An Important Message

You know things have been pretty calm this past week or so, so I thought I'd take a break from talking about myself and do something I'm substantially better at: talking about all of you.  Well perhaps that isn't completely accurate, but this is about something that's at least slightly relevant to or directed at most of you.  I'm talking about something that many of encounter on a regular basis: Captha codes.  You know those strings of letters that you have to type in to put your comment on someone else's blog?  They're designed to keep computer programs from posting in places where they aren't supposed to, and in general I suppose that's a good thing, although I turned my captha's off in October, and never once has a program posted here.  You know, a while ago I didn't even mind, but lately they've been getting on my nerves.  Here, let me provide some examples:

(mundona)

This is about as bad as they used to get, which is why I didn't really mind.

(redit)                                                  (stole)

Sometimes they even came out looking like real words, every now and then they would even be words relevant to the comment that I had just made.  I always found these coincidences pretty amusing.

(cooties)                                          (dablog)

And I mean come on, how could you not laugh at a few of them.

(slain. t(r or i)v(I think that's an e followed by a v, maybe)I(not i, I, evidently there's a diffrence now))

But evidently they got tired of being laughed at, and google edited the captha's to prevent human posting as well.

(astere(t or i)(d or l) souls,(" or '', yes there is a diffrence))

It's very irritating trying to figure out what goes on in those blotches.

(usuldo What)

Eventually the codes were later re-edited to allow humans to post again, though still not as easily or entertainingly as before.  "What" indeed, this is actually on of the easier ones.

So yeah, sorry if I got a little whiny there, but it really is easy to turn those things off (just go to "Settings", then "Comments", go down to "Show word verification for comments", and select "No," it's quite simple), and it makes commenting around far less frustrating.  That's all I have for this post, but I really don't want to leave it at this.  I know, how about a song with a tangently relevant title and completely unrelated lyrics?  No, I don't particularly care that it doesn't fit the theme of the whole post, I like the song.

See you around

Cage

The Aura Interview

Look at that, I am killing it with these creative post titles.  Seriously though, this has been a good week for me, despite the thousands of miles transversed, I'm still in a good mood.  The only thing I can account this to is how much I enjoyed my visit to Eden Two, so at this point, if I haven't done so enough already I want to again thank both the Overseer and Aura for allowing me to see the facility, and interview you both.

I realize that until now I have neglected to describe Aura's appearance, let me rectify that now.  Aura was about my age, though she was a little shorter than me.  She had short brown hair and very green eyes.  She had a very casual feel about her, which was an interesting contrast to the Overseer's formality.  Anyways, after the Overseer let her in I started the interview right away.


Me:  Thank you for agreeing to be interviewed.

Aura:  Your welcome, it feels nice and interesting to be doing something like this.

Me:  So what's it like living in the Eden facilities?

Aura:  It's actually quite nice.  I still miss the way I used to get to live when I was a kid but not all bad to live here and keep safe.

Me:  So do you ever leave Eden Two, or are you just stuck here all the time?

Aura:  There's a rare occasion every so often where I'll be allowed out for a bit. But it's rare and has to be in a controlled environment. Try to have no risks I guess.

Me:  That makes sense.  You work with the Eden Facilities on some of their projects, correct?

Aura:  Every so often, I just like to see what I can do to help out while I'm here.

Me:  So do all of the people rescued by Eden participate to a degree, or was it just something you decided to do?

Aura:  I think I was the first to volunteer but a fair few end up helping out in some ways if they can.  Like how Jensen is volunteering to help, too.

Me:  How is Jensen coming along, by the way?

Aura:  I haven't seen him in a while but I hear he's doing fine. He hasn't regressed or anything. He must really feel safe now here.

Me:  That's good.  So, what is your job here at the facility?

Aura:  Oh, um, technically not a job per se.  I sort of just drift from work to work.  Like I help out sometimes with some of the paperwork or talking to new people like Jensen.  It helps to have a friendly welcome and proof of safety I guess.  Now that I'm on blogger I have been helping out with keeping watch though for more events going on.

Me:  So how much do you know about Eden's operations?

Arua:  I know we're trying to help people be safe from Him, I know that they keep trying to make new technology to help with stopping Him.  Umm, what else, what else?  Oh, right, and Overseer recently got that goo thing to experiment with too.  I don't really know much of the ins and outs I'm sorry.

Me:  That's o.k., I didn't expect a full list of operations.  I just wanted to see how well informed the average resident was.

Aura:  Oh, phew, that's a relief.

Me:  So you've been here 12 years now, correct?

Aura:  That's right.

Me:  Have you ever experienced the Product, as the Overseer calls him, since then?

Aura:  Thankfully no, I haven't had any encounters or effects in all this time.  The nightmares I guess but that's a given.

Me:  Not even on your rare trips outside the facilities?

Aura:  As far as I'm aware, no.  Unless one of the guards saw him and didn't let me know, or none of us saw him, or I saw him and forgot.  But as far as I know, I've been safe from him.

Me:  That's impressive.  Would you be willing to describe some of your nightmares?  If not I would understand, but I'm naturally curios.

Aura:  Oh, I'm (she pauses), I might at some point go into more details on my blog If I feel up to it.  The most I feel like saying right now is, it usually feels like I'm on The Path.  There's always black leaves.  He's always there but yet not.  Oddly the sky has usually been practically on fire during it too.  They've always been the constants in it.  There's differences as well though, sometimes everything is a wasteland, sometimes an abandoned city, sometimes no one, sometimes people I know (she pauses for a fair amount), sorry that's the best I feel like saying at the moment.  They can get pretty vivid, too vivid for my tastes.

Me:  I understand.  I remember some of the dreams I used to have, it's not a pleasant experience.  Have you ever had any contact with anyone you knew as a child?

Aura:  Sadly, no, I miss everyone so much but I can't risk any danger.

Me:  So what do you do here with your spare time? 

Aura:  Well I actually get supplied with some books, DVDs, Internet; although that one was obvious, even some games. So I tend to just relax with all that a lot.

Me:  I understand that until fairly recently you weren't permitted to search out information on the Product.  Why was that, and why did it change?

Aura: 

Me:  Well thank you for all that, and thanks for your time, is there anything else you want to say for the record?

(Aura surprised me here by actually having something to say.)

Aura:  More people need to start offering sympathy for the actual severe problems and not just the soap opera stuff going on to everyone.

Me:  (Slight chuckle) Yes the drama is a bit thick in this community, isn't it.  Anything else?

Aura:  Nope, that seems fine. Was nice to get to talk to you and take part in this.

Me:  Thank you, it was nice talking to you as well.

After that I talked a bit more with Aura and the Overseer, but I elected to return to Memphis as soon as possible so that I could get my car and return home.  Thus concludes my posts on the Eden facilities, for anyone who didn't get the link in the first post I'll plug the Overseer's and Aura's blogs again here.

See you around

FreedomCaged

The Overseer Interview

After the tour of Eden facilities we all went up to the Overseer's office, which was on the 47th floor.  It was larger than any of the offices on the lower levels, and it had an almost "working from home" feeling about it.  The Overseer sat at his desk and I sat across from in him, where I assume that his subordinates and colleagues sat when giving updates or receiving orders.

Me:  I want to thank you for letting me take a tour of your facility, I enjoyed it.

Overseer:  As did I in getting to allow someone to participate in a tour.  I want to thank you as well for showing such an interest.

Me:  Of course, your facilities have interested me for a while now.  My first question is this: where does all of your funding come from?  Obviously the law firm downstairs provides you some income, but I doubt it would be enough to pay for all this, plus eleven more.

Overseer:  Some of it has been provided by myself personally through the claiming of a particularly large inheritance.  Some additional funding is provided by a supporter within the American government itself.  A few other facilities have cover much like this one that helps provide income as well.

Me:  So when was the first facility built, and how long was it before you began to make more?

Overseer:  We had the first finished for the most part during 1999, work was already beginning on the others but slowly.  It took us most of the remainder of that year to finish up the last details on Facility 1.  After that particular incident in the Millennium; the other facilities stalled temporarily so we could make sure.  Within two months we felt assured that Facility 1 was a success and so continued on to make the others.

Me:  So why are you based here if the first facility was built in England?

Overseer:  Part of Project Destiny, the starting part is located here. I wanted to oversee it as much as possible personally.  It is also because a vast majority of those involved in this battle tend to be in America.  In fact, I notice a fair amount seem to be from the east coast, too.

Me:  That is a valid point.  So how do you keep track of all your different operations, the number you have in this building alone must require a lot of time and oversight.

Overseer:  Each department usually has it's own head to report to who will gather the information and file it to me.  It takes a while to look through which is why I don't have time to regularly post and comment many times.  Each facility also has their own head when I'm not there.  Their own sub-overseer I suppose we could put it as.  Who will help manage the projects there and report directly to me.

Me:  So how much does each person know about projects they aren't involved in?  They clearly know other projects exist, but if they wanted to could they learn of another projects focus or successes?

Overseer:  Likely not, for security reasons we tend to keep as little information shared as possible between the sections.  Certain projects tend to mix together so more info will be shared but never outright knowledge is given.  The heads however tend to know more to aid further with the planning but even then they don't gain the full picture.

Me:  So you're the only one with the full picture?

Overseer:  Correct.

Me:  So now for one of the bigger questions: How do keep your facilities safe from the product?

Overseer:  The perception filter plays a key role in that but also so does the way we manage our operatives.  We tend to make sure they don't go on a direct path back to facilities.  They are usually required to meet up with a security member from a facility on the way back.  They'll usually make sure that no one else is with them or following them as well as perform a psyche evaluation on the operative.  But I do think that the fact we haven't yet taken a full on offensive role against The Product has tied in to the lack of danger.

Me:  So it's more of a common sense and good fortune routine than an actual secret defensive weapon.  I'm sure some people will be disappointed to hear that.

Overseer:  Well we do have manners of defense prepared but we haven't yet been required to use it.

Me:  It's always good to have a back-up plan.  I suspect if I ask you won't tell me exactly what that defense is?

Overseer:  [chuckles lightly] I'm afraid not.  I'm sure you understand.

Me:  Of course, what about the other supernatural creatures that have a tendency to spring up and terrorize people, do you have projects dedicated to them or are you focusing exclusively on the Product for now?

Overseer:  We do have some small projects putting time into learning about them.  The Product is our sole focus but as seen by what Aura said in her story.  Those other beings were involved too.  We try to be more discreet with our investigations into them though.  These facilities are aimed at defence from The Product.  We're not overly keen on testing the effects of attention from the others.

Me:  I noticed on the post where you invited me to this facility that you recently had a problem with some of your scientists involved with testing the Azoth.  Would you care to elaborate a bit on what happened?

Overseer:  Ah yes, Dr. Fei Wong has been a long time colleague in this project.  Occasionally my employees will recruit new workers into our midst.  I will usually screen them myself too.  I made a mistaken in treating this too personal as I had good faith in his judgement and didn't screen the new scientist he employed two weeks ago.  Dr. Gordon Knox it turns out was someone not affiliated with this project but with someone else's efforts to fight back against The Product.  Corporate Espionage even in this fight it seems.  He tried to steal a sample of The Azoth and somehow much to my disappointment got past the other scientists.   Fortunately security was not lacking in their own job.

Me:  That seems like an interesting turn of events, do you know who he was working for?

Overseer:  Operative: Spiral is currently investigating the matter.  I'm aware of the existence of a few government agents that are fairly well-known and have interest in The Product but I strongly doubt that people like Fisk have anything to do with this.  It's likely someone low down.  It's possible it might not even be a government agent.  As you've no doubt seen.  There is a structure for many who serve Him now.  Their own corporate ladder for lack of a better term.

Me:  I've noticed.  How did you find runners and proxies to "rescue" before you began your blog?

Overseer:  Mainly through operatives out in the field and again through our employees keeping an eye on the news of different locations.  Especially different towns local news.  It's interesting how much that involves The Product fails to make mainstream news.  Some were easier to locate due to their insistence on wearing symbols like that Operator symbol on their clothing.

Me:  Why did you begin all of this, what was your thought process or end goal behind starting the facilities?

Overseer:  [there is a slight pause] I'd like to say it was out of a sense of justice or "that it was the right thing to do."  I do feel attached, I do feel a great pride in what I'm doing.  But admittedly it started off so I could prove that I could.  The standard drive behind most actions a scientist will take, even if some won't admit that.  It is always what fuels the desires of a scientist, to prove that they can.

Me:  (Slight chuckle) That's what fuels an alarming number of people, I'd suspect.  Tell me about Eden Eight, how, or possibly why did it fall?

Overseer:  Le Fay, short for Morgan Le Fay was the sub-overseer of that particular facility.  It was her actions that led to a lot of my current decisions when it comes to security.  She put too much of her personal bias and judgement into the role.  Far, far too much.  In her rash decisions; she ended up bringing in those on the Agent level of servants.  Ones that had no real desire to change and to make matters worse.  She had given them directions, she had made the location known.  They called The Product to that facility and he destroyed it.

Me:  Why would she take such action?  Surely even personal bias can only account for so much of such drastic actions.

Overseer:  I'm not quite sure.  I have a feeling her desire for the project shifted in some way.  Her contacts with me seemed to bear a tone of hostility in those last few days before the fall.  But, she died with the fall of that facility so I'm not quite sure on what exactly changed.

Me:  Well, you'll remember the posts she made in November, do you have any idea how she's still alive, or who might be impersonating her?

Overseer:  That I'm not sure on.  Although there is one possible theory: Le Fay was always (he pauses) fearful of the possibility of things to come.  Worried about what could happen in the future if this project was to fail, what could change in times to come.  She feared the future.  When my operatives investigated the ruins of Facility Eight, Le Fay's body was found in one of the labs.  Near one of our hypnotic devices.  These devices were electronically operated.  Bear in mind this is just a theory and to me it sounds unlikely but, I sometimes wonder if her mind was fragmented into the electronics, and that recently The Manufactured Newborn, as it is known, came into contact with her.  It seems impossible though so I don't quite know what to make of these comments.  Regardless, whoever it is has clearly learnt to manipulate a perception filter as I am still incapable of seeing them.

Me:  Let's see, that's all I have on my agenda, unless there's something you'd like to add for the record?

Overseer:  That seems to be all that comes to mind for myself, too.

Me:  Very good, do you mind if I use this office for my Interview with Aura as well?

Overseer:  Not at all, feel free.

Me:  Thank you, and thank you for your time.

After that Aura came in and I interviewed her as well, I'll try to have that post up later today. 

See you around

FreedomCaged

Visiting Eden

As you should know if you've seen the comments in my previous post, I was recently invited to visit the esteemed Eden facilities, run by a man who calls himself the Overseer.  For those who don't know, the Eden facilities are a group of 12 facilities that are run as safe-houses and rehabilitation centers for both runners and proxies, in addition to researching the Slender Man, or the Product, as the Overseer calls him, and incidents relating to him.

Out of consideration for my recent trip to California, the Overseer offered to provide me with transportation to New York, where the facility I was going to be visiting was located.  Of course I agreed, however I am a bit paranoid over advertising my exact location, and so on Friday, January 6th, I found myself returning to Memphis to meet with some new.  I naturally arrived at the rendezvous point early, but not five minutes after I found myself a nice all-day parking spot the limo arrived.  I'll say this much, if you visit Eden Two, you visit in style.  But you aren't here to hear about the accommodations, so I'll skip forward 24 hours to the next morning. After a quick breakfast I left my hotel to meet the limo again and we headed straight to Eden Two.  Honestly I'm not sure what I was expecting, but I'll confess to being somewhat surprised when we stopped right outside what appeared to be a typical private law firm.  I got out and approached the well dressed man standing out front, who I knew from our correspondence to be the Overseer.

The Overseer looked to be in perhaps his late forties or fifties, I've always been bad at identifying age.  He had gray hair and gray eyes, and was already smiling kindly as I approached.  After we got formally reacquainted he welcomed to into the building.  The lobby was exactly what you'd expect from a legitimate law firm: a reception desk, a few chairs, and some plastic plants scattered about, and after a quick look around I joined my host at the elevators.  The Overseer informed me that from floor 19 down the building actually was simply a law firm, then he produced a small key and inserted it into a small lock in the elevator, lighting up the buttons for floors 20 through 48.  Floors 49 and 50 however remained inaccessible, their contents confidential.

We began by going up to the 20th floor, where several of the offices for workers in the Eden facilities were located.  It wasn't until the elevator doors opened that I truly appreciated just how big this operation was.  The 20 and 21st floors were connected through a sort of balcony in the middle of the entrance area.  There was another reception desk here as well, set up for when visitors from other facilities came through, as well as several hallways containing offices.


And people, lots of people.  Well that may be a bit of an exaggeration, but there were several people moving around, and a few working behind desks.  Most of them seemed very focused, and even a bit on edge, they went about there tasks without even appearing to take much stick of their surroundings.  Evidently these floors were used  to keep track of field agents, investigate potential and confirmed "Product-related activities," and mange office paperwork that's inherent in any business, regardless of how public it's existence.  It was the sheer fact that there were several more floors like this, filled with people and offices, that made me realize just how large this operation was.   Even when you understand how big something is in theory, seeing it in person adds a new level of understanding.


But I digress.  Next the Overseer offered to show me to one of the offices, and naturally I accepted.  We walked down one of the halls and he opened one of the doors to an office.  It was a nice enough space, though it was shared by three different people.  It had a very professional feel to it, two of the men were typing away at computers, while the third had just stood up to get a file.  While the office was certainly big enough for the three men, it still felt a little small with all three of them in there.  This group of men was responsible for keeping tabs on one of the field agents in England, keeping him informed on important occurrences in his area, while at the same time staying aware of everything he was doing.  They seemed a tad uneasy, and one of them kept tapping his desk nervously.  I imagine they didn't report directly to the Overseer himself and weren't used to his presence in their workspace.  taptaptaptap


After that we went to visit an office built for one of the Operatives.  While the office itself was smaller it felt much more comfortable, and even had a picture vase with flowers in it sitting in one of the corners.  While the person to whom this space belonged clearly didn't spend all of her time there (she was "in the field" during the tour), she had still taken steps to make sure it was identified as her own space.  After we were through looking through her office we returned to the elevators and went up to the 27th floor, which was the first of the lab areas.

The Lab floors were naturally a bit more sterile.  The walls and floor seemed much more clean and several even appeared reinforced.  There were also more cameras on this floor, and keycards were required to enter most of the rooms.  The first lab we visited was the room where the Azoth experimentsAzoth, which I found quite surprising, of course I'll let the Overseer explain exactly what the results were if he wants it shared.

Then we looked at one of the rooms where the perception filter was tested, which I also found quite interesting.  The lab was set up roughly the same as the other one, with an experimentation area and an observation area, however in the experimentation area there were several mirrors set up, so that the subject of the perception filter could be viewed indirectly.  The filter itself seemed to be set up on two stands in the center of the room, though I'm not quite sure how to describe it.  It looked very technical and complicated, though most of the actual components were inside the device.  When one of the scientists in the lab actually stood between the stands I lost track of him for a moment, and it took a lot of concentration to focus on him again, which I was really only able to do because I knew what I was supposed to be looking for and where it was supposed to be.  Still, I haven't looked that hard to find something right in front of me since I gave up on trying to find Waldo.

Then we went to one of the security rooms, it also required a keycard to enter, and when we stepped inside we were again casually greeted by the security officers assigned to that room.  Most of the monitors showed hallways, and the rest showed several labs, both the experimentation and viewing areas.  A few of the monitors were turned off, I was assured that these were associated with rooms that no longer got use, and they were turned off for power reasons.  The room itself was fairly nice, it was large enough for both of the men working there to move around a bit, but other than the screens there really wasn't a whole lot to the place.

The last place we visited was the residential floors, which were dramatically different from the two floors we had previously visited.  The whole area was very "homey."  There was wood flooring, wide comfortable hallways, a more natural color scheme, and even some paintings here and there.  For a moment I almost forgot that I was 40 something stories high, the only reminder that we weren't in an actual house were the occasional signs directing people unfamiliar to the layout towards places like the indoor gardens, the cafeteria, and other notable areas.  The Overseer then took me into Arua's room.  Aura, if you're reading this I apologize for entering your room without your permission, in our defense it was the closest door at the time.  However, out of appreciation for your privacy I won't be to specific about the room, instead I'll just say this: it was very comfortable.  Aura had been able to customize the room in a way that gave me an insight into her personality and interest, and had arranged the layout in a way that was comfortable and casual.

After a few moments in the room Aura entered, and scolded us for looking inside without her permission.  After I had reacquainted myself with her, we went up to the Overseer's office, which was on a separate floor, and I had the pleasure of interviewing them both.  I'll have those interviews up sometime tomorrow, I still need to transcribe them from the audio recordings.  Anyways, that's the basic rundown of Eden Two, at least that's the tour I got, it was an interesting experience, and I enjoyed the chance to see it for myself.

See you around

FreedomCaged

Hidden But Not Gone

You know, while I was trying to think up an appropriate title I noticed that I have virtually no consistency in how I capitalize my blog titles.  Go ahead, look, my first post all words start with a capital letter, second post only the first word begins that way.  Literally every other post I made in October has all words begin capitalized like a book would, and then the others I just capitalize the first word, as though it was a sentence, I didn't even notice that until now.  I'm sorry, we should all know by now that I'm now stranger to irrelevant tangents, but this whole paragraph is just worthless, I guess that's what happens when you do an entire post in one sitting.

^Don't read that.^

Let's talk about perception filters.  This seems to be a very common occurrence in the Slender-afflicted community, I have even noticed several specific instances of it I have been directly involved with.  Despite their obvious uses and purposes, perception filters should not be confused with either invisibility, or the actual removal of information.  In fact, from a purely theoretical standpoint, invisibility would actually be considered an easier accomplishment, to make something invisible you simply need to bend light around it, or perhaps project something on top of it; but finding a way to censor data so that only specific people can see, or fail to see, it, without using some kind of identifier like a password should be far more difficult.  From what I can tell, there seems to be two kinds of perception filters (well obviously you could argue this several different ways, but for explanatory purposes let's assume that the most important thing is how many people are filtered): individual filters, and group filters.  As I believe the former is easier to explain I'll begin there..

Individual perception filters are filters that are placed over a single individual that result in them not being able to see something, or altering their perception of it.  It's relatively simple to explain, because the filter can easily be said to originate with the individual.  Individual perception filters deal with the mind of the afflicted person,  they set up barriers created by an external, or sometimes internal, entity to block or alter something.  These can be very broad alterations, like not being able to see anything on a specific subject, to very specific changes, such as not being able to locate a door right in front of you.  However, there is likely little variation from instance to instance, each encounter with whatever was being filtered should be the same as the past encounter, unless the filter has been cracked or destroyed.  

Group filters are more complicated, in that they likely stem from the thing being filtered, rather than being a case of multiple individual filters (though such possibilities are not out of the question).  A great example to use when talking about this is how nobody perceives the Tall Guy quite the same (if at all).  While he has appeared in "plain view" of several non-hunted people before, most instances show him not being perceived at all by them, though in some cases witnesses have apparently seen him as a regular person.  This shows how the filter changes a bit from person to person, and sometimes from encounter to encounter by the same people.  I believe this is because the filter doesn't take place in the affected's heads, but rather comes from Slender himself.  This also explains why the effect fails when viewing it back on a video tape, without the source there to exert the actual filter, people can perceive what was actually there.  This becomes tricky, however, when filters take on a more layered approach, with the sharp dressed man there is only really the hunted and the ignorant, and, assuming he marks his victims in some kind of physical or psychological way, there could be a variety of ways the filter could just pass over the proper group.  But when it comes to other things, where the differences between those subject to the filter and those who are not aren't so clear, things get a bit more confusing.  Because I'm lazy, and I haven't slept in a good 20 hours now, I'll save you my highly speculative thoughts on how that works, looking back it's not like my better grounded ideas have had the best wording thus far.

Well that's all I've got for you on perception filters, I actually typed out another paragraph, but then I read back over it and realized it was virtually unreadable.  Anyways, I'm sure none of you can see this post, except for Gargoyle, who's probably mad I made a post in this topic a full 12 hours before he makes one on the exact same subject (please be true, I feel like we're going for some kind of record here).

See you around

Cage

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth

If you don't know this poem, shame on you, google Robert Frost and come back when you're more educated.  I'm sorry, that's probably a bit harsh, this post isn't about Frost anyway, I just happen to be a fan of the man's work.  But no, this post is brought to you on request of a friend, he wants to spread a question around.  What happens after you take the Path of Black Leaves?  It is a good question, isn't it, going down that road is a changing experience for those with the fortune or misfortune to walk along its trail.

I have only ever entered the path once, and sometimes I still feel it, seeping into my head.  I have never had hallucinations, and I'm not one to remember my own dreams, but there is something in that realm that changes you.  When I first went in I knew far less than I do now, but I could feel the power of the place right away.  The ground, the sky, it all reeked of a darkness and His power permeated the trees, and it all hit me at once.  I... lost control, it's a place I have never taken it a second time for a reason, any power I hold over Cage is lost there, I all but blacked out as the cruelest part of my mind had more control than it had ever had before.  Even when I left the path, my mind was clouded and dark, I couldn't think straight for weeks.  It is a place that has more power over me than I prefer, so I largely leave it be, but there are still things that can be learned from it without actually taking the Path.

So little is truly well known about those trees, about that dark road, but some things are common knowledge:

1. Everyone's favorite weight-loss success story has some major influence over the place. It is believed to be his realm, or perhaps a barrier between his world and ours.
2. It can be used to accelerate travel, people can walk a few yards down the Path, and travel hundreds of miles on our land.
3. Traveling there is not a good idea, especially if you are not prepared, it has a way of infecting your mind, and no qualms about killing off the occasional trespasser.

Yeah, that's about it, sorry guys, that's all I can find that is even slightly reliable and consistent.  I should start scouring, more of the old blogs again, I suppose.  But for this one I'm leaving you with a request, please feel free to share any experiences you have had with the path, or any theories you've developed on it, this is one of those posts where I'll probably come back and add in the details later.

See you around

-Cage

Just a bunch of 1's and 0's

Yes that's right, it's time for another lesson in building and breaking code, and this time I thought I'd try tackeling binary.  Binary appears to be a superisingly common encryption technique in this communitty, possibly due to the fact that it is an extremly difficult (or more accuratly time consuming) code to crack manually, even if you know binary, but also one that is realitively simple to make or break if you have easy internet acess.  Another possible explination is that, in purely abstract terms, binary is actually more basic than regular lanuage.  Binary runs off of a simple yes or no system, it only uses two symbol 0 to represent no, and 1 to represent yes, each segment is usually eight units long (though there are some less common variations), and can be translated into a letter or symbol based off of the number and placement of the 1's.  Technially speaking, this is all you need to know to decode binary logically, but I'll get to that later.  The point is, that becuase binary only ever has eight arguments at a time, it can easily be seen as the next logical step down from rational thinking, which may be at least partially responsible for its semi-common use by people that are experinceing the mental breakdown associated with becoming "hallowed".

While most people belive that binary is "computer code", and are, for the most part, correct, binary code as we understand it was actually first concived in the 1600's by the German mathmatician Gottfried Leibniz.  Leibniz belived that all of logic could essisientially be broken down into yes or no statements, and created a system of ones and zeros to represent this.  Though this system had little to no practial uses at the time it is the first example of a system that repersents binary code as we know it now.  I'm aware that you probably don't just come here for history lectures, so I'll skip ahead, however it is always important to note binary's origin as a system logic that predates computers.  There are plenty of binary translators online, and I would recomend using those rather than trying to memorize actual binary code (while binary is relatively easy to learn, decodeing it manually is more time-consuming than trusting a website).  However, you may not always have a computer with internet acess avaliable when you find binary code, and there are some tricks to remember that can help you to crack these codes in such cases.  Here is a list of 52 letters (capatilized and lower cased) translated in binary, which I will refer back to for cracking techniques. 

Letter Binary Code A 01000001 B 01000010 C 01000011 D 01000100 E 01000101 F 01000110 G 01000111 H 01001000 I 01001001 J 01001010 K 01001011 L 01001100 M 01001101 N 01001110 O 01001111 P 01010000 Q 01010001 R 01010010 S 01010011 T 01010100 U 01010101 V 01010110 W 01010111 X 01011000 Y 01011001 Z 01011010

Letter Binary Code a 01100001 b 01100010 c 01100011 d 01100100 e 01100101 f 01100110 g 01100111 h 01101000 i 01101001 j 01101010 k 01101011 l 01101100 m 01101101 n 01101110 o 01101111 p 01110000 q 01110001 r 01110010 s 01110011 t 01110100 u 01110101 v 01110110 w 01110111 x 01111000 y 01111001 z 01111010

For the record a blank space " " is represented by 00100000, which shouldn't be suprising if you've noticed the pattern by now.

Before I get into the lists I want to note that even if you don't remember any of these tricks that you can still crack a binary code logically the same way you code a cipher as long as you treat each segment of eight numbers as an in individual letter and work from there (to help you should probably identify all of the eight segment sets and replace them with an aarbitrary number right away).  One of the first things you should notice is that all of these numbers begin with the pattern "01", which is actually quite useful when manually decoding something.  Logically there are only four possible ways for the first two digits of a binary pattern to be arranged: "00", "01", "10", "11", and if a segment of eight letters begins with any of the three crossed out patterns than you aren't dealing with a letter at all, and shouldn't bother trying to translate it  (though for the record all numbers begin with "0011") (also it should be noted that there are actually four symbols at the end of the spectrum that begin with "01", but they are rarely used).  The next thing you might notice is that the only diffrence between the capatilized and lower case letters is that wirh lower case letters there is a "1" in the third spot, and in the capatilized versions ther is a "0".  This draws attention to the fact that the first three digits can basiclly be ignored once you've checked to make sure what you're translating is actually a letter.  In case you didn't notice from the chart, the placement of the "1"'s and "0"'s is actually quite predictable after that: "00001"=a, "00010"=b, "00011"=c, and so on.  The letters start at the bottom of a scale, as the letters increase the "1"'s gradually work their way up towards the top.  And once they "fill up" the places below them, a new one forms at the top, and the places get filled in exactly the same way they did before.  For example: "00111" (which equals g) is followed by "01000" (which naturally equals h).  If you can remember this progression than binary code is actually quite easy to learn, and can be decoded with realitive ease.

Now this will probably be my last full blown post for a while, as this past week a cooling fan in my computer broke, and I want to get that fixed so I can run more energy comsuming programs without it overheating.  And since I don't want to log onto this account through public computers I won't actually be able to put anything on this blog, however I will probably still leave a few comments here and there through the nice Name Only feature on the blogs that have Anonomyous comments enabled.  Then, after next week I have finals, which means lots of essay writing and studying for my various classes, so even if I have my computer back I probably won't have the time or energy to update this thing.  Admitadly you all have your own concerns, and I'm likely not a major one of them, but this way you don't have to worry about checking back for new material inbetween all of your other various happenings.

See you around

Free

The oldest trick in the book

Hello again, everyone, I'm sorry I haven't been posting more, but sometimes it is difficult to find the time to sit down and focus on a single subject for a while.  In fact, I still have to record the results of that last poll, update my return post, and begin work on a case study I'm preparing.  But you aren't here to listen to me talk about the things I need to do or my excuses for not doing them, and because my actually useful tag is getting a shameful amount of work I thought I would give a basic tutorial on basic codes, specifically the Caesar's Cipher.

The Caesar's Cipher was so named because it was used first and most famously by none other than the great Roman Emperor: Julius Caesar.  Caesar would, when writing information he wished to keep a secret, shift all of the letters in his message right three times, for example A==D, B==E, and so on, with letters at the end of the alphabet wrapping around to the front ( X==A, Y==B, Z==C).  While this is infamously the most simple code out there, it worked quite well for Caesar, as many of his enemies were largely uneducated and the whole idea of encryptions was not widely used.  However, today it is embarrassingly simple to crack a Caesar's Cipher, though it can be admittedly time consuming if you lack the proper tools, as letters can be shifted as many times as the user chooses (up to 25, of course, for obvious reasons), though the most popular shift seems to be one of 13, so if you think you are dealing with this kind of code you should probably start there.

Of course shifting a letter over two or three (or even 13) places in the alphabet isn't likely to fool anyone for long, and to overcome this problem the Cipher has evolved over time.  One of the most successful ways of making a Cipher more difficult to crack for your enemies is to include a key in your encryption.  This means that instead of simply shifting letters over through the alphabet you use a phrase or other reference point to shift the letters to seemingly random other letters, so the shift is no longer completely liner. If the key is "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" (which is a convenient phrase at it contains every of letter in the English language) than you could use it one of two ways.  First you could shift the letters within the phrase over on top of each other, so that within the encrypted message T==H, H==E, E==Q and so on, leaving an encrypted message looking like this: "Heq Uickb Rownf Owj Uipso Wlqo Heq Azyd Gwt"  Ovbiously, this looks far more confusing if you aren't encrypting the actual key, but for teaching purposes it should be sufficient.  The other option is to use the key itself as the basis for coding the alphabet, and then adding extra shifts as needed, for example:

T H E   Q U I C K   B R O W N   F O X   J U M P S   O V E R   T H E   L A Z Y   D O G

A B C   D E F G H   I J K L M   N K O   P E Q R S   K T C J   A B C   U V W X   Y K Z

To avoid unnecessary confusion already used letters in the key were struck through, as were their translated counterparts.  As you can see, this makes cracking a keyed cipher far more challenging.  However, while it is no longer possible (or at least no longer feasible) to crack a keyed cipher through a brute force application (randomly testing all combinations of matchups until one that works is discovered) these can still be overcome logically, even without the key.  What is most important to remember when cracking a keyed Cipher (I am running largely off of memory and personal experience here, so I'm no longer sure that these examples qualify as strict Caesar's Ciphers, but they are close enough that I will cover them a bit further) is that English is a structured language.  There are many letters that will appear together very commonly, and other letters that appear only rarely.  If you are having trouble with some of the letters in a specific word it may help to make note of where within a sentence it is, that could narrow down the words purpose or meaning, and make it clearer what the letters within could be; this is where knowing the writing style of the coder can be very helpful.  Finally it helps to make a list of as many two or three letter words as you can think of, as these will be the easiest to crack, and will often give hints as to what some of the letters in the other words are, and make them easier to crack as well.  Needless to say, one letter words should be quite easy to crack as well.  All in all the longer a keyed Cipher is the more chances someone has to crack it, which is something to keep in mind when you are making your own.

That's all I have on Ciphers for now, though I will probably explore other kinds of codes in the future.  In fact you can make a cipher even more difficult to crack by stacking it on other codes, but this post is long enough, so that coding strategy will have to wait for its own post.  Now I must go update my return post, so until next time

See you around

Free

A Return

The blogger A has returned!  Now some of you may not know who this is, I myself have never actually seen any of his actual work as his previous blog (Defining) seems to have been mostly erased, but it seems he is back after over a year of silence.  I have no idea what A is actually like, I honestly haven't looked into him all that much, but from what I have discerned he was once someone important, and so I will, of course, be watching to see what this develops into.  Of further interest he claims that he is "Going to kill the Slender Man", wonderful, it's not like anyone has ever tried that before... I could provide more links, but you get the point.  Also his URL is "overcoming my humanity", which is daunting or concerning in the slightest.  I don't know why I'm complaining, if he succeeds than maybe my life can be just a little less dark, and I can spend less time trying to make a decision that will eventually kill me.  Who knows, maybe he knows something I don't, maybe he knows something I do, wouldn't that be interesting, but regardless I'm sure all will be revealed in time, and it looks like it should be interesting until that point anyways.

Anyway, because I didn't start this blog to outline the specifics, I'd like to turn this to a more general topic: Zombies.  Seriously though, it seems as though some of you people just can't stay dead, and I'd like to explore why that is.  We all know the Tall Guy likes hunting his prey for a very long time before moving in for the kill, some people have gone years before finally being killed, now I have several theories on why that is, but I'm not exactly at liberty to discuss all of them, so we'll just focus on how this effects someone's survival chances in other high risk scenarios.  It seems like many times He will just leave someone for dead rather than killing them himself, giving them a chance to survive exclusively through the force of will.  I believe that being hunted by such a fear inducing creature gives people a sense of determination that fades only when faced by the Man himself.  It is this new found determination and desperation that allows people to push through events that would have left them helpless and resigned to their fates prior to their stalking.  In short, because they have already been through so much, surviving some of these incredible circumstances isn't as big of a leap as it once was.

I have a little more to say on this subject, but I have a draft for an essay due tom arrow and I've been putting it off for weeks, so I'm going to leave off here for now.


Right, so I'm finally updating this, good for me, I need to get a cookie later to celebrate.  But first I'd like to go ahead and reiterate what some of the comments below have already said: Many times we have no way of knowing weather or not a person really died.  Heck in the Messenger's List of the Deceased there is a second list filled with people who might be dead.  It can be difficult confirming the death of a hunted (new term of mine, it's faster than typing runner/fighter, this is the only time I'll clarify), so many people are spread out, and when the one unifier we have is the interned it can be tough finding someone who actually identify the body.  Also I'd like to refer you back to the sacred Rule #1, while this is for me, it is important to remember that just because one person says they saw someone die doesn't mean you can trust them on that.  It's things like this that make it hard to be sure of a persons death, and thus make it more common to see such people return.

Also I'd like to address the possibility of supernatural resurrections.  Yes, yes, let us all sigh and roll our eyes at this thoroughly absurd notion, in fact, lets do it in unison 3 ... 2 ... 1 ... go.  Good, now that that's out of the way let's all remember what we're dealing with here: a supernatural creature whose origins, motives, and powers are largely unknown.  Things like someone genuinely coming back from the dead should surprise none of us at this point, as virtually everything else has been done already.  Of course the ramifications of such developments should not be taken lightly, either, anyone who has truly been revived has likely undergone a tremendous psychological metamorphosis, regardless of weather or not that was the intention of the resurrector.

Well, that's all I've got, sorry it wasn't full of danger, excitement, and intrigue, but hey, this is an analysis blog, not an action one.  I promise if I ever decide to be interesting again I'll let you guys know.  I hope it was at least informative, and not mind-numbingly boring.

See you around

FreedomCaged