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MIT Hacks XKCD Talk With AACS key
Reader Hanji alerts us to a hack pulled off when Randall Munroe, author of the popular webcomic XKCD, spoke at MIT by invitation of the Lab for Computer Science. MIT hackers dropped hundreds of labelled playpen balls onto the audience from hatches in the ceiling. The labels bore XKCD's logo as well as the recently discovered 16-byte AACS processing key. At another point in Munroe's talk he was stalked by remote-controlled mechanical velociraptors; but fortunately he had been supplied with a squirt gun full of grape juice.
thats better than being stalked by remotely controlled mechanical MPAA lawyers
http://xkcd.com/c202.html
Learn your history, n00b.
LOAD "SIG",8,1
Yeah arent college pranks supposed to be stuff of legend?
"Lets drop some things and then set our overpriced RC toys at him!"
"Genius!"
"Yep, we're MIT students!"
The xkcd talk was hosted by the MIT Lecture Series Committee, not the MIT Labratory for Computer Science (which was merged with the AI Lab to form CSAIL a few years ago, and thus no longer formally exists).
For some reason, I expected him to be really thin, and wearing a black hat.
This is a sig. It is appended to the end of comments I post.
how odd we don't see the two tags together more often
Actually, there's a reason behind the playpen balls (not pens). It's a reference to the strip.
In MIT-speak, a "Hack" is a prank.
I can't say whether that is related to "Hack", as in to program, or "Hack", as in to exploit software.
It's a little late to be jumping on the spread-the-AACS-key bandwagon, isn't it?
A Minesweeper clone that doesn't suck
The grape fruit juice and the raptors come from a blog entry about a letter he received.
Pfft, everyone velociraptors fear nothing besides traffic cones.
and the velociraptors http://xkcd.com/c87.html
Genericon is trying to get him to come to RPI next year, so with any luck I may get my chance to meet him. Until then I'll just keep plastering comics on my door.
Evidently, the key to understanding recursion is to begin by understanding recursion. The rest is easy.
The playpen balls were a reference to one of xkcd's more popular comics, Grownups. The message on the playpen balls was a reference to some of xkcd's comics "My hobby...".
In fact, most etymologies of the modern usage of the term hack go back to this use in the 1960s at MIT.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hack_(technology)
...that someone, SOMEONE, comes to my local city to chat that is even 1/2 as interesting. It has been YEARS since I was at a guest lecture... seem some good ones (esp Douglas Adams - talking about his book Last Chance to See). Wonder how you get on a mailing list...
"If you are on fire you can just stop, drop, and roll. If you fall into Lava you are just dead." - my 5yr old daughter
They chose velociraptors for a reason.
in stereo!
What was the name of that Internet "law" (more like an observation) that once you reach a point far enough to the political right, your viewpoint becomes indistinguishable from satire?
I assume you posted this in honour of the late Jerry Falwell.
I may make you feel, but I can't make you think.
They really need a new lecture hall. Most uncomfortable seats ever!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOWntIdegws
Were that I say, pancakes?
Now I know why the XKCD site is sooo slow. I just discovered it yesterday and was going through the back posts. Little did I know the site had been slashdotted.
You must be attending Clarkson!
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
is downright insulting to the rest of us.
Really? I didn't see anything in TFA calling me a poophead.
The term 'hack' has long been applied to various pranks on the MIT campus. Please read this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_hack
Unlike porn, which yada yada rimshot hey-ooh!
Well, to be perfectly precise, that's all a real hacker is. But those who released the key were crackers. Not to be confused with the fucking hilarious racial epithet.
For those who may have missed the Velociraptor joke, another one here, and one more for good measure.
I love xkcd!
"To be is to do." --Socrates
"To do is to be." -- Aristotle
"Do-Be-Do-Be-Do..." --Sinatra
I might consider hiding hundreds of labelled playpen balls in the ceiling and dropping them on the lecture a clever use of engineering and ingenuity. It's not everyday that happens...
Unlike porn, which yada yada rimshot hey-ooh!
Awwww. I miss that. LSC suxxxx! :)
Well, if they absolutely had to drop shit from the ceiling and involve the lame-ass robots, wouldn't it be cooler to drop ballpens with hidden RFID chips broadcasting that stolen DVD key, then make those raptors and random gadgets harass the carrier? Hunter-seeker transistor ants homing in on your cellphone? Mounted paintball guns targeting a passerby until she begs them to killer aunt delete select all? A tape recorder hidden in an elevator demanding MAFIAA royalties for listening to the elevator music the visitors "have not bought": hand over $2000 or we sue you for x100 that? A suit or armour OCRing the badges/name tags, then chatbotting the visitors. A rigged soda machine locking out non-diet cans if your BMI is too high? Anything, but this?
I would have to agree with GP, this MIT prank would be great for a Sunday school or a fat camp.
Obama likes poor people so much, he wants to make more of them.
Extremisim in any form is pretty tough to distinguish from satire. For instance, it's hard to tell if the thousands of the inane "OMG Linux+OOo+Beryl rocks M$ is the sux0r!" posts here are satire or not. I hope at least some of them are.
Playpen balls are an xkcd in-joke.
http://xkcd.com/c150.html
-----
PGP Key ID 0xCB8FF658
int getRandomNumber() {
/* P.S. Schneier approves! */ // Chosen by fair dice roll, guaranteed to be random.
return 4;
}
I'll gladly admit that xkcd is a great comic, and that there are plenty of smart students and professors at MIT. However, the disproportinate amount of press coverage that MIT (and the Ivies) receive is downright insulting to the rest of us.
Wow. You sound JUST like the people that bitch about how much press Apple gets...
You mean like Aram from Men in Hats? Man, I miss that.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Also, if you don't already know, being afraid of and protecting yourself from velociraptor attacks and playpen balls as sexual innuendo are a common meme at xkcd and on its forum. Simple things like releasing playpen balls and stalking Randall Munroe with velociraptors seem to be the perfect hack considering the general spirit of the comic. In the end, the sophistication doesn't matter if it completely misses the joke and just doesn't feel right for the occasion. There's a right time and place to show off your tech skills, but this one just wasn't.
:/- spoon(_).
Well shit, I'm sorry. If anyone at your school bothered or thought to stage a similar event, it might have gotten coverage. But nobody did. And maybe there's a reason for that.
Make Slashdot readable! See journal.
*ducks as joke whizzes over head*
Care to explain the significance of Clarkson?
(It's not that I'm bitter. It's just that pranking lectures isn't even remotely unique to MIT. I just don't get why the editors deem it even remotely newsworthy when such a prank is pulled off at MIT. That said, they HAVE performed some fantastic pranks in the past. I got a big kick out of reading about the lengths they went through to steal the Caltech cannon, not to mention the various crap they've put on top of the great dome. This prank, on the other hand, was pretty darn lame.)
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
You'd think that a comic like this would appeal only to those of the dorky persuasion, but I think I know why it has broader appeal. (I know at least one non-dorky person who doesn't know the technical background of the jokes, but still really likes xkcd.) It's because the comic isn't really about dorky things; it uses dorky jokes to talk about themes like loneliness which even non-dorks can appreciate, and does this often enough that many non-dorks find it worth the time to read. Compare this to, for instance, Schlock Mercenary, which has its appeal pretty firmly limited to dorks.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
I find it amazing that of all the moderation that comment got, not one of them was +1 Funny.
Chances are any disscution on Slashdot will degrade into a flamewar about ID/Christianity within 14 posts.
LSC..
You gotta find first gear in your giant robot car
"Lets drop some things and then set our overpriced RC toys at him!"
Great job, Guys! Throwing that switch and all, I can see your MIT education really pays for itself
</Barney>
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
NOTE: Poster is not responsible for the wrath of the world if someone actually finds a way to deface the moon. Besides, it was supposed to be a Coke logo, not the Magic Number...
Coke logo? All this time I thought it was supposed to be "CHA".
What was the name of that Internet "law" (more like an observation) that once you reach a point far enough to the political right, your viewpoint becomes indistinguishable from satire?
You're thinking of the law that "once you reach a point far enought to the political right, your viewpoint becomes indistinguishable from your liberal girlfriend's."
Oddly, it's equally disturbing for both parties.
One man's -1 Flamebait is another man's +5 Funny.
Having only recently been introduced to xkcd (and having read the entirety of the strip in one sitting) I have to say this entire thing is quite amusing. The balls, the raptors... obviously the folks who pulled this have read and understood the strip.
If you haven't read it yet, I highly recommend it. Geek humour at it's finest (and sometimes most touching)
Hey Rob, where's my 20 questions with the xkcd author???
If I knew the wedgies I gave you back in 6th grade would have resulted in this . . . I might have taken a moments pause.
The comics have the Title attribute defined. For example http://xkcd.com/c253.html. I read them all and noticed this a week later and then had to go back and read them all again.
I love xkcd.
Reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.
Firefox doesn't show the whole titles (i.e. hovertext) without the Long Titles extension. Get it. Enjoy it. :D
Don't miss the alt text.
In horseriding the term "hacking" is a horse ride for the fun of it. "I'm going for a quick hack about". There's also a "hacking jacket" which is a coarse wollen short coat with a particular pattern. It is considered bad form to wear these to a hunt unless you are a terrier man or other non rider.
I'm surprised that this term isn't ever referenced as it seems nearer to the comp.sci. meaning than using an axe in germany !
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Anyone confused about why playpen balls and velociraptors should see:
Grownups
Velociraptors
I support free speech and think the MPAA is overreacting. But at the same time, this guy (and everyone else who has plastered the key everywhere) is acting in a provocative manner. This whole argument is starting to sound like the brother/sister act of "I'm not touching you". Maybe if both sides grew up and actually tried to understand the other sides argument, this type of thing could be resolved.
http://timcol6.freehostia.com/
MIT is famous for it's elaborate student pranks. They call them hacks. For example, turning a hallway(or was it building?) into a Super Mario level, and other great ones. See: http://hacks.mit.edu/
True, but those who originally got the key and released it were crackers as it is illegal to initially knowingly release a trade secret. Everybody else just parroted the information, so basically the MIT boys were a poorly updated RSS feed
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
Mods: It's not off-topic. The 'xkcd' hat guy was modeled after the character Aram from Men in Hats. (See the alt text to this comic.)
Well, if you want to know if anyone takes the STR blog seriously, just check out some of the comments people leave. There seems to be quite a few that are not also satirical in nature.
It made me shudder even more than some of the crudest, most ignorant Youtube comments, which are basically the bottom of the barrel for human nature.
I may make you feel, but I can't make you think.
It's a good thing with all the patent issues that Richard Stallman now has his very own katana.d -part-ii-richard-stallman/
http://blag.xkcd.com/2007/04/19/life-imitates-xkc
What was the name of that Internet "law" (more like an observation) that once you reach a point far enough to the political right, your viewpoint becomes indistinguishable from satire?
i believe you're refering to Poe's law:
"Without the use of a winking smiley or other blatant display of humor, it is impossible to make a parody of fundamentalism that someone won't mistake for the real thing."
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
So go do something worth mentioning at your school.
/.
/. and go actually DO SOMETHING!
The students at University of California Santa Cruz (Go Slugs!) did the bit with post-its and got blag coverage just fine.
boingboing
digg
(and in the blue)
Parent should stop whining on
--
But to spit on the very act of creation is cheap nihilism.
-Metafilter
Yes, that's exactly it.
I think the reason I couldn't recall it was because I conflated the general concept of fundamentalism with the current political situation. The way it's actually phrased is much more universally applicable.
I may make you feel, but I can't make you think.
Has nothing to do with cleverness, but it has everything to do with the context of xkcd - perfect, in fact (but that is just one man's opinion)
So, like 27 people link to the playpen balls comic, but no one mentions that someone actually baked him a cake shaped like the internet - a deliciously(!) multi-layered reference to XKCD?
sic transit gloria mundi
on the other hand, you can go over to democratic underground.com and see this amazing trip down the road of stupidity and failed critical thinking
That isn't satire. That is an actual liberal posting on an actual mainstream liberal website and he is obviously batshit insane. I have never seen anything on freerepublic.com as retarded as that thread on democraticunderground.com
Care to explain the significance of Clarkson?
Clarkson (my alma mater) has a perennial case of the MIT / CMU / Stanford wannabees. They don't understand why they aren't a top-drawer engineering school. The answer is, as always, that they're a bunch of ninnies. Individually every (well, nearly) professor is smart as a cookie. But when they travel in packs, they become dumb as rocks. Sandstone, probably.
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
As crazy and conspiratorial as it is, that post seems downright sensible compared to the things Pat Robertson says.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
I think it's really there because 1)Randall Munroe is pretty much a demigod now, having the power to change reality, and 2) the AACS code.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
You forgot something. The juice joke doesn't make sense without that. :P
If you can't appreciate what is special about an MIT prank, fine.
But if you can't appreciate what is special about XKCD, then you have some reading to do. Start here. And don't forget to read the TITLE text by hovering over the images. (Not ALT text, as others have mislabeled it.)
Freedom is assumed. Then they try to take it away. The degree to which you resist is the degree to which you are free.