A Dastardly Scheme from the Parent Corporation

Recently one of our supporters in Schenectady, NY was about to take a Regents examination on "Living Environment" when she was waylaid by Deandre M. Ellis, a known operative of the Parent Corporation. We are still working with our operatives to understand the motives behind the scheme, but it appears that the Parent Corporation has taken some interest in whether our supporter (who shall remain nameless to protect her identity) passes her Regents examinations. The police have Mr. Ellis in custody and have given us full access to him, but we haven't been able to learn much about the reasons behind his disguising himself as a girl to take the examination. Some of our other operatives (including "Viktor") have been canvassing their areas to find signs of a greater plot, but we have no conclusive evidence of anything yet. We would like to ask our supporters (as a precautionary measure) to be alert and notify us of any similar incidents so that we can form a better picture of the Parent Corporation's intent. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not grateful for your vigilance!

Bad News: More Bank Failures

We recently announced the failure of the Nabisco Triscuit Bank, and it is with great sadness that we must announce the failure of another bank due to insufficient liquidity. The bank in question (Saga Garden Bank) was located in Saga prefecture in Japan, and had a single customer with 360 million yen (US $4 million) invested, but failed due to market pressures when an unknown culprit absconded with the money. Their customer died two months later, and since there were no other customers the US government has neglected to let them share in the bailout plan.

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we want nothing less than for our supporters to be financially responsible. It is much easier to take care of a society where individuals take care of themselves. We would like to warn our supporters looking for investments of a few warning signs:

• Limited deposits/withdrawals allowed. While this may not be a sign of a bad investment, it should at least get you to question it. The Saga Garden Bank, while it was immune from house fires and earthquakes, only allowed for deposits and withdrawals if you brought your own spade.
• Very low interest rates. Although rates have dropped recently, any time your bank offers you zero or negative interest you should probably avoid the investment.
• Reputation. If the bank has no other customers you may want to avoid them.
• Security measures and insurance. If the investment offers no physical or electronic security for the money, it is probably a bad idea. If the investment has no insurance, it is probably a bad idea.
• Account access protocol. If the bank has no protocol to ensure that only the account owner can access his money, it is probably a bad idea.

As you learn and carefully follow these guidelines we are confident that you will be able to avoid the less stable banks such as the Saga Garden Bank of Japan.

New Zealand's Funniest Home Convicts

Michael Crichton suggested in The Great Train Robbery that our impression of criminals as dumb brutes is wrong, and that our impression is based solely on the criminals who get caught, who are obviously a less-intelligent segment of the criminal world than those who don't get caught. This video of an attempted escape by a pair of convicts in New Zealand illustrates this point very well. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not amused by their escape attempt, but we know that we would all be better off if we caught more of the intelligent criminals. We pledge to our supporters to do all in our power to increase the intelligence of our incarcerated criminals.

One more thing...

As our research into the Parent Corporation and its goals, structure, methods, and tactics continues we are constantly learning more about the threats they are unleashing on the world. We have posted about the hole punch and its associated evils, but we left out one important piece of information that has now become clear: not only is the hole punch dangerous, but the "holes" or circular pieces of paper that it produces are as much or more dangerous. Until now our research has focused almost entirely on the dangers posed by the hole punch itself. Don't get us wrong, the dangers are real and they are significant. We urge our supporters to not be lulled away into security thinking that there is nothing wrong with a hole punch as long as it isn't used incorrectly. What surprised us, though, was the evil that is the punched hole.

Punched holes may seem innocent, but if you have ever used a hole punch and accidentally bumped the plastic cover for the hole receptacle you know how quickly those innocent little disks can spread. "Okay," you're saying, "so it is a bit irritating. What danger does it pose to me?" Most of the time the paper we buy is harmless, but there are paper manufacturers and dealers that traffic in paper soaked with hallucinogenic chemicals or other noxious substances. They don't do this for profit, mind you. They do it out of hatred for the human race and the potential it has. The Parent Corporation has not made their contempt for civilization a secret, and we know they have used hole punches to transfer large quantities of hallucinogens without being observed by the authorities.

If you are lucky enough to never come into contact with the Parent Corporation or its operatives then you may not need to heed our advice, but for the vast majority of you it would be wise to avoid not only the common hole punch but the punched holes as well. We know that many of you have long suspected the dangers we are uncovering, and we would ask you to please write in with your stories so that we might share them with the world. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not committed to the fight against tyranny in all its forms!

Henry the tuatara: A love story

While there are few that would argue that we have a shortage of romantic novels, one segment of the world's population would probably make just that argument: those who want to read romantic stories about reptiles. There are plenty of stories out there about reptiles. For an example take Edgar Rice Burroughs' series about Pellucidar, the world at the earth's core. Reptiles feature prominently in these tales of the perils of prehistoric earth, but very rarely in a positive light. The dominant race when our protagonist arrives in Pellucidar is a race of reptiles called Lahars. They don't even have the chance for romance as they killed off the males of their species long ago and reproduce through some unspecified asexual means. Most of the other reptiles do not even have any emotion or intelligence ascribed to them.

We are very pleased, then, to inform you of a real-life reptilian love story playing out in New Zealand right now. Henry the tuatara was unable to maintain any sort of positive relationship with any of the female tuataras that the zookeepers introduced to him until he had a tumor removed from his bottom. Something about this operation (the scientists would probably say it allowed his bodily systems to return to normal, but the romantics know that it had to do with Henry finally sensing his own mortality) caused him to no longer lash out at female companionship, and at the age of 111 Henry finally became a father! At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not pleased that Henry has overcome his fear of commitment!

The Obesity Virus

I, for one, was very pleased today to read about Nikhil Dhurandhar's recent research linking obesity with a gene for the common cold. He make it clear that this virus cannot explain the significant increase in the proportion of the world's population that is obese, but that it is likely a contributing factor in some cases. It's refreshing to see people take unique approaches to problems, and it's even more refreshing when it seems like an episode of Red Dwarf. We hope that Dr. Dhurandhar will spare some of his team to look for the luck virus soon. With a virus like that we could, dare I say it, rule the world!

The problem with dynasties

Amid rumors of the failing health of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-il the Asian media outlets have put forth a variety of theories of who should succeed him. Yonhap has named Kim Jong-un as the most likely successor, but others argue it will be his older brother, Kim Jong-nam. Such crises of succession are prevalent in dictatorships for the important reason that dictatorships are run by a single individual with unlimited power. If the dictator dies before choosing a successor there are often dire consequences.

At the GNU Public dictatorship we are nothing if not progressive, and would like to point out that succession will not be a problem in the GNU Public Dictatorship's model. The advantages of being led by a Board of Dictators are not limited only to the distinct points of view we bring to the table, but clearly extend to crises of succession. As a member of the Board passes, another will be chosen to replace him or her, completely eliminating the power struggles that occur when a dictator passes without choosing a successor. There will always be some risk that all Board members die simultaneously (at least until we perfect our asteroid shield), but in that even it is likely that the world's population will be reduced to the point that tribal chiefs should be able to maintain law and order.

A first step in greenhouse gas emissions

Japan took an important step today to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by launching a satellite to study greenhouse gases from space. This satellite will orbit the earth at an altitude of 666 km and according to Japan's Space Agency Jaxa:

"Gosat (Global Greenhouse Observation by Satellite) will 'contribute to the international effort toward prevention of (global) warming'."

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are just glad they are thinking ahead and creating some greenhouse gases during the launch for it to study while it's up there.

More retaliation!

It seems that the Parent Corporation does not want us to stand up to them. They have once again attacked one of our supporters in his home and burned him severely. Do not despair, we have no intention of capitulating, and their attacks on our supporters will only serve to galvanize our resolve to crush them as they would crush us. We join with Princess Leia in saying to the Parent Corporation that "the more you tighten your grip...the more star systems
will slip through your fingers."

Busy busy busy

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we have been nothing if not very busy over the last weeks. The amount of new information available to us because of the surrender of our antagonist "John" has been monumental, and we are not yet through all of it. We are glad to see that other organizations have stepped in to take care of some of the more important world problems (for example this bill). We thank you all and congratulate you for your willingness to pick up the slack while we are busy with our research. We assure you that when we have gleaned enough information from these documents that we will return our full attention to important world affairs.

The Reason

We have received such a flood of request forms about the Reason brads have tines of differing lengths that we have decided to hold a special board meeting to discuss whether or not to reveal this secret publicly. One the one hand, we will satisfy your curiosity and enable you to make more informed decisions about brads, but on the other hand we will be putting ideas in the heads of impressionable world citizens that have never thought of such twisted things. The GNU Public Dictatorship's Board of Dictators will meet on Saturday, January 31, 2009 to discuss your requests. Until that time we ask that you refrain from submitting Form 4482-12J to request this secret.

The Unholy Brotherhood of the Hole Punch

Recent weeks have seen very interesting developments in the world of office products, but perhaps the most noteworthy was the emergence of the common hole punch as the Parent Corporation's tool of choice. Most of you are aware of hole punches and have seen them in action. Some of you have even used them before, but after you read this post it may be a long time before you find yourself tempted to use one again.

Before we get started, some housekeeping about the nefarious brad. Almost everyone agrees that brads are sinister, but the reasons they are so sinister are not so well known. We exposed several of these reasons in our previous post about the Brad Guys, but several of them remained a mystery. Until now, that is. Recent documents from the Company's archive have cleared up many of the mysteries surrounding the brad, including the real reason the tines are of different lengths. The cult of the brad has been exposed. Unfortunately, the world is not yet ready for the reason brads have tines of different lengths, and many of the secrets of the cult surrounding the brad are better left as mysteries. If you would like more information about either of these topics please submit Form 4482-12J (Request for Sensitive Information Regarding the Company) to your local GNU Public Dictatorship office. If your reasons for knowing are legitimate and you pass a personality profile (and, of course, there are no blemishes from elementary school on your permanent record) we, the Board of Dictators, will meet to decide whether to give you the information. Your other option is to wait until the information can be made available to the general public, but we can't make any promises on how soon that will be.

But enough about what we can't tell you. What we can tell you is much about the dreaded Unholy Hole Punch and the evils associated with it. The history of the hole punch begins in the stone age with cavemen and other neanderthals who decided they needed to punch holes in leather in order to make more fashionable clothing. One bright neanderthal stumbled upon the idea to use a piece of bone to punch a hole in the leather from one of their kills, and the awl was born. Incidentally, for the curious, the reason it was named "awl" is because the inventor's name was Awlaw, or Awl for short. We have spent much time investigating the awl, but we have found no evidence to link it with the perfidious purposes to which the common hole punch has been put. To spell it out more clearly, we do not see any reason for our supporters to discontinue their use of awls at this juncture.

Regardless of the innocuity of awls at their inception, the ideas behind them have been twisted beyond recognition. Many years later when the memory of Awlaw had all but disappeared a new player appeared on the stage. Nobody knows his real name, but the historical record is clear that he told be to simply call him "Mister." "Mister" arrived in Germany in the early 12th century, just when paper was beginning to be common in Europe. He asked a blacksmith to create an "awl for paper," but was disappointed with the result. He finally asked a local clockmaker to design a cross between an awl and scissors, and what emerged was the early version of the common hole punch. "Mister" did not initially cause much controversy with his invention until he started using it to deface public proclamations. The official historical records of the time do not mention "Mister" as he was not caught in the act. The only reason we know is because of the documents we received when "John" surrendered to us earlier this month. As it turns out "Mister" had several more hole punches created and he recruited a small group of loyal supporters whom he called The Unholy Brotherhood of the Hole Punch. They clandestinely punched holes in all of the proclamations issued by the local magistrate, and they made it their business to cut the proclamations up and, with the aid of some twine and their hole punches, transform them into hideous puppets of the local leaders. Interestingly, they always tied their twine in such a way that one lead was longer than the other. In addition to terrorizing the local leaders they also used their hole punches to create holes in paper that could later be filled with other substances, and in this way they maintained a drug trafficking network whose existence was never guessed by the local authorities.

The Unholy Brotherhood of the Hole Punch (UBHP) began to expand, and by the 18th century had convinced nearly all of their neighbors that hole punches were nothing to be feared. This careless attitude toward hole punches has pervaded society even until recent weeks. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we would like to be the first to warn you all that handheld hole punches are anything but innocent, and that continued use thereof will be harmful to your physical, mental, and emotional health. In addition to their history of use in illicit activities and their close association with brads, hole punches have also been linked with personal health issues such as carpal tunnel syndrome, increased arthritis pain, and blood blisters, and with social health issues such as the spread of cholera and the common cold. There have been other studies* that have delved into the link between perforation of paper and delinquency in children, but we believe that most of our supporters are already aware of them. We urge our supporters to err on the side of caution and rid their houses and places of work of these nefarious instruments of evil before the Parent Corporation can use them to enslave us all and make us do their twisted bidding.

* If you have access to a university library or similar facility, a simple search for the keywords "perforation" and "delinquency" should yield quite a number of interesting results. Unless, of course, the Parent Corporation owns the library.

Retaliation!

We knew we were taking some risks in exposing parts of the Parent Corporation, but we are deeply sorry to this 78-year-old woman (who shall remain nameless for her own security) who was intimidated by agents of the Parent Corporation. Her sacrifice has been noted, and she is now under the protection of our operatives.

We believe the Parent Corporation had taken note of her tireless support of the GNU Public Dictatorship, and in the typically craven way the Parent Corporation tends to operate, decided that due to her advanced age she would be an ideal target. They took her money and murdered her parakeet, but what the article linked to above does not mention is that while one of the "robbers" was demanding money the other was spreading hole punches and brads around the apartment. Do not fear for her safety, however, as our Brad Disposal Technicians have swept the house and found them all.

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not appreciative of your support! We are constantly amazed at how much you all do for the fight against the Brad Guys and the Unholy Hole Punches. Keep up the good work!

New information about the Parent Corporation!

We have been debating for several days now whether or not to make this new information about the Parent Corporation public before our research is complete, but in the interest of your safety we decided to take the risk and let the Parent Corporation know that we know. "Viktor" has been instrumental in confirming this information, and "John" has been mostly cooperative in our interrogations. What we have confirmed is that the Parent Corporation has many "brands," so to speak, one of which was the Company. Each of the "brands" specializes in different materials and different markets, but the goal is always the same: world domination through seemingly innocent office products. The collapse of the Company has hurt the Parent Corporation as they had much invested in brads and brad paraphernalia, but the hurt is clearly not a death wound. We may have exposed brads for the twisted instrument of evil that they are, but the Parent Corporation has a whole symphony of evil.

The information we feel we must now make public is about the Parent Corporation's most prominent product: the common hole punch (pictured below, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons). We are not talking about the industrial three-hole punch typically used for preparing paper for use in binders, for reasons that we will have to make clear when our research is finished. We ask our supporters to immediately curtail their use of such hole punches. Unfortunately we cannot explain more at the moment, but rest assured that when our research is complete and when we are sure that we are not giving up our hand too early that we will explain the reasons why the Parent Corporation is pushing these hole punches on the unsuspecting public.

How Not to Fake Your Own Death

Before we get into this post, we would like to make it clear that at the GNU Public Dictatorship we do not believe in faking your own death. There are many other more creative ways in which you can accomplish the same purpose, but that's not the point here. The point here is to explain in part what went wrong with Marcus Schrenker's attempt to fake his own death. Incidentally, Marcus would never have needed to fake his own death if he hadn't been cheating his customers, but that's beside the point. Once he chose to fake his own death he made several elementary mistakes that we hope all of you will avoid should you choose to fake your own deaths.

First we should talk about his method. Here he made a fairly good choice with the very popular "one-man plane crash." The general flow of this method is that a person will get in a plane at point X, letting one or more people know his or her intention to get to point Y. Somewhere between the two points he or she will abandon the plane mid-flight, let it lose control and crash to the ground while he or she floats down with a parachute. He or she then disappears from the public eye until the whole thing blows over. The important aspects of this plan are that (1) nobody sees the crash, (2) nobody knows the crash has occurred until well after they realize you didn't make it to point Y, (3) either the amount of time between the crash and the finding of the aircraft is long (as in the case of a remote mountain range) or the crash is so massive that no signs that you were not in the plane at the time of the crash would be visible. Assuming these conditions hold, the success of this plan relies mostly on the ability of the person to remain hidden.

Now that we have established that his choice of method for faking his death was sound, let's talk about his execution. He seemed to do fine up to the point where he was to abandon his plane, but at this point he made several mistakes. First, he decided to go overboard and call in a distress signal. This choice invalidated all three assumptions as now the authorities know you are crashing and can track you on radar or by visual means, and will likely find the crash very soon. Second, he decided to leave the autopilot on so that the plane would crash into the Gulf of Mexico. This was a mistake as it allowed the responding airmen to find the plane, still in flight, without its alleged pilot. You do have to give Marcus credit for thinking about crashing into the ocean, though. If he had succeeded it would have been very hard to find the remains of his aircraft. His third mistake was checking into a hotel in the area rather than laying low for a while.

Overall, we think Marcus could have done much better. We hope this post has helped you not to make the same mistakes as he made should you choose to fake your own death.

A new venture

We have been carefully watching the rent-a-friend industry in Japan for some time now, and we believe that we have a strategic opportunity therein. We are, therefore, announcing a partnership with Hagemashi Tai to provide rentals of some of the services the GNU Public Dictatorship provides. As of right now we haven't decided exactly which services to offer, but our ideas include

• rent-a-dictator: for countries or organizations that can't seem to unite behind a leader, we will offer (for a nominal fee) a leader behind which they will unite (or else...). We don't have plans to offer any support for transitions to other leaders or other forms of government...you're on your own after you stop paying the rental fee.
• rent-a-spy: many organizations would love to have secret agents but just can't afford them or can't seem to maintain the appropriate level of secrecy. We would provide a "proxy spy" who will then communicate with one of our certified operatives to help the renter accomplish whatever he or she needed to do. As espionage is inherently unpredictable we don't plan to offer any sort of guarantees on the success of a particular mission.
• rent-a-blog: many people have the heart of a blogger but just can't find the time or the stamina to keep a blog up over time. We would offer renters a complete blog for a person to use for a day or two, or however long it takes them to get tired of blogging. They would be able to leverage one of our already-popular blogs and not have to create their own identity, so it would be ideal for those that would like to dabble in it without taking on the full responsibility.
• rent-a-logo: creating a logo can be hard work, and when you tire of it and want to change you generally have to create a new one from scratch. We plan to rent logos to people so that they don't have to worry about selling their used logos back.

We have other ideas, but we don't want to tire you. If you have a specific service you would like to see, contact us here or at your local GPD office. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not resourceful!

The GNU Public Area

Most of you have already visited the GNU Public Theme Park in Corpus Christi either in person or using RideTorrent, so you have likely already experienced some of the next-generation rides emerging from the open-source development model. We would like to take a moment to highlight some of our favorite rides that have emerged from the GNU Public Area in the two months since it opened:

• OpenTeacup: As much fun as the original teacup ride, but because it is open source you can adjust it to spin at the rate that suits you best. You can also tweak all of the safety parameters so that you can ride uninhibited by the oppressive safety regulations at proprietary theme parks.
  
• JSplash: An open version of Disneyland's Splash Mountain. The mountain terrain can be generated randomly using fractal rules, or it can be fed into the ride at startup time. It even keeps statistics about how fast each car travels and uses a fuzzy predictive algorithm to decide whether there are likely to be any injuries.
  
• RideZilla: An improved version of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride at Disneyland, where instead of characters from the beloved children's classic you can supply your own 3-D model specifications. (Warning: this ride is probably not suitable for minors without parental supervision as the 3-D models accept whatever input they are given)
• SCROT-F: (Super-Cool Ride of the Future). We can't really say more about it, except that it is super-cool and quite fun. If we said more it might spoil your experience.
• nTours: Much like the beloved Star Tours ride at Disneyland, but with an easy-to-use ncurses interface.
  

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not pleased with your efforts. Keep up the good work, and please continue to enjoy the celebrations of the demise of the Company!

A decision about "John"

After much discussion and some input from our supporters we have decided that the GNU Public Dictatorship will offer asylum to "John" and will protect him from the Parent Corporation while we prosecute him for his crimes against humanity.

The decision to grant his request for asylum was not taken lightly, nor in ignorance of the side effects of our choice. We understand that the Parent Corporation will be trying very hard to take him from us and that we are increasing the risks to our supporters around the world. We understand that we are taking on the responsibility to feed and clothe him indefinitely, as he can clearly not be allowed outside of our protection while the Parent Corporation remains viable. We understand that some groups will call us "weak" for protecting our enemy. However, at the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not fair, and we believe that "John" will have a better chance for justice with us than with the Parent Corporation. Don't worry, however, we won't be letting him off easy. He will pay his debt to society.

More celebrations!

We are very pleased to see that you are all continuing to celebrate the demise of the Company, and that the celebrations are more like those in the Special Edition of Return of the Jedi where somehow the entire galaxy (that had, incidentally, done nothing to inhibit the Empire) got the word that the Emperor was dead and decided to celebrate than like those in the original theatrical release, where the Rebel fighters that had participated in the destruction of the Death Star celebrated their victory in a small, unassuming way with their new friends the Ewoks. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we recognize there is much to do, but we are nothing if not pleased with our progress thus far!

Suspicious Office Products?

It is good to see that the celebrations of the demise of the Company are showing no signs of abating. It is also good to see that e-mail messages have been pouring in since we asked you all to be on the lookout for suspicious office products. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not pleased with your participation. The vast majority of these e-mails have identified one or more of the following items as suspicious:

• The hole punch. Long a subject of suspicion, but still no positive proof of any involvement with the Parent Corporation, other than the obvious association of brads with punched holes.
  
• The paper clip. Not nearly so suspicious as other office products, but a number of supporters have identified them as something we should watch since their function is very similar to that of brads.
• The staple. The staple has long been our answer for those seeking to avoid supporting the Brad Guys, but could we have been wrong? We're investigating everything right now, and, in the meantime, we suggest that you use fewer staples until we know.
• The cotter pin. It is less well-known than other fasteners, and is typically not used with paper, but it serves a very similar purpose.
• Microperforation devices. These are generally highly specialized and look very much like medieval torture devices. For a sampling of them check out Stewarts of America. (Incidentally, Stewarts of America was founded right as the Company was rolling out its brad machine...we're not sure about whether this is a coincidence or not just yet)
  

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not concerned for your welfare, and we ask you all to be vigilant and to keep a careful lookout for anything out of the ordinary. We were not particularly surprised by your list, as with the exception of staples, which we have assumed to be perfectly safe, we had been watching the other industries. As always, we'll keep you informed!

"John" and his request for asylum

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not fair and forgiving, but it seems that "John" was toying with us even as he surrendered to us. A careful analysis of the documents "John" brought from the Company and the ones "Walter"/"Viktor" brought from the Company has shown that even in his plea for assistance "John" has been holding back information. He claimed to have brought all of his secret files, but his files did not contain even half of what we got from our spy. Add to this the fact that he lied about from whom he was hiding, and we have a dilemma.

Should the GPD grant "John" asylum to protect him from the Parent Corporation (and, of course, to punish him in a humane way for the many crimes he committed against humanity), or should we simply turn him out to face the wrath of the Parent Corporation for his failures? Please respond either here or by contacting your local GPD office. We look forward to your input.

Keep the Celebrations Going!

We would like to thank Janice Friel of San Diego, CA for sending in this pic of her neighborhood celebration of the defeat of the Company!

We would also like to urge our supporters to continue to celebrate (and to send in pictures of your celebrations) despite the niggling suspicion that we may still have a nefarious Parent Corporation to deal with.

The Prodigal Spy

In the most bizarre turn of fate yet, we have received direct contact from "Walter," who has been feeding us the information that led directly to the overthrow of the Company. It turns out that "Walter" is none other than the supposed traitor, "Viktor."

Months ago, "Viktor" was approached by the Company and asked to join their cause. This would have been a good move on the part of the Company, since "Viktor" has been our most valued and innovative agent, but they overlooked one critical factor. "Viktor" was born to parents who were killed, in part, due to side effects of a tragic accident involving brads. It is his love for his deceased parents that has driven "Viktor" to work so hard against the Company for years.

When approached directly by the people whom he considered responsible for the death of his parents, "Viktor" thought quickly and decided on a risky plan: to infiltrate the very core of the Company. To do so, "Viktor" had to completely cut his ties with us and appear as a traitor. To convince the Company that his transformation to traitor was complete, it was necessary that he completely convince the GPD as well. We were completely taken in by his shocking actions.

While appearing to be a traitor, "Viktor" worked 20 hours a day to maintain the trust of the top Company executives while feeding us information simultaneously through his new pseudonyn, "Walter." He assumed we would make the connection between two six-letter names with consecutive starting letters, but we never even dared to hope that "Viktor" would return to us as the prodigal spy. We at the GNU Public Dictatorship, are, however, nothing if not ready to welcome a prodigal back to the fold with open arms.

"Viktor" is, so deservedly, a true hero of the people. We welcome him back with open arms. When the Company began to dissolve and the Company's leadership began to flee for safety, "Viktor" took advantage of the mayhem to secure the Company's most guarded and secretive documents. We have only begun to filter through the mass of information that "Viktor" has brought to GPD headquarters, but our initial findings are alarming. It seems that the Parent Corporation has much more power than we thought possible. The scheme regarding the Company's brad production is merely the tip of the iceberg.

As our agents make more progress, we will, as always, keep you, the public, informed. 

A Parent Corporation?

It seems that "John" turned himself in not to avoid his subordinates as we initially understood, but to avoid those to whom he reports. We don't know much about this entity other than the fact that "John" refers to it as the Parent Corporation in all of his files, and that apparently brads are only a small part of the Parent Corporation's strategy for world domination.

We would like to urge all of our supporters to be on the lookout for other menacing office products and to help us notice any unusual trends. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not cautious, and we hope that while you will be cautious that you will continue to enjoy your victory celebrations.

It is!

Recent indicators that the Company is collapsing have had us giddy with anticipation, and with each new indicator we have had to stifle our desire to print up a "Mission Accomplished" banner and fly to a carrier off the California coast to give a victory speech. We were poring over intelligence reports, not quite sure whether we could believe what we were reading, when, to our surprise, one of our operatives escorted none other than "John" himself (the Company's No. 1) into our offices. We asked where he caught "John," but he said that "John" had turned himself in.

Our initial astonishment quickly gave way to pragmatism, and so we began to interrogate our nemesis. It seems that our efforts to stifle the Company have been going even better than we thought, and that they have been barely limping by for several months now. Our questioning soon revealed what we have long suspected: that the Company is not the only brad-pushing organization, but that they are the de facto leader in brads and brad paraphernalia, and that the traitor "Viktor" had provided them with very valuable information, only some of which they had been able to act upon due to their indigent circumstances. We also confirmed that the reason that "John" was coming to us was that the Company no longer exists in any substantial form, and that he wanted to ask our protection from his former subordinates who would likely try to kill him for his failures. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not forgiving, and we are seriously considering his request for asylum, especially since he turned over to us all of his personal Company files. For the curious, we did ask him about the current whereabouts of "Viktor," but he couldn't (or perhaps wouldn't) tell us much.

Over the next few weeks we will be examining the files "John" has given us, and we will be keeping you as up-to-date as we can without compromising our own position. Keep in mind that the threat from brads and rogue Brad Guys has not diminished, and that vigilance is (as it always is) your best defence.

Contact your local GPD offices for local victory party times, and enjoy being Company-free!

Sneak Peak: The Car Wash Prison

We have all heard something referred to as "your own personal hell" at some time or another, but we think our friends in the car wash industry have finally produced one. I was lucky enough to be present to observe the initial test of this wondrous device, and can say without reservations that it was all that it was hyped to be.

It all began as a normal car wash, where the victim was treated to several minutes of warm water soak, soap, rinses, TripleShine, clear coat protector, and so forth. The true genius of the device, however, was not apparent until our victim tried to back up to get more drying time and found himself trapped by the outer car wash door. He tried to back up but couldn't get over the bump, and he couldn't go forward because of the door. What is perhaps most exciting about this tool is that it catches only those who are greedy enough to go back for more air, and not the average car wash user.

We are very pleased with the Car Wash Prison in its current form, and we have been told that they are currently working on several improvements. Keep up the good work! At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not amazed by your constant innovations!

Can it be?

We received a tip today and in the process of verifying it have discovered that the Company is laying off at least 2/3 of its staff, including its top-secret operatives. While we have not confirmed the exact numbers yet, we have had several confirmed reports of known Company employees seeking other employment opportunities. Can it be that we are really this close to absolute victory over the Company and its fiendish purposes? We're not sure, but we'll keep you in the loop!

The Time Lord, Hero of the People

It is with great pleasure that we introduce you all to another Hero of the People, the Time Lord, a.k.a Peter Whibberley. He was instrumental in agreeing, along with an international panel of scientists, that the earth's rotations and the atomic clocks which he cares for were falling out of sync, and in getting another leap second added to 2008. Incidentally, since 1973 there have been 23 leap seconds. We hesitate to think what would happen to society without these carefully-placed leap seconds. As the Time Lord himself said,

Ultimately, over many hundreds of years if leap seconds were scrapped, the time of night and day would drift away from the time shown by our clocks, so if nothing was done to bring them back into line, night would be happening at midday as shown by the clocks.

We are sure the people of the year 67,712* will be grateful for the Time Lord's foresight in preventing their midnight from happening at noon and vice versa**. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not inspired by the things our scientists do for us!

*In 35 years there have been 23 leap seconds. For the purposes of this calculation, we assume this rate to be constant. There are 60 seconds per minute, 60 minutes per hour, and we would need 12 hours worth of leap seconds to switch midnight to noon, so we have (12 hours*60 minutes/hour*60 seconds/minute*35 years)/23 seconds=65,739 years. Add in 1973, and you get the year 67,712 when, if leap seconds were abolished, noon and midnight would be swapped.

**Update: Apparently our assumption that the rate of leap seconds remains constant over time is incorrect. It apparently grows at a quadratic rate, putting the year in which noon and midnight are swapped much sooner. See the comments for details.

An accident?

I mentioned a family that found US $10,000 in a box of crackers they got at the store in yesterday's post. What I didn't talk about, however, was the "accident" that put that money on the store's shelf.

It seems that a woman had put her life savings into an envelope and had put that envelope in a box of crackers for safe keeping. Apparently, however, she did not have enough money to subsist on once she had stored her money in this way (it's hard to write a check against "The Nabisco* Triscuit* Bank" and get people to believe you that they're good for it), so she returned the box of crackers to the store to get some liquidity in her investment.

Here's where the story takes an interesting turn. Apparently the store restocked the obviously-opened crackers instead of composting them. I'm not sure which I would be more frustrated about...finding US $10,000 only to have to return it to the rightful owner or learning that the "new" box of crackers I had purchased was in fact previously-owned. We asked representatives from the grocery store to comment on this "accident," but were told that they are sticking to their story. We'll have to let it slide this time, but at the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not concerned about your health, and so we ask you all to report previously-owned groceries to your local GPD office so that we can have a better picture of the scope of this sort of "accident."

* Nabisco and Triscuit are registered trademarks of Kraft Foods.

If you're going to steal money...

If you're going to steal money*, you had better either make the amount insignificant (i.e. a few pennies) or so astronomically huge that nobody would believe you if you told them you took it. The US $10,000 that this family found in a box of crackers was not small enough for them to take without looking for an owner, and it wasn't big enough to tempt them into being dishonest about it. This guy, however, was able to get away £100 billion because the idea of him being able to overdraft by that much seemed ridiculous.

* Our lawyers wanted us to make it clear that we do not advocate the stealing of money, and that if you do so you do it without the blessing of the GNU Public Dictatorship.

Punishment Commensurate with the Crime

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we believe that any punishment meted out should be commensurate with the crime or other circumstances that necessitated the punishment in the first place. More specifically, while we will deal harshly with offenders, we do not believe that talking during a movie should be a capital crime, and certainly that citizens should not take it into their own hands to harass or injure the perpetrators. We urge our citizens to refer such cases to their local GPD office, where the case will be resolved to the satisfaction of all parties. We also believe that for crimes of stupidity (such as this one, in which the perpetrator attempted to steal a fire engine and drive cross-country) the punishment needs to focus more on reforming the criminal than on punishing them for punishment's sake. If we can just teach them to have more common sense then perhaps we won't have to punish them later on!