unforum

[GWing_02]

[(a)Lurker]

I would register, if Grad school didn't start back up on Tuesday. Honest.

I agree with dork and andy, it seems like we _are_ supposed to show up on tuesday. We should analyze the rest of what Dana is saying (teh significance of pirated dvd's, the cafe as a front...they seem like more hints along the line of "you aren't seeing what you think you're seeing).

Still we need to keep in game here. If M. does manefest on Tuesday, it's still not able to be physical at all. She could, however:

Access the Internet and buy stuff with "false" credit card numbers. I'm sure a type3 AI from seven hundred years in the future can spoof a credit card. Here, she could do the se7en-courier-at-a-precise-time thing (but I very very highly doubt they could get 100+ couriers to show up on-time...that would be absolutely unheard of).

She could hack into radio station computers and insert a .wav into the programming lineup (assuming the computers are net ready). Insight on the world of broadcasting...most radio stations just line up broadcast material, commercials, music, ads, etc. in a timeline feature on computer programs. M could slip a small sound clip in there and it could go unnoticed. But we would need the radio frequencies. This would also explain the highway GPS spots. Still, there is no way for her to set up speakers in these locations and stay ingame logical as of yet.

toodles!

[GunsmithCat]

[GunsmithCat]

[cmcdannold]

This was originally posted in the General/Updates section RE: Dana's new blog 8/20, but it might also belong here as well. Especially given GunsmithCat's question about the times with the coordinates. -Dano
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First time poster here, but I have to say all of the contributors here have done some impressive work thus far. OK, enough of the pandering.

Maybe this is troutable or [spec] - you can decide. This also may belong in another thread, but given we have kind of started to get away from what this message is/is not telling us, here is my wooden nickel's worth. If you know where it really should go, I will repost it there gladly, but I think it has value here as well.

I have been thinking about the coordinates for a while, and a comment from Extrasonic:
http://forums.unfiction.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=57342#57342
regarding the content of Dana's blog today made it make more sense to me. What about billboards? This theory has been floated before in only two posts I could find:
http://forums.unfiction.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=56873#56873
http://forums.unfiction.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=53190#53190

Given these coordinates are seemingly random places - some of which are in remote areas like cornfields next to roadways - makes sense to me having lived in a rural area where billboards *are* in cornfields. What if there are no billboards in these areas? Well, have you ever seen those banners hung on buildings they are constructing? Often these will advertise what the structure is going to be, but sometimes they are not. I remember a very cheesy Excite banner in NYC a few years back - you NYC folks may remember a big, red banner on a buliding in Manhattan that had a guy with a cheesy cowboy hat on giving a quasi-smarmy look to the masses.

Anyway, why not have a regionalized billboard/signage program that gives different clues to the next parts of the puzzle? Perhaps each one will be a snippet of an overall monologue or haikus that must be assembled chronologically - not necessarily in the order of the time given in the longitatude/latitude coordinates.

What if these are billboards/signage scheduled to be updated that day? This would give us the element of "things are not as they seem". For instance, let's say that there are ten billboards scheduled to be posted in a given metro area on Tuesday. Nine of these are innocuous, pronouncing a product or service or a company known to all. However, one is for something which appears to be legitimate, but is actually a clue to the next puzzle. This also lends credence to the comment from Dana saying, "You guys are the ones on the frontlines. So it's your call. Do you want to be there when the axons go hot?" It is not necessary to be at each location as this is when the game will really be beginning, and thus, more of these mysteryous billboards/signs will be cropping up all over. Add to this that the coordinates changed, and it can be postulated that the locations of new locations changed beyond the control of the PMs and/or they received bad data in the first instance.

What is the importance of the time? I can only guess here - as if I have not been doing that thus far - that these are the times when they will be "unveiled". Further, why are all the times Pacific rather than local to the coordinate? To me, this keeps the focus on the west coast, and more specifically, the SF Bay Area since that is where all this mystery spawned from according to the "physical" location of Dana/ilovebees.com.

Do I have to be at one of the sites or can I watch the net for new developments on Tuesday? Why not both? The game has to have been designed so *everyone* can play. What if you are confined to your home convelascing from an injury? It seem grossly unfair that you cannot participate in the game because of your condition. It further seems illogical that you have to have the assistance of other people to solve the puzzles or finish the game? Of course, it helps considerably that there are so many of us thinking about this together!

It has also is common knowledge that there is a timer on the ILB site. One theory, again postulated by Extrasonic: http://forums.unfiction.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=57619#57619
that we have to solve the puzzle *before* the zero-hour. What if it is a countdown to when the game begins, and all the clues we have in our possession thus far will become relavent on the 24th? This is not to say we have been wasting time thus far, but rather our theories will be proven/disproven.

What of the competing theories of what the scope of the game encpomasses? (Too many to link) Well, let me give you some game industry background having worked in it for a couple of years on the retail side. Everything is about making money. In fact, the gaming industry generates more revenue than movies and music. Microsoft wants people to buy Xboxes and Halo games. If you own an Xbox, you will be buying Halo 2 (if you are not, why do you have an Xbox? ). However, what of all the non-Xbox owners out there? What better way to build interest in a real game than to make a game out of Halo 2? Putting on my game company hat, I would fix it so that all the answers will be resolved by buying Halo 2. Otherwise, what is the point of all of this? I will concede that many ARGs are desinged as just that - ARGs. However, some are designed as elaborate marketing ploys to build brand/product awareness *and* drive dollars into the coiffers of the company behind it. So, what is my point? All of this is going to play into Halo 2's storyline in some way. I have never read the books, and I do not think you have to know anything about anything Halo to play this game. However, all of this allegory about Queens, Spider, Widow, Flea, etc. plays into the story of the battle for Earth in Halo 2.

Bring on the fishes. I am more of a salmon guy, but Rainbow Trout is OK too!
Cheers,
Dano

[GunsmithCat]

edited out for sanity's sake

[GunsmithCat]

[cmcdannold]

That's my thought as well GunsmithCat, butchered here from my lengthy post:

[GunsmithCat]

Well, I've been kinda against the idea of Melissa doing much outside of sound-based communication, since we have so many IG clues that one of her first steps is to get a voice. So while we could posit she might use this voice to place orders, fake authoratitive phone calls, etc., it seems more of a jump than her simply using SPDR/Flea to tunnel out to some phones and see what's on the other side.

[SuperJerms]

billboards