GLaDOS brings down PSN

In a freak turn of events; GLaDOS has turned Tulpa (Slenderman stylee) and has borked the PSNetwork (not the PSN network, people. The N stands for network).

I, for one, am sitting here doing this:

SELL! YOU ITALIAN BASTARD

 and this:

Please, someone tell me its back online!

So, what are you doing with your giant black doorstop tonight? I'm going to tape it to a wall and use its pointy corners to scratch the lower part of my arse cheeks.

Nakd Bar Giveaway from Brit Chick Runs

I was flitting around Twitter today and saw a tweet by my recently discovered LGC buddy @MalwenGoch:

18 delicious Nakd bars being given away by @BritChickRuns including my current favourite: cocoa mind. See http://bit.ly/g8hyiE to enter.

Never have I been known to pass up the chance of free confectionary, I duly visited the site and signed up. Brit Chick Runs is giving away a box of 18 Nakd bars for free (to anyone with a British postcode),  all you have to do is go to her blog and leave a comment on the post, then either tweet about her competition or make a post. I decided to do both in the hope that in doing so I will maximise the possibility of healthy-bar-output.

Here's a direct link to the blog post with full details: Brit Chick Runs gives away free Nakd bars. From Brit Chick Runs herself:

Old, faithful, hardcore readers who’ve been following my blog since the beginning [of time] will know I have raaaved about this companies’ bars A LOT! But, weirdly enough, I’m yet to try the new flavours. I rather ashamed of myself really. Especially seeing as they are so awesome:

Raw fruits

Raw Nuts

Natural flavours

Nuttin’ else. Nada! Simply whole foods, rolled together.

Usually when a tweet includes the phrases "Nakd" and "Brit Chick", it's about a particularly rowdy night out in Skegness, chucking up in a taxi and falling asleep in your boob tube - but this is far more wholesome (although it is a little... *snigger*... seedy).

Twitter Challenges Govt' Subpoena

linked from wired.co.uk

In my gollomphing around the net I came across this article on Wired.co.uk concerning Twitter's response to the recent subpoena they were issued for information on a number of key figures in the Wikileaks saga. Instead of simply allowing their databases to be opened up and scoured of the key information, Twitter challenged the gag order which came attached to the demands, they won and subsequently notified the persons involved that their information was going to be released. This action by Twitter allowed the persons involved (including wikileaks founder Julian Assange, accused leaker Pfc. Bradley Manning,  former WikiLeaks spokeswoman Birgitta Jonsdottir, and WikiLeaks activist Jacob Appelbaum) to challenge and attempt to quash the subpoena in court.

Wired.co.uk's Ryan Sigel states:

That's what makes Twitter's move so important. It briefly carried the torch for its users during that crucial period when, because of the gag order, its users couldn't carry it themselves. The company's action in asking for the gag order to be overturned sets a new precedent that we can only hope that other companies begin to follow....


...Even more remarkable, Twitter's move comes as a litany of companies, including PayPal, Mastercard, Visa, and Bank of America, follow the political winds away from the First Amendment, banning donations to WikiLeaks. And Amazon.com voluntarily threw the site off its hosting platform, even though there's nothing illegal in publishing classified documents.



By standing up for its users, Twitter showed guts and principles. Much of it is likely attributable to Twitter's general counsel Alexander Macgillivray. As security and privacy blogger Christopher Soghoian notes, Macgillivray was one of the first law students at Harvards' Berkman internet law centre and at in his previous job at Google "played a major role in getting the company to contribute takedown requests to chillingeffects.org."

I can't help but feel the bile rise in my gut, this whole WikiLeaks saga has raised the Orwellian fear in me and it's shown in stark releif just how powerless the little man can be if the government wishes him gone. It is laudable that Twitter has supported its users in such a way, and it makes me feel a little bit safer knowing at least the big T has our back.

The Looking Glass Club

[EDIT - I now realise the start of this post is a bit of a rant, if you want to read about The Looking Glass Club then scroll down past it!]
I have returned, fresh faced from the land of Londonium. I have not returned empty handed, though, oh no. I come bearing gifts of a new found distaste for the "scene". I know, I know, I once was one of the kids who hung around the park - baggy trousered and bedecked in black. I was cool and I despised the establishment, yeah those adults! They never listen to us! Fight the powa'! But since then, I've... well, I've got some freaking perspective!
Travelling on the tubes the past couple of days I have begun to despise the posers in square glasses without lenses, who grow moustaches - not because they are superawesome and make you look like a manly man, but because it is ironic to do so. Those parodied on Family Guy and other comedies as going to coffee shops to type on their laptops, because whats the point in writing if noone sees you doing it? With trousers with rolled up legs showing their ankles, they slope around with an air of aloof mysticism carrying battered books or notepads. I am at once in awe and at odds with them - bedecked in battered trainers and a jumper as I am.
[EDIT -Rant over!]


Phew, well now, lets get to business shall we? A couple of days ago a new thread popped up on uF (here it is, in fact) concerning a book just released by a British writer named Gruff Davies. Now, apart from having the manliest name ever created Gruff has provided an interesting challenge for us ARGers and puzzle-lovers. If we can solve the puzzle of his book, we could win up to £1million.

Before I set out for the land of the drainpipe trousers, I ordered myself a copy - hoping it would arrive before I had to leave for the trainstation, it didn't and instead the journey down was occupied by my second read-through of Eldest (of the Inheritance Cycle) in preparation for the next, and final, installment which will be out later this year, with any luck.

However, as I pushed open the door to my flat early yesterday evening a package from Mr Davies was waiting for me. Inside the cover was a business card advertising the competition tied to the book: 

Are you smart enough to win up to £1 million?

Read the novel

Solve its secrets

Available now from major online stores: Amazon and Barnes and Noble

Find out more, visit:

http://www.thelookingglassclub.com/

The copy is signed by the author and whilst it isn't all that thick in itself - the typeface is much smaller than I anticipated so the book is a much more daunting task than I first thought.

Having said that, I delved into the first chapter later that night and I believe I was gripped. It took me a page or so to get a handle on Gruff's style of writing, accustomed as I was to the simpler style of the Eragon books (I really have been powering through them), but once I had my teeth stuck in I really was just dragged along by the story. So far I have gleaned that the story concerns the main character Zeke (or "Steel") who is tasked with protecting Skyler; a pregnant twenty something with amnesia. The start of the book is frantic and confusing, not in a bad way, but in a way which I believe is perfectly constructed to mirror the tension of the chase into which we are thrown.

Now, to the meat of the post - the competition. Along with the book itself are a series of challenges set to the reader, to be solved by the end of this month (so you best get ordering if you want in). Full details can be found on the LGC website, but as a short summary: solve the first puzzle to be put into a draw for a Kindle, solve the first four puzzles to be put into a draw for an iPad, solve the entire book first (that is, before anyone else) and win up to £1million. The puzzles come in the form of an except from "Tony's Diary" and seem to come at the end of each chapter. The book begins with what appears to be a yes/no morse or binary code, since then I've conquered the first chapter and reached the second puzzle, a fiendish word square which, at first glance might be dismissed as a simple substitution or rotation cipher, but when you look closer there are far too many triple letters for it to be so bland. The puzzle is accompanied by the line "an amphibious mammal swims in this sea".

So, fancy a challenge? I'll certainly be aiming to finish the book by the end of the month - if not solve it, if only to pay off my student loans! Head to the website to order a signed copy, you can also download the entire book - FOR FREE in pdf form (although, you won't get all the puzzles). Also follow Gruff Davies on twitter @gruffdavies. Right, best be off, these iPads won't win themselves you know...

[EDIT2] Try not to do as I did and transcribe by hand half a page of no nos and yes yes's before realising you can copy/paste from the pdf. It really does damage your calm...

EverymanHYBRID: Murder is a Dirty Habit

Having spent the last post talking about the latest Marble Hornets info, I thought I'd focus on the other big Slend-romp of the moment - EverymanHYBRID.

[WARNING SPOILERS FOR EMH]
As I was saying in the last post - although the subjects of the two Slenderman stories might at first seem similar, group of friends, Slendy-goings-on, and stuff "goin' down" - in fact the way the stories are approached and presented to the viewers are quite different. Take, for example, the latest offering from the guys over at EverymanHYBRID:

The video comes after a torrent of excitement from the followers over at UnFiction when we heard in the last entry that one of the characters, Ryan, had been in a car accident (it seemed). Vince threw us a small bone stating "I heard that noise"...
Most of the latest video shows the crew over in what appears to be a field, they are dimly lit by candles - presumably they are at the scene of the accident. Before this, we hear Jeff telling Evan to slow the car down so he can get a shot of a mutilated deer by the side of the road - uh oh, I smell the work of a particularly gougey garden-utensilly named foe (although, Slendy has also been known to mess with animals). The camera then cuts to laughter and a darkened interior location, we hear a sneering voice talking loudly in the next room, the place appears to be lit by lots of candles. The camera cuts again to the guys in the field. Vince tells us that Ryan was in an accident and passes on to Jeff to describe the rest of the story. Jeff describes to us how he was asked by Ryans Mother to help identify the body, how he had been mutilated with scratches all over his body and a broken neck.

The EMH crew doubt this is a car accident. Using their super-power detective skills they summise that as most of the glass was inside the vehicle it means something smashed through from the outside, rather than Ryan going through it from the drivers seat. The guys then go on to describe how Ryan recieved a strange email from a person known as HABIT (see here for a description of this character) asking for information, Ryan pressed him for his identity but also provided the information. We see the address come up on screen and the screencap of Ryans reply is linked in the description:

In the final scene in the field the guys describe how they have now sent their info to this guy and are so similarly "signed up". Almost everyone in the world has now also done the same! Some have been provided ID numbers for this "contest" already, I'm eagerly awaiting my reply!

The final scene is back in the candlelit house, the camerman moves closer to the voice in the next room and we see that it is Evan, talking to someone across the table - weilding a butcher knife. Evan describes how he has brought these "little fishes" for this person. Finally, as the cameraman moves further into the room we see the seat opposite is empty - finally the cameraman speaks and we hear that it is Jeff. He asks Evan what he's doing, as Evan gets up and advances on Jeff he turns and immediately runs into the ghastly figure of what appears to be Slendy - accompanied by his signature audio/visual distortion:

I really liked this episode - it was fast paced, it had a slick feel to it - with events seemingly occurring simultaneously until we realise who the characters involved are. The camera always cut away from one scene just as it got juicy and left you wanting to go back.

Feels to me like the guys really stepped up the game in response to the new season of MH coming out. I can't wait to see how insane Evan is going to go, how long Vince's beard is going to grow and where they are going with the whole Rake-in-Alex's-bedroom dealio. As always, the best place to follow the debate is over at UnFiction - I'd definately suggest getting an account over there and getting involved. I'd also suggest heading over to YouTube and Twitter and subscribing to both EMH, Marble Hornets and also Tribe Twelve - who I will do a post on tomorrow.

Argh! Porcelain Bees!

I've mentioned in a number of my posts that I am an avid gamer. However, what I haven't mentioned is that I also like to indulge in a bit of ARG-y goodness now and again. ARGs or "Alternative Reality Games" are games in which the player can get totally involved, the story unfolds in front of them through a number of different mediums and more often than not the puzzles are solved through community collaboration. I've mentioned my interest in online communities and their composition, evolution and cohesion in previous blabberings.

One of the most widely known ARGs is the horror/thriller game Marble Hornets (although, it is often seen as more of a chaotic fiction). MH tells the story of a group of friends who are haunted by the ghostly figure of Slenderman, as well as a number of other unsettling characters. The story revolves around the character Jay who is given a bin bag full of old videos by his friend Alex and told to destroy them. Instead Jay watches the tapes, originally meant to be film from the budget movie they and a few friends were filming, and sees Alex's sanity unwind as his is stalked by Slendy.

The story is mostly told through youtube and Twitter (@marblehornets) posts, with updates coming in the form of "Entries" - beginning with The Introduction and culminating in Entry 26. I don't want to give too much of the story away, just in case you are interested in getting involved, but its certainly worth watching from the start - also keep an eye on the video responses!

The main reason for this post is that "Season 2" appears to be starting, with Jay's Twitter being updated with 3 new mysterious and cryptic pictures - the ARG forums are furiously attempting to decode them, check out the action on unFiction here. I would thoroughly suggest getting involved in the forum and contributing, they are all very friendly and the community spirit of solving each problem as a group is really rather thrilling. There are tonnes of other viral and grassroots ARGs to get involved in on the unfiction forums, it was a big part of my life in the early part of this year and I've lost contact with the group of late, I'm hoping to get back into it with the new season of Marble Hornets.

Just.. erm, watch your windows, do not start to film yourself and, whatever you do, don't go into the freaking woods...