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Cicada 3301

by imb on 11/28/13, 2:27 AM with 30 comments

  • by tokenadult on 11/28/13, 3:31 AM

    Please submit Wikipedia articles, if at all, with their original article titles. It's bad enough to have submissions of most articles from the Encyclopedia That Anyone Can Make Stuff Up In (can you tell I was just editing Wikipedia this evening, trying to fix problems), but worse when Hacker News guidelines are ignored to submit a Wikipedia article with a linkbait title. There are a few sources for this article (which is good) but there isn't much information about the article topic even from those.

    Have a happy Thanksgiving, by the way. Thanks for the kind submission, and don't mind my objection to the title not being the original article title.

    AFTER EDIT: After all, I read the other comments here before I posted my comment, and it's not even clear that a "secret think tank" is really what the source of the cryptic messages is. That's reason enough to change the title of the submission here.

  • by eieio on 11/28/13, 3:22 AM

    This is neat, but from the second paragraph of the article:

      According to a document posted anonymously, 
  the puzzles are a recruiting for a "think tank." 
  Thus far, this is unverified.[citation needed]
    Calling it a "secret think tank" seems disingenuous here.

  • by FLUX-YOU on 11/28/13, 3:09 AM

    http://uncovering-cicada.wikia.com/wiki/Uncovering_Cicada_Wi...

    Have fun. Also, no way to verify if it's an ARG or an actual group to my knowledge.

  • by mmastrac on 11/28/13, 3:19 AM

    Seems more likely that this is a group of 4channers looking to have some fun rather than a "secret think tank".

  • by perfectcents on 11/28/13, 5:25 AM

    So I just read through the Cicada 3301 wiki and on the last page (link below), in the questions sent to the last puzzle's "solvers," there are a couple references to Douglas Hofstadter.

    One of the response options is "Strange Loop," and one of the questions is:

    'I am the voice* inside my head (You undoubtedly just thought "I don't have a voice inside my head." That is the voice the question is referring to).'

    (If you aren't familiar, these are both references "I Am a Strange Loop", a book by Hofstadter.)

    Anyway, the reference to Hofstadter and the mysterious, elaborate, international nature of this Cicada operation reminded me of a previous thing. A book called “Being or Nothingness” by “Joe K” was mysteriously mailed to academics all over the world a few years ago, and I'm not sure anyone ever figured out why. In it, there were references to Hofstadter and other thinkers. Much like Cicada 3301, the whole thing was kind of intriguing and a little creepy.

    In "The Psychopath Test" by Jon Ronson, Ronson asks Hofstadter if he had anything to do with the book and Hofstadter said no. And why would he, right, but both the book and this Cicada 3301 thing seem very Hofstadter-esque to me. Just thought that might be worth pointing out.

    http://uncovering-cicada.wikia.com/wiki/What_Happened_Part_2...

  • by aroman on 11/28/13, 3:44 AM

    I submitted the same wikipedia page a few months ago and it only got around half the up votes. I guess titles and timing are everything :)

    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6389167

  • by ruchir_21hj on 11/29/13, 11:08 AM

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet/10468112/The-... A detailed analysis on Cicada 3301 by Telegraph.

  • by nospace on 11/28/13, 4:06 AM

    I have decided, arbitrarily, that Cicada/3301 is Satoshi. That was their first project (Bitcoin).

  • by stephenaturner on 11/28/13, 5:43 AM

    Seems like a game, or art project or something of that kind. It doesn't have to be overtly commercial to still be an elaborate ruse, and it's probably more fun if it's not particularly commercial.

  • by ajiang on 11/28/13, 3:37 AM

    Let's not give technical recruiters any more ideas ;)

  • by PublicEnemy111 on 11/28/13, 3:53 AM

    Anonymous has a great HR team

  • by somee on 11/29/13, 4:11 PM

    NEMO 33 Zwartebeek Brussels

  • by rfnslyr on 11/28/13, 4:25 AM

    Seems like an elaborate ruse.