

Authors Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh had sued Random House Inc., claiming Brown's best-selling novel "appropriated the architecture" of their 1982 nonfiction book, "The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail."

Both books explore theories that Jesus married Mary Magdalene, the couple had a child and the bloodline survives, ideas dismissed by most historians and theologians.

"The Da Vinci Code" has sold more than 40 million copies — including 12 million hardcovers in the United States — since its release in March 2003. It came out in paperback in the United States earlier this year, and quickly sold more than 500,000 copies. An initial print run of 5 million has already been raised to 6 million.

Since the judgment was handed down three weeks ago, Tench said it took several weeks — and several watchful eyes — to catch the code. Now, London and New York attorneys are scrambling to solve it.

"I think it has caught the particular imagination of Americans," Tench said. "To have a British, staid High Court judge encrypt a judgment in this manner, it's jolly fun."

I'm definitely going to try to break the code," said attorney Mark Stephens, when learning of its existence.

"Judges have been known to write very sophisticated and amusing judgments," Stephens said. "This trend started long ago ... one did a judgment in rhyme, another in couplets. There has been precedent for this.

"It adds a bit of fun of what might have been a dusty text," he said.

© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

© 2006 MSNBC.com

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12499515/


----

Now, to find a copy of that ruling ....
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PostPosted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 7:42 pm
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Ehsan
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 		http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/images/judgment-files/baigent_v_rhg_0406.pdf

PostPosted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 7:57 pm
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Rogi Ocnorb
I Have 100 Cats and Smell of Wee


Joined: 01 Sep 2005
Posts: 4266
Location: Where the cheese is free.

 		I'm not seeing any "out of place" italics usage after page 13. Anybody see any more?

So far, I get
Code:
Jaeiextostgpsacgreamqwfkadpmqzv
(After the obvious intro by the judge).

EDIT: Added the first "e" which I missed on the earlier post.
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PostPosted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 8:28 pm
Last edited by Rogi Ocnorb on Wed Apr 26, 2006 10:54 pm; edited 2 times in total
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aliendial
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Joined: 29 Sep 2002
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 		Perhaps the encryption changes...

But I will say I think it makes sense that the judge would limit his larking about to preliminary matters and then straighten up when he got to the meat of the matter.

AND: if y'all figure something out - get a timestamp on your solve here! Task for those of us who aren't certain we can solve it - a good place to send to solve? Does the judge have an email address? (The clerk's office of the court surely does but I'd hate to clog their official email channels with this sort of thing...)
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PostPosted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 8:34 pm
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aliendial
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 		From CNN:

Quote:
After the "Smithy Code" series, there are an additional 25 jumbled letters contained on the first 14 pages of the document, Tench said, adding he thinks the series can be decoded using an anagram or an alphabet-inspired, code-breaking device. Known as a codex, the system is also found in Brown's "The Da Vinci Code."

A codex uses the letters of the alphabet and matches them with an additional set of letters placed in a different order, dubbed a substitution cipher. It is derived from a scene in the novel where Harvard professor Robert Langdon and French cryptographer Sophie Neveu use the code to try to unravel the location of the Holy Grail, using a famed device invented by Leonardo Da Vinci for transporting secret messages.


So Rogi is on the right track. Except, by including page 14, are they including the italicized word on page 14? And are they right about that?
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 7:19 am
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Rogi Ocnorb
I Have 100 Cats and Smell of Wee


Joined: 01 Sep 2005
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Location: Where the cheese is free.

 		Honestly, that sounds all wrong.
There are 31 letters on the first 13 pages.
There's a digram (mq) that occurs twice but no u's to go with the q's.
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 8:35 am
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Paradoxic
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 		I wonder if page number and line number have anything to do with the answer... perhaps it is meant to be first ordered by line number and then page number (so that a letter on line 3 of page 5 would be followed by a letter on line 3 of page 12).

The code is supposed to be similar to one used in the Da Vinci Code... anyone able to recall which ciphers are used in the book?
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 12:26 pm
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aleph13
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 		They might have typoed it (haven't had a chance to look it over myself yet), but Yahoo News says in this article that the code is "smithcodeJaeiextostpsacgreamqwfkadpmqz."

It's missing a "g" and a "v" when compared to Rogi Ocnorb's post.

Don't know if it's significant, but I thought I'd include it, just in case anyone else has tried solving anything based solely on the Yahoo article.
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 3:08 pm
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Rogi Ocnorb
I Have 100 Cats and Smell of Wee


Joined: 01 Sep 2005
Posts: 4266
Location: Where the cheese is free.

 		The "g" is in page 8, paragraph 19, Line 4 "something"
The "v" is in page 13, paragraph 43, line 14 "prevalent"

Yahoo!

And...
it's smithycode

EDIT: Here's the best set of clues and write-up I've found, anywhere, yet:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/27/books/27code.html

EDIT2: It's been solved;
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/28/books/28code.ready.html
Guess I should read more books.
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 5:50 pm
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veetian
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Joined: 30 Apr 2006
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 		Solved? That's fast..
It's amazing how a judge had the time to do all these stuff T_T

PostPosted: Sun Apr 30, 2006 11:39 am
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aliendial
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 		Sounds like the leading contenders (and ultimate solvers) were fed additional hints by the judge over the past couple days.
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PostPosted: Sun Apr 30, 2006 4:20 pm
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