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[-M-]

[Big Speck o' Spec] Leaving to China

[CorSorei]

That was my thought on the whole thing. It just didn't make sense to me that any sane person with even a shred of common sense and/or inteligence would go to where you're expected to be, when you know you are being watched, threatened, and possibly hunted. In a situation like that the reasonable thing to do is to throw off pursuit by doing what's unexpected. Then again, I put way to much faith in everyone have some inteligence/ common sense. Or I could just be way over analyzing it all.

[gheritt]

Guys, I don't think Dana's plan is exactly lacking in common sense. As far as she can tell, her computer wants to kill her. What does she do? She gets away from the computer. She leaves the country. She goes hiking, away from any means of contact, electronic or otherwise. This is not a bad plan.

I'm not saying she couldn't be faking her trip to China so she can stick around and figure things out, but really... it's entirely believable to me that she's gotten too freaked out to deal with this freaky, supernatural situation, and has really gone somewhere to put the whole thing behind her.

[krystyn]

Y'know, before running away to China, I'd simply unplug the machine from the wall, or deactivate the credit card associated with the colo service, if the server weren't actually in my (or my Aunt M's) home.

I think there's still a good chance she didn't go to China at all, and that she found out a lot more than she was telling us. I am a little confused as to why she's being sort of chicken about this, when it's a squarish box hooked up to power that she can terminate at any time. I am willing to suspend my disbelief a great deal, but I admit it sort of dissipates when I think about her being so afraid of what is essentially a really elegant virus, that she hops on a plane to the other side of the world, leaving the machine humming away, merrily metastasizing and shiznit.

It just don't make sense, bub!

[-M-]

[tsioc]

Doesn't China have what amounts to a massive firewall in place?

I remember reading somewhere that there planning to build their own, sealed internet, or intranet if you will.

How much does Dana know about computers? Is it possible that she would feel a little safer in China because of this? Does she really understand the nature and abilities of the AI she is dealing with?

[Elec]

I'm not positive that Dana ever admitted to believing or understanding that it was an AI she was dealing with. If she assumed that it was hackers specifically targeting her, she might be worried about real people doing her harm. You'd be awfully tough to track down if all someone knew was that you'd be backpacking around China a while.

What strikes me as odd is that at this point, with Dana out of the picture, there is currently nobody we can interact with who has any influence over the system or what's going on. We can watch the changes, but can't say "Hey dummy, try this!" It'd be like if I set up a webcam and said "Hey guys, there is a small fire in my kitchen. What should I do to put it out?" and then tried a few suggestions. After none of them worked, I'd move the webcam to my neighbor's roof and say "This looks bad, the fire is spreading!" Finally, I'd say "My whole house is on fire. It's too hot for me to go back in there or try to put it out - it might be dangerous! I guess I'll just leave then..." All anyone could do is sit helplessly and watch the mofo burn, same as with the web site, because there's nobody there to do anything about it.

That leads me to believe that if Dana really is out of the picture, we'll have to gain a new contact in order to proceed. It may very well be the pious flea (or whoever else is responsible for problem quite interesting and the killer messages). It seems at least that somebody has been reading our emails and generating responses, even if they aren't totally helpful or coherent. The only other (boring!) possibility is that we sit and wait another 11 days till something new happens.

[CorSorei]

1st: krtstyn, thanks for the laugh. You seem to be just a little sarcastic (not a bad thing by any means) and yet still you manage to make logical points about things (not easy to do), and I'm enjoying every min. of this.

2nd: I still say if someone/something wanted to kill me I wouldn't go where it expected me to be.

3rd: Or when all is said and done; Am I just putting to much faith in all people having some shred of common sense and/or intelligence? Someone please tell me??? It might help to ease my troubled mind.

Apperciate the logical agruements, rational opinions, and any help a kind generous soul can give my lost troubled mind.

edit: Since I was busy typing I missed that. It does bring up a good point. Maybe her leaving will be what allows this to metastisize.

[TheBiggestSean]

What I think is important is that Dana didn't say "they saw me. They know me."

She said "It." She knows, perhaps distantly, intellectually, that what she's dealing with is not a human being or even a group of individuals.



Sometimes the girl frustrates me. I think we've all made it clear, or tried to make it clear, that as long as she sticks clear of that computer she should be MOSTLY safe.

Then again, can any of us honestly say that if our computer threatened us, operating beyond our control in a manner that was wholey supernatural, we would react with curiosity and logic? I think not. Personally, if my computer decided to suddenly go freak-a-zoid on me and do things without my permission, like take pictures of me and then send the general feeling of "I'm going to kill you." my way, I woudln't ever want to be near it again. I would even go as far as suspecting that it could harm me via electrical discharge or something weird like that if I tried to unplug it.

In some ways I understand her paranoia. In others.... She could have been extremely useful in terms of communicating more directly with whatever is trapped on her computer. Either way I doubt we'll get much of a response from her.

[ToiletDuk]

[CorSorei]

If my computer started doing anything like this, hell probably before it started doing stuff like this, I'd react with with a 20 lbs. sledgehammer or maybe lots of thermite. I wouldn't run and I won't abide anyone/thing threatening me in my own house. There's only so much a sane person can take right? I mean a sledgehammer and thermite aren't overkill in a situation like this are they?

[krystyn]

Instead of blunt weaponry and explosives, I'd simply storm on back to Best Buy with my warranty clutched in hand, demanding a replacement machine.

Dana, just unplug it! Honestly!

[gheritt]

Krystyn, it's a good point about trying less drastic means to solve the computer problem, but Dana was already planning to go to China. It's not like she left specifically because of the computer.

[krystyn]

Then why would she leave, if it were such a dire situation? She just left the machine running?

Something's not adding up.

[MageSteff]