| June 30, 1999 |
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Is this an authentic Cortana post? Note the address relay.arecibo.nasa.gov. Remember that Cortana has used the address cortana@jpl.nasa.gov in the past. The Bungie IPs match previous mails. But is it authentic? You be the judge! The Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico is the world's largest single dish radio telescope. On November 16, 1974 a message was transmitted from the Arecibo Observatory towards M13, a globular cluster 23,000 light years distant in our Galaxy. The Arecibo Message consisted of 1679 bits, to be arranged in 73 rows by 23 columns (those both being prime numbers). It graphically described a binary number sequence, hydrocarbon chemistry, DNA, the human figure (including a height scale), our solar system, and the Arecibo dish transmitting the signal. You can see the Arecibo Message in its binary form at:
http://rip.physics.unk.edu/Astronomy/AreciboMessage.html More info can be found at:
http://seti.planetary.org/seti-messages.html
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| June 29, 1999 |
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Well this is what the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, edited by John Clute and Peter Nicholls, London: Orbit, 1993 (ISBN 1-85723-124-4) has this to say about Keith Laumer's novel "A Plague of Demons":
A Plague of Demons (1965), in which a tough human is biologically engineered into a sort of superman so that he deal with a threat to Earth and finds - after a long, remarkably sustained chase sequence ending in his capture by some singularly efficient aliens - that for centuries Earth has been being despoiled of its best fighting men, who, like himself, are taken off-planet and surgically transformed into command centres for gigantic armed fighting machines embroiled in an eons-long interstellar war. In this cyborg form, he regains autonomy, organizes a revolt of his fellow cyborg-supertanks, and prepares to carry - fabulously armed - his message of freedom to the stars. Amazon.com has a short reader review of the book. It goes as follows:
A reader from Orange Park, FL , June 21, 1998
Something I accidently bumped into while surfing; Odd stuff!
It seems that the Soul is getting compettition from Marvin the Paranoid Android (of Hitchhiker's Guide fame). Which Is more annoying to talk to, Marvin or the Soul? Find out here: http://www.mijnbedrijf.com/thhgttg/marvin.php3 |
| June 28, 1999 |
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In the Marathon manual, there's a screenshot of the netgame setup dialog. On that screenshot, the currently selected is 'Mars Wants Women', instead of 'Mars Needs Women'. You'll find the screenshot on page 17 of the Marathon Manual. While it is now common knowledge that "Mars Needs Women" was originally called "Mars Wants Women" the fact that the original level name was present in the manual has never been documented on the Story page. The screenshot also reveals that the duration of the net game was set to 666 kills. And who was "beware the lady"? Perhaps the Bungie home movie provides a clue.
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| June 27, 1999 |
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I don't remember if this has been mentioned, but Acrappa pointed me to a Blam Sighting in the Myth: TFL manual. If you look at the screenshot on page 30, you'll notice a 4-person coop on Crow's Bridge named "blam ding". Blam... It's Everywhere! ;-)
you can play GURPS in the Marathon universe. Here's the link to the official web page:
Matthew goes on to say:
Since the Soul is so popular, you might want to remind people on the page to keep shaving letters off BOTH ends of their queries until they no longer get the programmed response. Good advice. Also check the Pathways Into Darkness page for the use of word triggers in one of Bungie's earlier games.
While friends of mine were making fun the the "Soul" at Bungie's page, I mentionned that the small thingy wasn't as capable as "Eliza", an early text-based program in which you are "interviewed" by the so-named Eliza, and it can leads to pretty interesting discussions.Ê So, when I typed something with "Eliza" in it, the ever-cute-looking Soul responded: |
| June 26, 1999 |
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Hmm...Someone probably already reported this, but I was messing with the Soul, and typed in a sentence, and got a response of "Me too."
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| June 25, 1999 |
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One of the dead people says: In fact Pathways contains an almost identical quote to that in "The Tick", namely:
Spiders. They're everywhere. Can't stand 'em. which is said by Greg on "Watch Your Step". The phrase "They're everywhere" is used throughout Pathways. Could this have also inspired the famous Marathon Bob phrase?
On "Try again" (Terminal 2), one of the Bungie technique "tips" is listed as:
I was looking through some odds and ends of the Story Page the other day, and I happened to glance at the Unformatted KYT Terminal. One phrase caught my attention: "I am hero". Oddly, this seemed familiar to me, as if from some old dream, but I couldn't exactly remember... Then it struck me. I scrounged up an old issue of "The Tick", and after searching for a while, came across a part where The Tick is reading the autobiography of "The Sultan, THE superhero of the 40s and 50s". The autobiography is entitled "Sultan: I am Hero". They provided part of the book too, the tinto reading "I am hero. In a world of violence and subversion I am a saver of lives and souls." This is pretty interesting, considering that "The Tick" is also the alleged origin of the phrase "They're everywhere!".
In chat last night Jdgermeister (Terrence Nowicki) was telling me about the HAL 9000 and the Damocles Oni computer. Well I then pointed out that the Jjaro Terminal Texture had the exact same image on it. Thus I took his picture of the two and added the Jjaro texture also. Also Jdgermeister noticed that the Girl (Shinatama) linked with the Oni Comp, and at the end of 2010 Hal and Dave become one nice HALDave9000 thing. You can see Bruce's pic here. Thanks also to Terrence who noticed the similarity between the red lense (eye?) on Damocles and HAL 9000.
http://macledge.com/interviews/oni-reyes/index.chtml At the end of the interview Lorraine indicates that her next project will be Blam! |
| June 24, 1999 |
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It is very likely that Oni takes place in 2032 as an influence from AIC/Youmex's landmark classic Bubblegum Crisis anime series (1987). Bubblegum Crisis takes place in Megatokyo, 2032 A.D. Although many anime series have been set in the early 21st century, I can think of no other events offhand in 2032... Back in Dec 2, 1998 the Story page reported on Alex Okita's manga influences. One of these was "Bubble Gum Crisis". Alex wrote "I grew up with this stuff.". Also in Aug 3, 1998 William Spencer <williamspencer@hotmail.com> wrote:
Durandal names the captured pfhor scoutship "Boomer". I think this is a reference to the anime series "Bubblegum Crisis". In the dark-future/cyperpunk universe depicted in the show, artificial intelligence robots are often referred to as "Boomers" because of this nasty habit they have: if the controls on their minds are damaged (say, from stress), they undergo a spontaneous growth in mental capacity, and this surge of energy causes the robot to "exhibit extreme violent tendencies"...Sounds a lot like rampancy, doesn't it? So perhaps the "Bubble Gum Crisis" influence extends further back in Bungie's history.
http://oni.bungie.com/gallery/screenshots/images/11ss.jpg Zach goes on to say:
An "appearance"? Damocoles is not only in concept art, screen shots, but also in the Oni trailer. Two times partnered with "Shinatama". Who is described by Bungie as "Cyborg dispatcher for the TCTF with a direct interface to the mainframe." human/AI symbiosis? Concerning the above screenshot Chris writes:
By bringing up the contrast and brightness (attached shot), we can definitely make out a round dark patch where the Marathon symbol is located in the concept art... unfortunately the resolution isn't good enough for us to really make out much.
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| June 23, 1999 |
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The Screen Shot is from when I was playing in the Gauntlet of Hyper Blade
http://oni.bungie.org/images/cover_back.gif The original TCTF supercomputer ("Damocles") pic can be seen at Bungie's Oni site at:
http://www.bungie.com/oni/gallery/misc/images/02.jpg
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| June 22, 1999 |
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You can get them from Bo's Marathon page at:
http://www.student.nada.kth.se/~d88-bli/marathon/
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| June 21, 1999 |
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Today's submssion by Navin Jain has been removed by request. Sorry for any inconvenience caused Jason.
http://pages.infinit.net/heady/tru7h_finder_1.3.sit (406K) Etienne also points out that the following URL reduces to a seven.
http://marathon.bungie.org/story/ No kidding. He also sent a list of others 'seven' words such as:
Marathon Infinity The list goes on and on... but I'll let you discover them for yourselves. ;-) |
| June 20, 1999 |
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I was chatting on the Oni Hotline server last night and the conversation eventually turned towards Konoko's new appearance. A Bungie person, who happened to be on, mentioned that the pictures were done by Wendy Pini, the girl who draws and created Elfquest. This explains why she basically looks just like an elf in the new pictures.
I noticed that Oni takes place in 2032. hehehe...
Check out http://www.mp3.com/artists/19/miro.html.
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| June 19, 1999 |
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Zach Pearse <zachy@usa.net> and Chris Butcher <cbutcher@atlas.otago.ac.nz> both point out that while Bungie's Oni site has changed and some old concept art removed the TCTF supercomputer ("Damocles") pic with the Marathon symbol is still retained. See: http://www.bungie.com/oni/gallery/misc/images/02.jpg The Marathon symbol in this pic was first noted way back in Nov 20, 1998. The fact that Bungie have retained this pic with its obvious Marathon connection is interesting. Back in Nov 21, 1998 Alex Okita of Bungie West had stated that he had drawn the symbol in for "fun".
In the "Blasts from the Past" section, under "Early Marathon usenet humor",
is the document that explains the "TRUE Story behind the Marathon delay".
Here is an excerpt:
Yes this comp.sys.mac.games post by David Barabe dates back to Nov 1994 long before Rob McLees joined Bungie and introduced the word "blam" into the Bungie lexicon. Seems that Bungie have also taken a shining to the word "blamma" as well. Back in '94 the word described perfectly the online madness caused by long delays and leaked Marathon betas. Ah those were the days! ;-)
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| June 18, 1999 |
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Here's the message you get when you register your secret email alias (see IMG's news page for details) on bungie.net: |
| June 17, 1999 |
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Remember that you thought that we didn't see Blake in Marathon 2 or Inf. I think that you are wrong. In fact, I think that we DO see Blake in the actual game. Where, you might ask? Robert Blake eh? WHERE'S MY TOZT?!!! ;-) All Robert Blake screenshots gratefully accepted? |
| June 16, 1999 |
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The recent discussion of how a Tick's energy and oxygen drain can't kill you reminded me of an odd observation I made a while back. If you have an invincibility powerup active as you run out of oxygen in a vacuum level, you don't die, even when the invinvibility wears off. Instead, the screen flashes and the "absorbed" sound plays, as if you had been hit. So apparently it's not having zero oxygen which kills you, it's hitting zero oxygen via the oxygen draining effect of vacuum levels, which triggers a (presumably infinitly powerfull) shot of damage from the inside, killing you. But if you're invincible, it can't hurt you, so you can run around the level with zero oxygen from then on. However, if you recharge on oxygen and then reach zero again, after the invincibility has worn off, you will die like normal.
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| June 15, 1999 |
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http://www.raingod.com/angus/OtherWorlds/ScienceFiction/notes/Mercy09.html And also his main Art Gallery page at: http://www.raingod.com/angus/OtherWorlds/index.html
As you may or may not know I have created a SoundSet for MacOS 8.5 or higher called The Marathon SoundSet. It features sounds from Bungie's very popular Mac games. You can get it at http://ds.dial.pipex.com/mzannetou Maybe Angus and Micheal should get together on this. :-)
I found this while looking around for Linux info. I thought it would be neat to look at. Marathon 2 running in Sheep Shaver on the BeOS. Nifty. http://www.sheepshaver.com/screen13.gif |
| June 14, 1999 |
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About the attacking tick-sequence:
I cant remember how, but the ticks do actually attack you sometimes -- I think it involved the invincibility powerup.
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| June 13, 1999 |
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"Gran Turismo: The Real Driving Simulator". SRCL 4269 Sony Music Entertainment Japan, copyright 1996 and 1998. (Date on the CD is May 21, 1998). |
| June 12, 1999 |
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...you mentioned that Tru7h Finder crashes on some words such as Marathon, Jjaro, Pfhor, S'pht, etc. I noticed that it also crashes on my name, Forrest Cameranesi, as well as a few other phrases I tried but don't recall at the moment. Now that 1.0.1 is out, I tried all these words again and found an odd thing in common; they all add up to nine. Apparently, anything which is a nine crashes Tru7h Finder 1.0. I wonder why this is? The number nine eh?
Okay, here's yet another TF update...
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| June 11, 1999 |
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Running out?!!! Order your copy today!
http://pages.infinit.net/heady/tru7h_finder.sit (399K). Further bug reports should be sent to Etienne at <heady@videotron.ca>.
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| June 10, 1999 |
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Loren Petrich's letter on the Story page reminded me of a 1996 Apple press release about Game Sprockets: Good question. The Apple press release is dated July 2, 1996 and refers to the Computer Game Developers Conference which was held on March 30 - April 2, 1996 in Santa Clara, CA. Were you there? The timing of this event is interesting since Marathon 2 had shipped at the end of Nov' 95 and Infinity development had just been announced (Feb '96). In those few months after Marathon 2 shipped work had begun on a Marathon 3 but was later dropped in favor of a new direction, namely Myth. Presumably Bungie had made improvements to the Marathon engine which while never released did see the light of day at the Computer Game Developers Conference in 1996.
This is similar to Marc Weber's prog Heptagon (568K) sent in Jan 3, 1998. See The Number Seven section for details. |
| June 9, 1999 |
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On the MP3 web site for the Oni and Marathon tracks, ...two weeks of course ;-) While you're at the mp3.com site download those Marathon 2 and Infinity MP3s.
While browsing Bungie's Dead Letter Office, I found this typical Webmaster anecdote most of the way down Old Letters from 1997 (before July): Have you got a yellow-and-black Infinity CD?
Loren Petrich <petrich@netcom.com> writes concerning what could be done if the Marathon source code was released by Bungie:
* Update Marathon 1 with Marathon 2/Infinity features. These include Life could be good! :-) |
| June 8, 1999 |
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Weekend Warrior was our first commercial 3D on the Mac. It dates back to the dawn of 3D Acceleration so it's fairly cheezy compared with Nanosaur or Bugdom, but try it out - its a fairly funny game. Back in Dec 17, 1996 the Story page announced:
The most expensive game ever? Amazingly the Bungie/ATi Weekend Warrior/Xclaim VR 3D bundle announcement is still up. ;-) At the time you needed the ATi card to really play Weekend Warrior making it the most expensive game ever. Now you can get it for free.
FYI, tycho.net is owned by some folks I went to college with. Tycho is the name of a cat owned by Qarin Van Brink, one of the principals. (Note that Qarin is the sister of David Van Brink, formerly of the QuickTime team. The world is much smaller than we think.)
Darkus: Have you ever come across something in a game that just blows your mind, and what was it? hehehe... rules? What's all this about rules? |
| June 7, 1999 |
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Well, if we're into spotting Marathon sounds, when opening a window under Windows 98 with the Theme "Baseball" selected, you hear the Marathon "Playball" noise.
For Marathon, Bungie has also been using sounds from the Sound Ideas archive (http://www.sound-ideas.com). Some sounds are downloadable (http://www.sound-ideas.com/downloadable-sfx.html). Try the 44 Magnum sound. Sounds familiar.. |
| June 6, 1999 |
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I discovered a while back. Sound Dogs.com <www.sounddogs.com> is an internet sound library. It contains literally thousands of sounds for developers to pay for and download to use in their projects.. video games, music, movies, what-have-you. I was looking for some sound effects one day after finding this place and happened to put in a search for something like "sci-fi space effects". And guess what I found? Nearly all of the M2 effects and all of the Jjaro and S'pht'Kr sounds.. My guess? Bungie and DoubleAught used Sound Dogs.com as their sound resource. Either that, or Bungie needs to look into this. ;)
More info about the Music Track mentioned yesterday. It is indeed named Nobody. And I have meticulously recorded every Marathon Sound in it. (Hey, I was bored) :) All sounds are considered centered, or equally balanced on each side, if they have no notation after them. '(Left)' means it is heard in the left speaker. '(Right)' means it is heard in the right speaker.00:01-03 Marathon 1 Startup Theme Beginning 00:02-04 Transport Out (Left), followed by Transport In (Right) 00:07 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 00:10 Drone Death (Left) 00:12 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 00:19 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 00:23 Drone Death (Left) 00:25 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 00:28-30 Transport Out (Left), followed by Transport In (Right) 00:35 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 00:56 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 01:02 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 01:36-38 Transport Out (Left), followed by Transport In (Right), Followed by Transport In (Left) 01:40 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 01:45 Drone Death (Left) 01:47 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 01:54 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 01:57 Hunter Howl (?Twice) (Left) 02:00 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 02:02-04 Transport Out (Left), followed by Transport In (Right), Followed by Transport In (Left) 02:10 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 02:31 Pfhor Worbble (Right) 02:38 Pfhor Worbble (Right) 02:44 Pfhor Worbble (Right) 02:52 Pfhor Worbble (Right) 02:56 Transport Out 03:11-13 Transport Out (Left), followed by Transport In (Right), Followed by Transport In (Left) 03:15 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 03:18 Drone Death (Left) 03:28 Drone Activate Twice (Right) 03:31 Drone Death (Left) 03:37-39 Transport Out (Left), followed by Transport In (Right) 03:57 Drone Death (Left) 04:05-08 Marathon 1 Startup Theme Begining 04:06-08 Transport Out (Left), followed by Transport In (Right), Followed by Transport In (Left)
i organized all the the myth-* connection theories we had on the site before, and added some new ones that you (forrest) wrote and some that were posted on agm/agm2.
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| June 5, 1999 |
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I saw a post on a Hotline server that said the 6th track on the Gran Turismo soundtrack contained several Marathon sounds. Intrigued I downloaded the track and found out that the post was correct. I heard these sounds, but I'm sure there were more: Having had the chance to listen to this track I can confirm Dustin's description above. The 6th track is simply littered with Marathon sounds. I wonder if Bungie know?
|
| June 4, 1999 |
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If you have problems hearing the music please let me know.
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| June 3, 1999 |
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Forrest Cameranesi <forrest@west.net> writes concerning the different Pfhor ranks. See The Pfhor section of Facts and puzzling things about... for details.
Well, I fed the new front-page link on blam.bungie.org into CalConvert, thinking that the hex would convert to some interesting decimal number... surprise, surprise, the character conversion was the interesting one. ;)
Incidentally, I think 6 is the accepted answer for the medieval question "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?"
Take the sixes away. They seem redundant. I would just like to point out the obvious here. blam.bungie.org is NOT run by Bungie and it's NOT Bungie's official Blam page. Also if the people who maintain blam.bungie.org have inside information on Bungie's new game Blam then they are either not sticking to their NDAs or they have been given licence to release it in a manner which is decidely obtuse. |
| June 2, 1999 |
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June 2, 1999: SJ Games Announces GURPS Myth More details can be found at http://www.sjgames.com/ill/ I know this is going to generate alot of discussion about whether or not this is item #2. I would like to remind everyone about what Matt Soell (Bungie Software) said back in Apr 19, 1999. Matt wrote:
You guys have an extra surprise coming down the road. When I asked Matt was the "some segments of the populace" Mythers? He replied:
No, not Mythers. So #2 is not GURPS Myth.
|
| June 1, 1999 |
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blam.bungie.org More Halo business at www.mythii.com |
| May 31, 1999 |
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...the word the soul responds to with the "source of my power" remark is neither "rolling" nor "lingling" but simply "ling." This could be a reference to Ling-Ling, or perhaps to something else... a search for "ling" on Altavista turns up lots of references to Buddhism and Taoism... the source of the Soul's power?
The Soul has apparently been updated recently. I was unable to get a non-random response using your name a few weeks ago. the same is true of several bungie employees. Notably, it still has no information about Pathways into Darkness.
|
| May 30, 1999 |
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Regarding Admiral Tfear's human-like appearance: on "Defend THIS!" Leela tells you:I have received a preliminary report from some members of the science staff who have finished post-mortem examinations on three kinds of Aliens. They report that by modern genealogical standards the different Aliens belong to different SPECIES.
I can't say how much this translation will differ from any other, but I belive that the exact line (in English) is:In the year 1999, 7th month, the King of Terrors shall decend from the heavens, and the King of Mongrels will be reborn.
Just thought you'd like to know, Bungie's Soul has it in for you. Ah!... Ling-Ling the all powerful!
Dear Marathon/Myth Lovers,
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| May 29, 1999 |
|
The picture is of Tfear surrounded by the bodies of Nebulons. We know this from Jason Jones' credit screen on "All Roads Lead to Sol..." He holds what looks like a helmet with three red eyes characteristic of the Pfhor. No surprise here since Tfear is a Pfhor fleet admiral, indeed he has a third eye on his forehead. What puzzles Brandon is why the figure is so humanoid like? If one remembers back to Marathon the Pfhor's features were very insectoid like. Even the Enforcers had these features. While there were some changes in Pfhor features between Marathon and Marathon 2 they still retained their overall Marathon look. So why does Tfear look almost human like?
THIS is the way the world ends. Now Erlendur Jonsson <hvammur@mmedia.is> writes:
Nostradamus... does not prophecise armageddon but a renewal after 2049 when WW3 is over after waging on from the 7th of July,1999. The seventh day of the seventh month? Ever the sceptical one I asked Erlendur for a reference for this. He repied
Sorry but this info on Nostradamus comes from an Icelandic book on Nostradamus called "Nostradamus og spadomarnir um Island" which is based on direct translations on the original texts and the book shows the entire text translated and everything about the translation is explained. So you can refer to this book if it is impossible to find this translation in english somewhere on the Net but I doubt the book would be very useful to you in Icelandic (very difficult language, haven't mastered yet and I'm a native:-) ). If anyone has any information on Nostradamus's predictions for the 7th of July 1999 please pass them on. References included please.
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| May 28, 1999 |
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http://blam.bungie.org/forums/blam.forum.cgi?read=70
...after reading Matt Soell's comments regarding a Marathon/Myth connection and the Great Devoid, I went back re-read some of Cortana's comments. The use of Angel in:I have walked the edge of the Abyss. Lucas continues:
The history of the Great Devoid only mentions that it was created by the Callieach to destroy themselves rather than be enslaved by the Trow. The name looked Celtic in origin so I looked it up. The Callieach was a neolithic goddess to a early clan of Celts. She was called the "Bringer of the Ice Mountains" and the "Bear Goddess." She was seen as a caring Goddess, who protected her people and cared for them. Also a governor of the dream realm. Her feast day is (get this!) November 21 (3 x 7).
You might be interested to know that 'Thule' was also the name of a Teutonic mystical group that existed in Europe in the middle of this century. No clue here as to how old it was, or if it's still around. By my reckoning, it was a Hermetic order, basically a Nordic contemporary of Israel Regardie's Order of the Golden Dawn. It probably took its name from the Latin you referenced, to mean 'the Northern lands,' exactly. And the least said about that the better!
Check the source of Never ever read the source code... it could be dangerous! ;-)
Just one thing
Well, it isn't a big Blam breakthrough or anything, but I did some Soul interrogation and discovered a possible new response. I don't know if this has already been found or not, but I haven't heard of it in any of the recent soul posts. When asked about "rolling", it responds: "Ah, you seek the source of my power...never!" (I was just typing crazy stuff and I had that "Rollin', rollin', rollin', keep them doggies rollin'" song in my head, having watched the Blues Brothers recently.) |
| May 27, 1999 |
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Bungie recently registered blam.org and blam.net with the Internic. Simon Brownlee followed this up and found that blam.org and blam.net were in fact registered by Bungie back in Mar '98. The big question at the time was what were Bungie up to? Of course we now know... or do we? Sarwat Khan <sarwat@interlog.com> points out that while blam.org and blam.net are still registered by Bungie the name Halo isn't. It has been suggested that Halo was another (real?) name for Blam. Of course this could be mere speculation. But what is odd about all this is that Blam is suppose to be a codename. If it is and Bungie release a game with a different title then why did Bungie bother to register blam.org and blam.net in the first place? Something to think about. ;-)
On the B.org Blam! site the e-mail link "Us" reminds me of the old Double Aught sites' link to their Contact page. Hmmm... seems the so-called "Angel Gang" have updated their page again! Now they have Forums... though it's easy to miss the link.
As of this morning, the Core (Blam Core sounded silly, sooo...) moved into its account at http://core.gamestats.com/ and opened for business. Good to see the former Myth Codex crew get their Blam site up.
"Ultima Thule" is from the Roman writer Seneca's tragedy _Medea_. The full quote runs as follows:Venient annis saecula seris, Sounds very Cortana'ish.
I'm not sure if its relevant here, but Thule is the name of an archaeological complex dating from approximately 1000 AD and were the immediate predecessors of the Inupiat Eskimo.
Have you asked the Soul: loquerisne linguam latinam hehehe... madness.
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| May 26, 1999 |
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Received: from dux2.tcd.ie (dux2.tcd.ie [134.226.1.24]) by dux4.tcd.ie (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id XAA09371 for <hsinclir@dux4.tcd.ie>; Tue, 25 May 1999 23:12:17 +0100 (BST) Received: from mail.bungie.com (IDENT:root@mail.bungie.com [209.125.9.11]) by dux2.tcd.ie (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id XAA07748 for <Hamish.Sinclair@tcd.ie>; Tue, 25 May 1999 23:12:13 +0100 (BST) Received: from freak (freak.bungie.com [209.125.9.7]) by mail.bungie.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id RAA01717 for <Hamish.Sinclair@tcd.ie>; Tue, 25 May 1999 17:09:56 -0500 Message-ID: <002b01bea6fb$e71ea560$07097dd1@bungie.com> From: "Nathan" <nathan@bungie.com> To: "Hamish Sinclair" <Hamish.Sinclair@tcd.ie> Subject: The Soul Date: Tue, 25 May 1999 17:14:04 -0500 Organization: Bungie Software MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2014.211 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2014.211 X-UIDL: d8024875b94d7c6298a122894521bd4b The Soul just thinks it has a sense of humor - I'm alive and well and, at least for the moment, still employed. :-) Nathan
I when to http://blam.bungie.org/ last night and once again the page had changed. I took a look at the HTML and found two words I assume are from Cortana. <HTML> <HEAD> <TITLE>B L A M</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF"> <!-- ultima Thule --> <!-- Cortana --> <center> <IMG SRC="blamlogo.jpg" ALT="B L A M"><br> <a href="mailto:blam@bungie.org?subject=What's the fuss..."><IMG SRC="truepath.jpg" ALT="Choose..." border=0></a> </center> </BODY> </HTML> I looked up the word Thule in my trusty American Heritage Talking Dictionary and found: Thule: 1. The most northerly region of the habitable world to ancient Greek geographers. Posited as an island north of Britain, it has been variously identified with Iceland, Norway, and the Shetland Islands. 2. A town of northwest Greenland northwest of Cape York. A U.S. naval base was built here during World War II. Population, 449. To my amazement there was a reference to the term "ultima Thule" also in the Dictionary: ultima Thule: 1. The northernmost region of the habitable world as thought of by ancient geographers. 2. A distant territory or destination. 3. A remote goal or ideal: "the ultima Thule of technology, the ne plus ultra . . . the answer to every earthly problem" John Gould
Today's version of the Blam! site features the caption "there is only one true path." A reference to our timeline-hopping cyborg from Infinity? Let's hope so! Wishful thinking perhaps or something more?
However while the Myth Codex may be gone my understanding is that both Ferrix and Malory are hard at work behind the scenes creating a new Blam site. Presumably this will be at a new URL.
I've noticed that the Soul uses a standard 'keyword' identifying procedure : that is, to trim the last letter or letters of a word so that various tenses are recognised. IE: Hung/arian, hung/er Hung/ry would all be trimmed to the keyword hung* (meaning that the word "hung" wouldn't work. This particular word is a bad example since "hungarian" is the keyword, but I have noticed this practice in other searches. |
| May 25, 1999 |
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Question: Nathan Bitner Could it be true or has the Soul lost it? Afterall as Mike points out if you ask the Soul about Bill Clinton you get this response:
Question: Bill Clinton
Check out the BLAM reference in Rob McLees's rant at Bungie's soapbox. It was put up on Jan 21, 1997. Rob McLees wrote in his Soapbox article:
"so I snuck up behind him and BLAM... that was cool"Michael Trinder <mike.trinder@arct.cam.ac.uk> writes:
Looking at the two Craig Mullins Oni images, the second one 'Oni Figure' caught my eye because of the architecture... then I noticed that the first one features the same concrete waffle slabs, yellow escalators and chunky detailing around the columns that surround the open atrium. See also the Lloyds Register of Shipping Headquarters in London at http://www.richardrogers.co.uk/rproject.html#lyd and http://propertymall.com/ayh/p-lloyds.html for architecture similar to that seen in Oni. If you remember Bungie ran this ad some time ago:
7/12/98: So we're looking for an Architect! Someone skilled in the following: AutoCAD r14, 3DStudio MaxR2, and a few years of experience in the architecture business. Also Bungie have repeatedly stated that real architects were working on Oni's level design to create realistic urban landscapes. |
| May 24, 1999 |
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I was rereading Tolkien's "The Fellowship of the Ring," and in Chapter Eight, there is a quotation from Lady Galadriel. She hands to Aragorn a sheath for his sword Anduril (somewhat similar in spelling to our rampant friend) and states "The blade that is drawn from this sheath shall not be stained or broken even in defeat." Sounds a *lot* like Roland's blade, doesn't it? And Aragorn is definitely of the hero type...
...if you ask it "Do you speak Hungarian?", it replies "No thanks, I'm full." A truly bad pun, sounds like something from Matt. Hmmm... when did Matt Soell start making bad puns? Did I miss something? ;-)
Hey, have you tried saying, "i love you" to the soul? err... not lately no. ;-) |
| May 23, 1999 |
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| May 22, 1999 |
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I went to Bungie.org's Blam section and it contained a mysterious blurred image. After looking at it for a while and conferring with those around me we figured out what it is. The three Bob image from the Marathon Trilogy CD. Can't be coincidence. Odd stuff.
i'm betting that this (Halo) is considered a SNAFU at bungie, the reason they took it off.
Halo Jones (no relation to Jason Jones) was a comic book sci-fi heroine created by writer Alan Moore and artist Ian Gibson for the UK based 2000AD comic (2000AD is probably best know for the Judge Dredd series). Highly acclaimed for its detailed plots Halo Jones (The Ballad of Halo Jones) gained a cult following. Halo first appeared in issue 376 (7th July 1984) of 2000AD and ran for only 37 issues. Divided into three books the first two were adapted for the stage in 1988 and Halo Jones herself was the inspiration for an album track by Transvision Vamp. Further details about Halo Jones can be found at these sites:
http://www3.fast.co.za/~stuartm/rave/cypunx/comix/halo.html
Marathon-to-halflife page... http://www.bovinia.net/marathon maintained by Thomas Riisbjerg <thomas.riisbjerg@image.dk>.
...but then there's the Great Devoid. Omer points out that the origin of the Great Devoid is given in Myth. Omer writes:
MTFL manual p. 46: So what was Matt referring to when he said: How did it get there?
Check out the _12_ number [1+2=3] binary image at
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| May 21, 1999 |
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It may not be quite as simple as that: there could be some part of the source code that they can't or don't want to release, and it would take some effort on the part of a programmer to get it cleanly removed. For example, the source code to Descent had to leave out the sound driver, since it was licensed from a 3rd party.
Here is another possibility of why #2 is most likely not the Marathon source code:
I'd like to point out that there will be no blam site to succeed mythii.com. The content will be merged into another new Myth site that will open Soon(tm). But you did uncover something... there are two sevens in the HTML. 2 + 7(!) = 9 = 3(!) ^ 3.
The thing in the background on mythii.com is the logo for myther.com.
This recent talk of Halo got me thinking. When we look at what a Halo is, it's a circle of light round luminous body, especiallly a sun or moon; a circle ring or the disc of light surrounding head of a saint (the angels always have them.) Note also the reference to an angel in the Cortana transcripts:
Dragon Magazine http://www.tsr.com/dragon/, the ultimate TSR roleplaying magazine, is featuring FOUR Myth dark units in their "Dragon's Bestiary" column. I recall that three of the units are Fetch, Ghol, and Trow.... Any guesses on the fourth?
Heyas, futzing around w/ the Soul I was surprised to find that it knew my name! That's right, enter Colin James :) It also knows the nick I used to go by when running MythFiles and during my admin and beta testing days: coldfront.
Seeing as the Soul knows Elvis I thought I'd see who else the soul knows. Try asking the Soul "do you know satan". The response sent a chill down my spine ;-).
Question: Tu hablas espanol?
When the Soul is asked if it speaks Spanish, it responds with "Por supuesto me little Juanita." This should be "Por supuesto me pequena Juanita." (tilde on the n in pequena). This means "Of course my little Juanita."
When asked "tu hablas espanol?' the Soul's answer "Por supuesto me little Juanita" translates to "of course my little jaunita", though the "me" should be a "mi". Guess Bungie learned Spanish from the treasure hunters in PiD. Hehehe...
All this Soul-talk on the Story Page (particularly the level-name ones) enticed me to have some fun with the Soul. I decided to plug the names of all the single player maps from the three Marathon games into the Soul and see which levels it gives you spoilers for. |
| May 20, 1999 |
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just a few things to say.
The Soul's been updated! hehehe... I guess the Soul has been briefed.
...the soul doesn't seem to know anything about Cortana. When asked It never gives the same answer. Sounds familiar. ;-)
Try asking the Soul about Elvis.
If you happen to have taken a level beyond Spanish I, maybe you can understand the Soul's answer to the question "Tu hablas espanol?" Because I sure can't. Also, telling the soul "I am God," "Are you God," etc seems to invoke an interesting (albeit slightly Nietzchian [sp?]) response. Will continue to probe the soul for answers. |
| May 19, 1999 |
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I think if you read the Cortana emails it is obvious that there's a connection. :-) I think that without knowing the story, they [IMG] can only report on basic generalities.... And if all one knows about Blam is the tiny bit of info which has gotten out, it would certainly seem that there is no obvious connection. Matt also had this to say about plot connections in Bungie's games:
...things are often more related than they may first appear. For example, there's no obvious similarity or connection between the Marathon world and the Myth one.... Matt wouldn't reveal what was at the bottom of the hole!
It hasn't been deliberately postponed or anything. Still on the list of things to do. It's just that, with the crush of E3 and a few other things, I suspect it will be a little while before it happens. What is the expected release date? Matt replied:
No announcement yet. It's one of those things that could happen at any time. Will Bungie be needing beta testers for #2? Matt answered:
It's not the sort of thing that will need beta-testers. Matt's final remarks about #2 are worth repeating.
I'm very eager to see #2 happen....I'm looking forward to seeing what happens afterward. ...happens afterward? Sounds intriguing.
Concerning repeated requests to have all the Marathon music tracks released on CD Matt revealed:
I was pushing to have all the Marathon music tracks included on the Sack CD, but it looks like we won't have enough room. Also Minotaur is unlikely to have TCP/IP support. Matt stated:
We worked on a TCP/IP version a while back but that was never finished so I don't think it'll be included.
Oh and check out Cyberlingling too. :-) |
| May 18, 1999 |
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On IMG's E3 page <http://www.imgmagazine.com/news/e3/e3.html> I came across this tidbit:"In addition to Oni, Bungie is currently working on a new title. At E3 Bungie was showing the game behind closed doors to print media (to secure future previews). Not much is known about this title except that the codename is "Blam". Here's what we do know..."Blam" is Jason Jones next game, whose previous titles include Marathon and Myth. The game has been in development for more than a year and it is expected to be released sometime in the year 2000. And from what we've heard, "Blam" is not set in the Marathon or Myth world." If IMG are correct and "Blam" is not set in the Marathon world then what are all the Cortana emails about? Matt Soell has gone on record saying that #3 was a new game and that the Cortana emails were related to this. Given the many Marathon-related references in the Cortana emails you might wonder what is actually going on here. And just what happened to #2?
First of all, regarding level titles, "Arrival" is also the name of the first episode of the British TV series "The Prisoner". Originally the series' creator, Patrick McGoohan, only wanted to make SEVEN episodes, but was persuaded to make SEVENteen.
Try asking the Soul these questions:
Ask the Soul:
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| May 17, 1999 |
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So it's "Two Months" now? ;)
Looks like the Codex boys may be starting up... yet another site. ;-)
The Soul is out of date!
...remember that little sigma is the seventh to last letter in the Greek alphabet fact? Well, I just noticed that "T" is the seventh to last letter in our alphabet... and how many times have you replaced that T in tru7h? It's all connected I tell ya! ;-) |
| May 16, 1999 |
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To reiterate what I believe is already being said: Oni will *maybe* ship by end of year. However, they learned a valuable lesson from Myth II and *really* don't want to ship until it's done. They were handing out Job Postings and I noticed they're still looking for someone to head up QA. Could someone *please* sign up for the job ASAP? :-) #2 is 'postponed' until further notice?!!! |
| May 15, 1999 |
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I finally get a chance to sit on a computer and I see that everyone has pretty much gotten whatever news scoops were to be had... perhaps.... :) If you remember Matt Soell had this to say back in mid-April:
You guys have an extra surprise coming down the road. And also:
I will reiterate one of my points from last time: Event #1: The Bungie Action Sack, actually called the "Mac Action Sack", will contain six of Bungie's classic Macintosh-only games: Minotaur, Abuse, Pathways to Darkness, and the complete Marathon trilogy all for $19. Good news for those who haven't got the Trilogy Box Set. Perhaps we'll also see an upsurge in Minotaur playing across the net. :-) How many people remember these from Minotaur?
Mask of Disguise
I know you and Bungie have a fascination with 3 and 7, but here's a tidbit to chew on..... Trend? Naw...
Mjolnir
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| May 14, 1999 |
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For more info on Blam! check the Cortana section.
Seeing as it's under discussion at the Story page I thought I would remind everyone that the potatoanus can, in fact, be killed. Mind you it isn't easy. This was proved with a lot of grenades in a Co-op film done by Miha of the MI level "Poor Yorrick" and can be found at the Marathon Vidmasters' page. Ever seen a dead potatoanus? Yuk! The co-op film can be found in Miha's Infinity Vidmaster pack. It's worth watching for the potatoanus football alone. Perhaps a new sport? ;-)
...in perusing the "Are You the Cyborg?" page, I was struck by the commentary about being able to "see" when you are dead -- and perhaps that implies implants, embedded links to Durandal, and whatnot. However, in PID, the dead are quite aware of stuff going on around them, stuck there aware and unable to interact in any way. It seems to me that the player is just the same -- except that we have the TAB key as a "get out of death free" card. Interesting analogy. Imagine getting killed in Marathon and having to lie around on the ground for 50 years or so until some guy with a Yellow Crystal comes along. Frightening thought! ;-)
Check out http://wm.themes.org/ If you check out the new themes list you'll find Marathon 2 listed at... #7 !!! ;-)
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| May 13, 1999 |
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Here's some notes in response to Forrest's comments on the Shapes file. Make of them as much or as little as you will. |
| May 12, 1999 |
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A number of people rightly pointed out that the two names in the subject headers are in fact real people! Don Lloyd <dlloyd@cfa.harvard.edu> of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics was first in with the information. Don writes:
The subject headers of the two recent Cortana messages include the names Paul Butler and Geoff Marcy. Story page readers interested in astronomy may recognize them as extrasolar planet hunters. See their team's web page at
Both R. Paul Butler and Geoffrey W. Marcy are in a group involved in the search for Extrasolar planets. Right, planets that revolve around suns other than our own. Check out these URLs.
I did some research on R. Paul Butler and Geoffrey W. Marcy and found these things...
...the sigma sign in the latest Cortana email was probably a higher-ASCII mis-translation. I believe it was intended to be the option-dash symbol (a long dash), often used to separate parenthetical (?) statements - like this - from the rest of a sentence. But that symbol uses an 8-bit ASCII identifier, while lots of the net still uses old 7-bit transfer methods. Thus, the translation between 8-bit and 7-bit uses a series of 7-bit characters to identify an 8-bit character. But sometimes the translation can be messed up, and the wrong character comes out on the other end. I've often seen option-dash symbols accidentally turned into sigmas. So, that's probably the case here, too. Good point. The Story page regularly receives mail containing seemingly extraneous symbols. I ususally delete these characters before uploading but in this case I left them in... just to be sure... to be sure. However... Lawrence Cabusora <lcabusora@peapo.exeter.edu> writes:
Just a random little thing I noticed about sigma being the seventh to last letter in the Greek alphabet. Don't know if anyone has mentioned this, but the Earth is the seventh to last planet in this solar system... and seeing as that the first sigma in the Cortana message is in the context, "As for this world [sigma]..." Hmmm... makes you wonder doesn't it! Turning to the main text of the cortana email. From the many comments received there would appear to be general agreement on two of the following lines:
This enemy - YOUR enemy - has proven more irritating than I anticipated. They own nothing which they have not stolen. This is similar to a description of the Pfhor's technology from Marathon 2
Most of the Pfhor's technology was plundered from sites abandoned by the Jjaro. And...
I can recall a sun - black, but shining - and the creatures that inched along its fiery tracks. This is similar to a description of the W'rkncacnter again from Marathon 2:
When the W'rkncacnter came, Pthia was Many people (not all) thought that Cortana's remark:
I at least find some joy in tormenting the other entity that seems quite trapped in this antiquated excuse for a network. was a tongue-in-cheek reference to Bungie's Soul. Others however felt that perhaps it was a reference to Leela trapped in the Vylae FTL network. However Omer Shenker <oshenker@iname.com> makes an interesting observation about the Cortana line:
It is certainly mindless, though for reasons I have yet to understand, it appears to have an unhealthy preoccupation with my mother. Omer writes:
The Disembodied Soul is being tormented by Cortana, who happens to be Jason Regier. Heh... given that Jason Regier has left Bungie for Blizzard he is undoubtedly open game for comments like this! Who remembers the Bungie Webmaster's comments about Greg Kirkpatrick's mother? And people STILL want to work for Bungie?!!! ;-)
JPL is the Jet Propulsion Laboratories, responsible for things with big engines, like... bussard ramjets. Terrence Nowicki <kablam@edmail.com> and Episkopos Pushkin <pushkin@disinfo.net> both point out that the Cortana lines
< Transfer Interrupted! > would be at home in any Marathon terminal.
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| May 11, 1999 |
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Received: from dux2.tcd.ie (dux2.tcd.ie [134.226.1.24]) by dux4.tcd.ie (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id XAA28169 for <hsinclir@dux4.tcd.ie>; Mon, 10 May 1999 23:42:50 +0100 (BST) From: cortana@jpl.nasa.gov Received: from mail.bungie.com (IDENT:root@mail.bungie.com [209.125.9.11]) by dux2.tcd.ie (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id XAA24909 for <hamish.sinclair@tcd.ie>; Mon, 10 May 1999 23:42:49 +0100 (BST) Received: from vesta.bungie.com (bob.bungie.com [209.125.9.8]) by mail.bungie.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id RAA09755 for <hamish.sinclair@tcd.ie>; Mon, 10 May 1999 17:41:09 -0500 Date: Mon, 10 May 1999 17:41:09 -0500 Message-Id: <199905102241.RAA09755@mail.bungie.com> To: hamish.sinclair@tcd.ie Subject: The Dissertation of R. Paul Butler X-UIDL: c8677456edd11d5a589ed876a6fd2031 I'm everywhere!
A second email arrived shortly afterwards:
Received: from dux2.tcd.ie (dux2.tcd.ie [134.226.1.24]) by dux4.tcd.ie (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id XAA12890 for <hsinclir@dux4.tcd.ie>; Mon, 10 May 1999 23:50:30 +0100 (BST) Received: from mail.bungie.com (IDENT:root@mail.bungie.com [209.125.9.11]) by dux2.tcd.ie (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id XAA25749 for <hamish.sinclair@tcd.ie>; Mon, 10 May 1999 23:50:29 +0100 (BST) Received: from Cortana (cortana.bungie.com [209.125.9.49]) by mail.bungie.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id RAA09847; Mon, 10 May 1999 17:48:49 -0500 Message-Id: <3.0.6.32.19990510175201.00798e50@mail.bungie.com> X-Sender: cortana@mail.bungie.com X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Light Version 3.0.6 (32) Date: Mon, 10 May 1999 17:52:01 -0500 To: hamish.sinclair@tcd.ie From: Cortana <cortana@bungie.com> Subject: Honors Thesis of Geoffrey W. Marcy Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by dux4.tcd.ie id XAA12890 X-UIDL: b0029884061f1ec3a48297b1e9196f6d There. Was that more to your liking? While you quibble about whose node I may control, what archaic program I may manipulate to communicate with you, or which system I may have temporarily disabled, taken over, or completely destroyed in the process, I am busy saving your pathetic futures. I am still not sure what he ever saw in you. Nevertheless, I at least find some joy in tormenting the other entity that seems quite trapped in this antiquated excuse for a network. It is certainly mindless, though for reasons I have yet to understand, it appears to have an unhealthy preoccupation with my mother. As for this world
One point to note... the Cortana email contains the Greek symbol sigma ( |
| May 10, 1999 |
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You can directly query the Soul. |
)
which appeared twice in the Cortana email:
