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Maybe Slow Is Better
So, I've had a lot of trouble with ARGs. I loved the The Beast, which was developed for A.I., but I've had a hard time getting into others. Sometimes I haven't had the time to dedicate to them but most of the time, especially with the more recent TV-related ones, things just started too slowly. The Beast started with a real bang, and got going quickly. A lot of ARGs just don't.
But![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
yuki_onna's doing one (and despite her protestations, I'm going to keep calling it that until demonstrated otherwise), and I figure I'll go with it. I mean, she's awesome and all, and it's slow, and maybe I'll be able to keep on top of it.
It's called Invisible Games. There's an LJ feed![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-syndicated.gif)
invisiblegames that may be the priviliged discussion area.
So let's get on board. What do I know?
Well, for starters, the site runs on WordPress technology. That seems to put a limited amount of options to what can be done. The theme appears to be "Rocking Minimalist Green 3 1.0," though I can't actually find any useful information about it.
There have been two posts so far. The first seems to be about an interactive fiction game played over telegraph using a modified version of a real machine. The Phelps machine looked like a piano keyboard. The text describes the keyboard like this:
From the example message in that post, we can assume that the bottom row of the Phelps machine is, in some order: Period, Comma, Dash, Space, Execute, Fire, Water, Earth, Air, North, South, East, West, Day, Night.
Later in the post, a message is transmitted that includes a numeral. It is not apparent how that would be transmitted.
There is apparently some relationship between the piano-like keys of the Phelps machine and the sound of an actual piano:
There is a picture of the Phelps machine on the sidebar. It is also a link to a music file that is the sound of a telegraph clacking. It may be possible to translate it into Morse code.
The second post is a bit more obscure. It tells the tale of another device, though this one does not appear to have a historical presence. Instead, it is a disc that uses local radio waves to power various lights and play whatever is on the frequency. What lights arise and what sounds come out depend on location. Also, it appears that the device needs to be fairly close to a radio source to be activated. The sidebar also has a picture of this device, and it also has an audio file. It seems to be the collage of sounds that might be heard when using the device.
At the bottom of each post is a strange assortment of information. Each post has an "Archive Group," although both current posts are listed as "Attic." Then, there are a series of "Lockwords" that seem to work like keywords. Each one is evocative, but often does not appear to relate directly to the post (in ways that we can see). So far, we've seen "Karolson Worlds," "Aristotelian Drive," and "Ur-Net" (in the first post) and "Portable Devices," "Warchalking," "Tether Systems," "Alternate Power Transmission," and "Feral Networks." Most of these act as normal keywords (linking to a category page in the WordPress setup).
However, "Karolson Worlds" and "Feral Systems" apparently divert to a different page called "Search Results." (This appears to be set up as a static page under WordPress.) The Search Results page (which is different from the actual search results page, which takes the form "http://invisiblegames.net/?s=sample+search") offers the cryptic warning: "Access Blocked. Notice: Further searches will be reported."
Next there's the "Last Accessed" information, which on both posts is "9.001.6.7.7". Until we get some movement on those numbers, it may be hard to figure out what dating system they apply to.
Finally, there's the "UIN#". This is probably stands for "User Identification Number" with the octothorpe being redundant. The number associated with it is "(47)663.5-9". I don't use ICQ, so I don't know if this is translatable to an ICQ number. The source code of the posts has the link for that number leading to "http://invisiblegames.net/users/(47)663.5-9/", but it redirects to "http://invisiblegames.net/user-profile-476635-9/". (Actually, page redirects happen with the "Access Blocked" lockwords too. I never investigated how to disable redirects with Firefox, though, so I haven't found out if there's anything of interest at the directed pages yet.) This leads to a user profile page with the information "Redacted."
The page also has a donation button which asks you to "Donate to the Museum." I have donated to the museum, but nothing has happened. (Actually, something has happened, but it was an unrelated accident.) In fact, I did a lot of breaking today. The "audio" and "image" directories are unprotected right now. There doesn't seem to be anything of use, though except for a much shorter MP3 of the telegraph track.
And that's everything technical I've looked at so far.
Go me!
FriShiE 0:58. FriNurH 5:05.
But
yuki_onna's doing one (and despite her protestations, I'm going to keep calling it that until demonstrated otherwise), and I figure I'll go with it. I mean, she's awesome and all, and it's slow, and maybe I'll be able to keep on top of it.It's called Invisible Games. There's an LJ feed
invisiblegames that may be the priviliged discussion area.So let's get on board. What do I know?
Well, for starters, the site runs on WordPress technology. That seems to put a limited amount of options to what can be done. The theme appears to be "Rocking Minimalist Green 3 1.0," though I can't actually find any useful information about it.
There have been two posts so far. The first seems to be about an interactive fiction game played over telegraph using a modified version of a real machine. The Phelps machine looked like a piano keyboard. The text describes the keyboard like this:
Given the Phelps black key letters A-N, which is to say 3 vowels and 10 consonants as well as the fifteen white keys which sufficed for four essential punctuation marks, an execute command, four elements, four directions, and diurnal/nocturnal information . . .Of course, A-N are actually fourteen letters, and the Phelps machine actually has fourteen black keys. On the original, though, the bottom half contains the letters M-Z, a period, a space and a dash.
From the example message in that post, we can assume that the bottom row of the Phelps machine is, in some order: Period, Comma, Dash, Space, Execute, Fire, Water, Earth, Air, North, South, East, West, Day, Night.
Later in the post, a message is transmitted that includes a numeral. It is not apparent how that would be transmitted.
There is apparently some relationship between the piano-like keys of the Phelps machine and the sound of an actual piano:
Curiously, when the corresponding Phelps Machine’s keys were depressed, a melancholy little melody emerged.But because the black keys are continuous, it's not clear how to map them to music.
There is a picture of the Phelps machine on the sidebar. It is also a link to a music file that is the sound of a telegraph clacking. It may be possible to translate it into Morse code.
The second post is a bit more obscure. It tells the tale of another device, though this one does not appear to have a historical presence. Instead, it is a disc that uses local radio waves to power various lights and play whatever is on the frequency. What lights arise and what sounds come out depend on location. Also, it appears that the device needs to be fairly close to a radio source to be activated. The sidebar also has a picture of this device, and it also has an audio file. It seems to be the collage of sounds that might be heard when using the device.
At the bottom of each post is a strange assortment of information. Each post has an "Archive Group," although both current posts are listed as "Attic." Then, there are a series of "Lockwords" that seem to work like keywords. Each one is evocative, but often does not appear to relate directly to the post (in ways that we can see). So far, we've seen "Karolson Worlds," "Aristotelian Drive," and "Ur-Net" (in the first post) and "Portable Devices," "Warchalking," "Tether Systems," "Alternate Power Transmission," and "Feral Networks." Most of these act as normal keywords (linking to a category page in the WordPress setup).
However, "Karolson Worlds" and "Feral Systems" apparently divert to a different page called "Search Results." (This appears to be set up as a static page under WordPress.) The Search Results page (which is different from the actual search results page, which takes the form "http://invisiblegames.net/?s=sample+search") offers the cryptic warning: "Access Blocked. Notice: Further searches will be reported."
Next there's the "Last Accessed" information, which on both posts is "9.001.6.7.7". Until we get some movement on those numbers, it may be hard to figure out what dating system they apply to.
Finally, there's the "UIN#". This is probably stands for "User Identification Number" with the octothorpe being redundant. The number associated with it is "(47)663.5-9". I don't use ICQ, so I don't know if this is translatable to an ICQ number. The source code of the posts has the link for that number leading to "http://invisiblegames.net/users/(47)663.5-9/", but it redirects to "http://invisiblegames.net/user-profile-476635-9/". (Actually, page redirects happen with the "Access Blocked" lockwords too. I never investigated how to disable redirects with Firefox, though, so I haven't found out if there's anything of interest at the directed pages yet.) This leads to a user profile page with the information "Redacted."
The page also has a donation button which asks you to "Donate to the Museum." I have donated to the museum, but nothing has happened. (Actually, something has happened, but it was an unrelated accident.) In fact, I did a lot of breaking today. The "audio" and "image" directories are unprotected right now. There doesn't seem to be anything of use, though except for a much shorter MP3 of the telegraph track.
And that's everything technical I've looked at so far.
Go me!
FriShiE 0:58. FriNurH 5:05.
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Sorry, I'm not going to participate in this, I just wanted to share!
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