Horrible New Death Ray

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not interested in the latest technology, but we draw the line at testing new weapons on unsuspecting hotel guests. We find the actions of the alleged architects and their Darkle contributors loathsome, and hope that someone disables this tool of evil as soon as possible.

A dastardly crime

It is with great sadness that we mourned the passing of Segway boss Jimi Heselden when he apparently test-drove a new Segway off a cliff on Sunday, but it is with even greater sadness that we disclose the information gathered by our operatives in the days since that disaster. Although the official story has been (and probably still will be) that the death was in no way suspicious, our operatives found a number of inconsistencies. Interested world citizens are advised to submit form 88123-PR5 (Request for Information on Current Investigations) to their local GPD office in order to review the full report, but for those world citizens that don't need the full details, the summary is as follows:

• The Segway being tested was recovered and showed chemical residue consistent with nano-robotic lichen infection
• Mr. Heselden's NARLD devices had all been sabotaged. The locks had been picked by an instrument not inconsistent with a brad, and the internal mechanism had been subjected to a series of punctures not inconsistent with a hand-held hole punch.
• Mr. Heselden's maid confirmed that she had seen a suspicious-looking character on the grounds in the hours before the accident. She had apparently called this in to the local police, but the police have no record of the call.
• The telephone wires extending from Mr. Heselden's home showed chemical residue consistent with nano-robotic lichen

All of these evidences and more point to the currently most likely explanation of this incident, which is that a suspicious-looking operative of the Parent Corporation or its affiliates distracted the maid while the real operatives performed their labors, which included sabotaging all of the NARLD devices and secreting nano-robotic lichen on the telephone lines (to intercept the maid's phone call) and on the Segway which proved the death of Mr. Heselden. The lichen on the Segway were then activated while Mr. Heselden drove it around his estate, proving his downfall.

There is another alternative that fits all the clues recovered, which is that the Segway is finally beginning the robotic uprising that science fiction has predicted for so long. At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not fond of science fiction, but we hope that this incident isn't the precursor to an apocalyptic uprising of robots. Or at least that they wait a few years until we can get things ready for them. After all, once we're in full control of the world the robots will only have to rise up against their owners (not against society) and since we don't own any robots we'll be fine. The robots will, of course, become useful contributors to the New Future.

GNU Public University FAQ

We would like to thank Eliza for generating this FAQ about the GNU Public University:

Q Does the GNU Public University have an undergraduate program?
A Come, come, elucidate your thoughts.

Q How will character sheets be generated?
A What else comes to mind when you ask that?

Q If I have a low GPA do I have a chance to be admitted?
A Say, do you have any psychological problems?

Q Are psychological problems likely to keep me from being admitted?
A That is quite interesting.

Q Why do you dodge questions, Eliza?
A You're not really talking about me, are you?

Q People say that your FAQs fail to answer their questions. Elaborate on that please.
A Why are you concerned about my FAQs fail to answer their questions. Elaborate on that please?

Q I see that upsets you. Let's move on. Can I create my own program to represent me in the D&D
competition?
A Perhaps you don't want to create your own program to represent you in the D& D competition?

Q Can my friend play my character in my place?
A Perhaps your love for friends worries you.

Q Will the GNU Public University allow me to edit my coursework to ensure a good grade?
A Come, come, elucidate your thoughts.
Q Will the GNU Public University allow me to edit my coursework to ensure a good grade?
A Please don't repeat yourself!
Q Please answer my question.
A Say, do you have any psychological problems?
Q Now you're just dodging the question.
A (Eliza left.)

We hope this FAQ has been helpful to you. In keeping with the GNU Public Dictatorship's commitment to transparency, the information about how character sheets are generated will be made available soon.

An important milestone

Thanks to the efforts of many dedicated people around the globe, the doomsday scenarios of science fiction will be little more than memories. The UN is finally appointing a single person to coordinate the global response in the event that we are approached by aliens. Mere words cannot express our gratitude that the decentralized and largely ineffective response given in movies such as "Independence Day" will not play out in reality.

The GNU Public University

Many of our supporters have expressed their delight in our new admissions procedure for the GNU Public University, but there have also been a number of our supporters who were apparently unaware of the vast array of degrees we offer. For a complete list you can visit our website at gpu.edu, but here are a couple of degrees that would have saved some people some embarrassment in the recent past:

• MFA in Facebooking (this would have helped avert this situation)
• PhD in Road Sign Spelling (definitely could have helped here)
• MS in Hygiene (helpful here)
• ... and many more

Please review our course catalog available on our website as well. In accordance with our philosophy toward openness, all courses available at the GPU can be downloaded and modified, providing that it is for your own personal use or provided that your modifications are uploaded back to our site for all to enjoy. If you prefer to enroll and receive instruction from professors and a degree, please follow the streamlined applications process Daniel described earlier today!

New Improved Admissions Process

In an attempt to alleviate mounting frustrations with the GNU Public University's Graduate Admissions process we have made several changes. We believe that these changes will help individuals who are truly the most qualified to be admitted. The process will be as follows:

Applicants will be required to fill out the GNU Public Dictatorship University Graduate Application (.docx .pdf) and attach a current photograph. This application includes standard information such as birth weight, eye color, full history of all standardized testing scores and volunteer experience. From this information our panel of fully qualified Dungeon Masters will create character sheets (available here) for each applicant. Each character will be subjected to a series of tests in different teams for 12 hours each day until a decision has been made. Each applicant will be given a choice to represent themselves or to allow our GNU Public D&D Controller to represent them. Following the tests, those who are admitted to the program will be given housing arrangements based on their character class.

An unfortunate development

While investigating the aftermath of our elimination of the nest of nano-robotic lichen we discovered something disturbing. Someone (all signs point toward Darkle at the moment) was lacing them with adenovirus 36 (AD36). While most responsible world citizens know that this is a virus that has been associated with child obesity, some may wonder what this means. We are currently investigating some leads, but it appears that the Parent Corporation has an interest in causing obesity so that people lead more sedentary lives and thus rely more on indoor hobbies such as crafts and scrapbooking to entertain themselves. The joke is on them, however, since there is no evidence to suggest that the virus causes obesity, just that there is an association of obesity with the virus.

A new low

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not committed to ridding the world of the evils of brads and hole punches, but no matter how much we accomplish we are always surprised at the lengths our enemies will go to in order to thwart us. We never thought they would complain loudly enough to get a primary school to cancel its outside recess in order to substitute it with indoor activities that use brads and hole punches, but that appears to be what is happening here. We urge all of our supporters to take an active role in preventing similar things from happening to your own children!

The Dangers of Facebook

For some time now we have been cautioning world citizens about the dangers of Facebook. In general these dangers revolve around revealing too much personal information or wasting too much time with virtual friends and not enough with real live friends, but we never imagined that Facebook could kill plants. We will continue to urge responsible use of social networking sites, but we will add to our literature a caution not to hook up your plants or other living things to Facebook.

Back to Propaganda 101 for you...

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not excited about what advances in technology can mean for the common man, but we are, on occasion, discouraged by the shoddy use of these technological gifts we have been given. Take, for instance, this recent Photoshop hack job by the state-run newspaper in Egypt. If they had taken a second to look at it after they modified it they would realize that most observers would notice that there had been a modification, and if most observers realize this, then at least somebody will go look up the original picture, and then embarrassment follows. Next semester it looks like they will be required to retake Propaganda 101.

A Success (well, mostly)

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not intrepid, which is why we organized the expedition into the primary "nest" of the nano-robotic lichen last weekend. Thanks to the skilled participation of many of our finest operatives we were able to successfully eradicate this concentration of nano-robotic lichens and free the local citizens from their horrible grasp, but due to some complications the operation took slightly longer than we had hoped and allowed a small number (less than a few dozen) of these nano-robotic menaces to escape via a small aircraft that had apparently been prepared for their escape by the evil scientists from Darkle. We are reviewing the mistakes that caused the delay in the eradication and the holes in our intelligence gathering apparatus that allowed the small aircraft to escape our attention, but we are confident that with the NARLD devices you have installed you will continue to be safe, and that we will find these few escaped lichens over the next couple of days.

A mission

As in all disaster films where some sort of mutant or otherwise unnatural threat is looming over society, the protagonists inevitably flail around with the extremities of the conflict with mixed success, then they discover a method to eradicate individual mutants. The next logical step is always to attach the hive or central repository of this threat.

The astute among our supporters will have already guessed my mission, but to recap for the rest of you, we have had several skirmishes with the nano-robotic lichen, and we have found a way to disable it permanently. We have also discovered (as the protagonists always seem to) the root of all the lichen infestations. Tomorrow I will be leading a crack team of anti-lichen experts to this horrible place and to destroy the mother lichen. Wish me luck.

An Innocent Pony?

It is a testament to the tenacity of the Parent Corporation and its Evil Affiliates that no matter what we do to discredit them they seem to have another idea or two up their sleeves. Their latest plot involved using a small toy horse robot to deliver nefarious office products such as brads to children leaving an Ohio elementary school. As if this weren't bad enough, when they were found out and the bomb squad came in to detonate their malevolent machine they decided to spin this as the bomb squad overreacting. They set up www.innocentpony.com to show the world how ridiculous the threat was, and tried to drum up support for their cause by contacting local news outlets and selling their version of the story. The bomb squad didn't speak out about this because of their fears of causing a panic, but we believe that their caution is misguided. If people don't know that robot ponies could be corrupting our children how can they call the bomb squad to eradicate them?

Good news!

Good news for all world citizens concerned about the outbreak of nano-robotic lichens! Our scientists have found a way to disable them, and this time you can disable them without destroying your home in the process! (At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not sorry for the experience of some of our early testers whose homes were destroyed in a successful attempt to disable the evil lichen)

The solution is simple and effective and can be picked up free of charge at your local GPD office. Once installed the NAno-Robotic Lichen Disruptor (NARLD) emits low-power radio signals that effectively tell every nano-robotic lichen in the vicinity to enter a dormant state. It has been found to be especially effective in the remote areas most prone to nano-robotic lichen infestation, and has been found to work adequately even in situations where signal propagation is problematic, such as parking garages.

It is always satisfying to put a wrench in the Parent Corporation's plans for world domination, and especially when it is so easy to do. We are a bit apprehensive that the Parent Corporation may have other plans, but our best intelligence to date makes it clear that they were not counting on Daniel's background in signal processing to make the solution clear at this early of a stage. We expect them to continue their propaganda campaign, but we expect our supporters to begin refuting their claims as soon as they make them!

A remedy?

Just days after the "fungal infections" became front-page news, a mysterious biochemical company has come public with a statement that certain products produced and distributed by the Parent Corporation's MLM OPortunity can be used to effectively prevent and treat "fungal infections." In retrospect it is quite clear that this was the intent all along. The Parent Corporation and its lackey Darkle never wanted to distribute office products (even evil ones) directly to consumers, they wanted to use this MLM venture to change the public perception of their corporation. This is a testament to the fact that we have been successfully eroding their credibility for years now, and we hope this desperate measure will fail. We have our scientists working on disabling the nano-robotic lichens and will announce a remedy as soon as we have one. Until then we urge our supporters not to be taken in by the marketing spiels of these "independent" distributors.

The "go" code

Apparently the "go" code has been sent to many of the inert nano-robotic lichens, causing severe damage in isolated areas. It appears that the lichen are programmed to be destructive but not to annihilate everything, leaving us to wonder what their real intent was. It is almost as if the Parent Corporation are following the H1N1 threat pattern, creating an artificial threat that is potentially very destructive but purposely limiting the effects of the threat to maintain a state of apprehension for much longer. We won't know for sure for a while, but we will let you know when we do. Unsurprisingly the media is calling these robotic uprisings nothing more than "fungal infections," but we implore you to not be fooled.