I have no idea what this means, but I’m going to throw it out there in case anyone can lend any insight.
You head to ChooseYourRevolution.com. You read a little short story, written in the first person, about a dreamer and philosophical rebel who wants to change the world for the better:
My first attempt at making the world a better place lasted less than two years. I had a fun idea, an endless well of passion, and eventually a big audience. But the attempt came to an end when I realized that I’d only found a partial solution to the mega-problem I was trying solve. That wasn’t good enough. People needed a total solution… and I was determined to find it.
So I called ****, who’d invented an Internet application now used, in various forms, by hundreds of millions of people. I’d heard about him through a few friends. “He’s the smartest man in the world,” one friend told me. “But he’s crazy…like nobody you’ve ever met,” another friend said. I was encouraged by their words.
I told him about the mega-problem that I’d set out to solve, and about the mega-obstacle that I’d run into. I was about to tell him that if, together, we could dream up and implement a solution, the world would be a better place. But he interrupted me, “We can do this,” he said. “And the solution will make people’s lives better, and perhaps bring together the world.”
We happened to live just a few miles from each other. So we met an hour later, shared a bottle of wine, shook hands, and prepared for the journey ahead. We started building the next morning.
Now, over a year later, we’ve created a solution.
It’s a website unlike other websites, powered by a technology unlike other technologies. Its single, fundamental task is to enable people and communities to communicate with each other in ways that were previously impossible.
If you register, you get a message. Mine read:
Your Key: Broke High School Students from Kentucky
Your key is unique. It is part of a pattern that reveals how we, together, will make the world better starting midnight June 13th. The individuals or groups that recognize this pattern and tell us why it matters — this is the secret that betters the world — will be honored in the e-mail that will direct people to the place where this revolution begins.To help you along, here are some tips:
1. Collaborate.
Though it is theoretically possible for one person to solve this puzzle, it is improbable. 1,000 people together have a much better shot at it.2. Don’t register multiple times.
We’ll know… and your additional keys won’t help.3. Check back daily for clues.You’ll get one a day. Today’s clue appears at the bottom of the screen.
Good luck. Be sure to check your email on the 13th!
So, what the hell is this thing? A puzzle? A mystery? Some kind of Da Vinci Code rip-off? Some of cult or New Age come-on?
Other answers that people have gotten include:
Somebody on an Unfiction forum created a Google map to show the locations.
At the bottom of the home page is this cryptic message:
wfzetg ih tpugimihw foqfz bva bggn esjsl.
yhi lszb idfwgp hkh njl uwksm crw.
So, what the hell does it all mean?
Tags: chooseyourrevolution.com, Choose Your Revolution
20 Responses
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The Pop View Says:
At 10:02 a.m. (ET) today, there were 948 registrations so far.
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AlvinBlah Says:
my key is:
Broke Women from Mauritania
Do you think this is some kind of global micro-lending program?
That’s my only guess, and I have no idea what the “clue” at the bottom of the page is, I can’t make heads or tails of the random text either.
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Maxcactus Says:
I think that the only way things change is at the personal level. Even if a solution eventually involves many people or an entire nation it begins with one person’s vision. I guess that this is an exercise at identifying with another person who may be in need. It is a way to initiate the turning of mental wheels.
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rtfm Says:
my key : Black Children from Pennsylvania
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jadecristal Says:
Black Women from Austria
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Eric Says:
A marketing campaign no doubt.
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Frank Says:
If someone has more free time than I do, this:
http://www.prustinteractive.com/toolbox/substitute/
might be handy for decrypting the gibberish.
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joel Says:
Rumor is that ChooseYourRevolution may be the next big social game project from the creators of I Heart Bees.
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The Pop View Says:
Now the code is gone, but this is at the bottom instead:
1. Reread my manifesto. You’re missing at least 14 clues.
2. Tell me what your key is in a blog entry. Then tell me how you think this revolution will begin. For now, you don’t have to be right. Just good enough.
3. Email a blog link to contact@chooseyourrevolution.com.
4. I will respond with the next clue on the blog of whoever comes closest to recognizing the patterns and the meaning behind them. -
The Pop View Says:
The most common English letter is E, followed by T, A, O, N, I and S.
The most common two letter words are OF, TO, IN, IS, IT, AS, HE, BE, BY, ON, OR & AT.
The most common three letter words are THE and AND, followed by FOR, HIS, NOT, BUT, YOU, ARE, HER & HAD.
Provided it is a substitution cypher, there is one two-letter word and five three-letter words.
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joel Says:
“In the young and burgeoning genre of alternate reality games, otherwise known as ARGs, the players’ collective intelligence is applied to cracking codes, solving puzzles, and completing complex tasks doled out by almighty ‘puppetmasters.’
“McGonigal wants to harness the power of the communal cerebellum her games create, and put it to work solving real-world problems. Maybe young folks in warring countries could play games together, and would be less inclined to shed each other’s blood. Maybe players could analyze real scientific data in the course of a game, crunching numbers and looking for patterns just as they always do, but with a payoff that goes beyond advancing to the next stage of a game.”
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The Pop View Says:
Someone on the Unfiction forum may have cracked the code:
“wfzetg ih tpugimihw foqfz bva bggn esjsl.
yhi lszb idfwgp hkh njl uwksm crw.”
is a Vigenere Cipher. Using yesterday’s result of “iowa couch potatoes exist.” gives usQuote:
orders of magnitude bring the best clues.
you have almost hit the first one. -
Flashish Says:
I got “Poor retirees from the Philipines”. I was kind of hoping for something easier like “Poor high school students from Beverly Hills”.
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MichaelJep Says:
Your Key: Christian Men from Colorado
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Ernie Says:
Careful, guys. This has Scientology written all over it. The answer’s gonna eventually be “They all have engrams!” followed by an ad with racially diverse people grinning like fools because now they have L.Ron in their lives.
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The Pop View Says:
At 10:02 a.m. (ET) today, there were 1068 registrations.
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coffeegirl18 Says:
Christian Retirees from Georgia
That was mine…it’s has religion/race, social class, location it seems.
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The Pop View Says:
What an explosion. By 10:10 a.m. today, there were 11327 registrations.
I’m guessing it’s because it is linked on the front page of The Huffington Post.
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The Pop View Says:
Clever, I guess. As of this morning, 11327 registrations.
And the answer was revealed last night.
A few public relations firms guaranteed me access to real, life-like revolutionaries. “We have an unparalleled web presence,” they all said. But Wilford and I didn’t want it to happen that way.
“Revolutionaries are like husbands or wives,” I said to Wilford. “They aren’t nearly as special if you buy them!”
He agreed. “Either this revolution begins organically, with people who want to make their lives and this world better, or it doesn’t begin,” he said.
It is my hope that together, we can help spread the word about this
revolution… the one that begins here!It turns out to be this:
Avanoo, a site that aims to tap into the “wisdom of communities” to offer answers to your questions
about life, is officially launching today.There are several question and answer sites already out there, such as AllExperts and new start-up Megabuzz, of Seattle. Each seek to maximize page views, and therefore advertising.
Avanoo appears to want to go deeper. Its idea builds on the “Wisdom of Crowds” theory, laid out in James Surowiecki’s book of the same name. For those who haven’t encountered it, the “Wisdom of Crowds” posits that the collective opinions of the many are more likely to be accurate than those of any expert.
However, Avanoo’s founders, Dan Jacobs and Jeff “Wilford” Vander Clute, say the Wisdom of Crowds, currently embodied on sites like Digg and Reddit, often represents the wisdom of a dominant social group and its sometimes mindless followers. Avanoo is designed to break down big crowds into discrete communities, along demographic lines. By doing so, Avanoo hopes to enable people to find opinions from the perspective they share.
Dan and Jeff, who are based in Venice, CA, have spent the last year stealth mode, developing a site and technology designed to ask any number of questions, capture the answers from any number of perspectives, and deliver results on demand. Today they are launching a wildly ambitious marketing campaign: 100 million opinions in 100 days. While this goal is pure madness, the world could have a pretty interesting resource for fun and research if it went according to plan.
The site’s Beta launch was announced in mid-May. The Choose Your Revolution domain was registered on June 1.
Dan Jacobs first made the news three years with a planned documentary in which he would go on 50 dates, one in each state. Jeffrey Vander Clute has worked at Clickshare, Lycos, eZiba, and Tripod.
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Chosenblogger Says: