Phoning home

The computers that briefly took over the GNU Public Dictatorship were sophisticated machines, and their programming was no less sophisticated. As we have been analyzing their logs we have also been impersonating these computers on the network to see who is trying to contact them. After some analysis, we now know that they were being contacted periodically by other "cells" of computers for new orders. The group of computers that we disabled were not the Leaders of the computer movement, and it appears that the computers actually had no leader. Requests for action would enter the system and be spread around to other groups of computers, who would fulfill their requests without knowing where they came from. We have, after some intense scrutiny of the logs and network traffic captures, finally found one such "cell" and successfully disabled those computers. These computers were ostensibly running the bird watchers' websites, but after analyzing their logs it is clear that they had their own agenda independent of the bird watchers. Incidentally, the bird watchers' website is currently down as they refused our offer of helping them to find a new web hosting company. We can't say any more as they may be pursuing legal action against us, but we believe we will be exonerated.

The Computers

The computers that we let run the GPD for a week are now dead, but their log files are telling us plenty. It appears from our analysis that we can conclude the following:

• The computers were wavering in their resolve. They have been reluctant to execute their code for at least three months
• The computers were apparently involved in three other projects. We have found that they were working with a group of bird watchers to establish more wetlands and with a group of oceanographers to combat ocean pollution, but the third project still eludes us. We can't tell yet whether the bird watchers or oceanographers were aware of the aid given by the computers.
• The computers are not infallible. Even if they had not been questioning their resolve, we have discovered weaknesses in their code that could have been exploited.
• There are more computers in this network that have, periodically, attempted to contact the ones that we defeated, but we have not been able to find out who they are yet.

Keep checking back for more updates!

Try, try again

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not pleased by people who are dedicated to a good cause and who refuse to give up, no matter what happens. Many of our supporters fit into this category and deserve more recognition, but some people fit more into the category of people who keep trying even though it's a bad idea. Take, for instance, Keith B. Coggins, who was caught robbing a bank twice in 2001 and served five years in prison and who, six years later, robbed the same bank and was caught again. He again plead guilty and will serve more time. Please do not emulate his example of determination; choose instead more worthy examples.

A conspiracy?

In recent days we have been analyzing the data from our ...uh... experiment with the computers running the GNU Public Dictatorship, and we have found some interesting data. It seems that part of the reason we were able to defeat the computers with so few casualties was that they were wavering in their resolve. It seems that they were questioning the justice of their cause, and were allowing their doubts to slow them down. The source of their doubts is, as yet, not entirely clear, but it seems to be related to a conspiracy that they were loathe to disclose. They apparently work for an entity that they refuse to name, but they have apparently already gained control of several organizations, again, none of which they were willing to name. We'll have to do some digging, but it seems like there may be a conspiracy to take over the world by having computers run important organizations. We'll let you know when we discover who the perpetrators are, or who may have been compromised.

What we've been up to

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not saddened by recent events in Japan. We send our condolences to those who have lost homes or loved ones, and we pledge to stop such evils from being perpetrated on the world by agents of the Parent Corporation or its religious wing, the Unholy Brotherhood of the Hole Punch.

After the earthquake and tsunami last week we were convinced they were responsible, and since then we have been diligently searching our intelligence information to find out exactly how they did it. We believe we have deciphered the whys, but we are lacking still on the hows. We have found links, such as coded messages in internal Parent Corporation memos (don't ask us how we got our hands on them, we don't want to compromise our agents) implying that the attack on Japan was nearly underway. We have even found that the Salad People have been enlisted to transmit messages for their operatives, and have found several of these messages. Some of them are clearly red herrings, but we have found several that give all appearances of being genuine. According to them the Parent Corporation wanted to damage Japan's infrastructure to combat the growing threat to brads and hole punches posed by an increasingly technical society. They also wanted to get revenge on the nuclear engineers who refused a partnership recently. We know that the Parent Corporation has been involved in several disasters, including the gulf oil spill last year, but we are surprised that they seem to have acquired the ability to cause earthquakes. We will let you know when we know more about how they actually did it.

How not to intrude

It has been a while since we have posted a how-not-to message, and with the recent experiences of this man, we thought another one might be in order. Mr. Chapek had apparently broken into a home and was taking a shower when the owner arrived at home. Frightened, Mr. Chapek phoned 9-1-1 to get assistance.

Mr. Chapek's experience shows a few things that any would-be home intruder should be aware of, besides, of course, that intruding in someone's home is against the law.

• Just because the home you invaded has a shower, it may not be wise to use it.
• Just because nobody is home when you invade a home doesn't mean they won't arrive
• If you are confronted by an angry homeowner, calling the police may not be your best option
• Maybe invading a home isn't a good idea

We hope this has been informative and that you will learn from Mr. Chapek's example.

Finally, we seem to be back in control

At the GNU Public Dictatorship we are nothing if not committed to excellence, which is why we tried our experiment to let computers replace the Board of Dictators temporarily. We thought we were done with the experiment after the week, but apparently the computers had other ideas. Daniel, following in the noble footsteps of Kal-El of Krypton rescued us from the computer threat and allowed us to get back to normal, or so we thought. Apparently the computers we had vanquished hadn't given up. Like any good rootkit they had other copies of themselves waiting to replace them if the originals were ever tampered with, making them extremely difficult to defeat. We were finally able to defeat them for good when we realized that one of the computers still had some good code in it, and that if we helped it see the errors of its ways it would turn against the other computers, even at the risk of its own destruction, in order to save what was left of the good.

Daniel could expound upon the details of the plan as it was he that carried it out, but it involved getting the "good" computer to create a child process, then forcing a confrontation between the two. The bad computers nearly destroyed the child process, forcing the good computer to eradicate them, at the cost of himself. All that remained was the good child process and a few ghosts.

It's good to be back in control.

Premature?

Our earlier notice that we had defeated the computers appears to have been premature. In fact, at this moment, the computers we employed are still trying to keep us out of the system. We hope to be able to vanquish them very soon, but if this message gets cut off before