Vanishing Point Game Entry One

So I read today at slashdot.org that Microsoft is hosting a viral marketing puzzle competition for Vista (which, by the way, I like saying Vee-sta, not vis-ta, but enough about me). I have always been interested in puzzles and such, so I checked it out - www.vanishingpointgame.com

VISTA is in there, maybe: www.VanIShingpoinTgAme.com

So it turns out there are two "competitions". Well, not really, one of them is really a sweepstakes for non-lazy people. I will talk about the actual competition first, seeing as it is rather absurd. The first person to solve it gets their name inscribed on every AMD Athlon 64 FX chip that is made from when you solve it until March 31st, 2007. Now I know there are two audiences reading this (if I actually have any viewers), the audience that just said to themselves, "holy crap - thats awesome" and those who thought, "why the hell would that be a prize?"

Either way, the puzzles for that line of the Vanishing Point Game have been pretty ridiculous thus far. First, after solving all of the first week puzzles (I'll get to this in a later post), you see a video by the main character of this contest, Loki. At the end, the phrase /on_the_run flashes on the screen. Tagging this to the main website (www.vanishingpointgame.com/on_the_run) yields this:
Hopefully you can read it (sorry, new to blogging), but the important part is the "Contact Me" at the bottom. Since the character's name is Loki, we try loki[at]vanishingpointgame.com to see what happens. Auto-response:

Life is a mix of work and play. You've found play...

~L

(by the way, I accidentally sent the email first to loki[at]vanishingpoint.com, I bet email collectors could do well with a few domain names near a lot of the puzzle ones)

Alright, so where the hell is work? Microsoft, of course. Emailing loki[at]microsoft.com gives us:

Out of Office:

Hmmm. Not quite what I had in mind. Try harder - then listen closely.

~L

Listen closely....hmmmm. Well, the only way I can listen is by talking to someone, right? So call Microsoft. The number? (1-800-MICROSOFT of course) Press 5 to talk to someone at MS. Press 2. Talk to the computer for a while until she nicely transfers you to an operator. Ask to be transferred to Loki. A pre-recorded message congratulates you:

"Awesome work. All knowledge eventually needs effective diagnosis."

Take the first letter of each: A-W-A-K-E-N-E-D. Try this at the website (www.vanishingpointgame.com/awakened), and voila:

Okay, call this gets you: "Please enter your fax number and press the pound key". Man this is a great way for MS to gather information about people.... A quick trip to Kinkos later and I got a fax from 561-297-3481 (boca raton, FL) (no it doesn't spell anything at phonespell.org) (also, I believe it was uploaded to the system originally at the time at the top: 01/05/2007 02:33 , hey, she said its all about time):


Itenerary for: L. KITSUNE

DATE FLIGHT DEPART ARRIVE

Jan 4 AW 291 12:05p 2:22p

Jan 11 SW 608 7:00p 8:05p

Jan 18 AA 1308 1:45p 6:40p

Jan 24 UA 373/339 9:15p 1:07p

Jan 28 AK 394 9:55p 12:08p

*note, the last time (12:08p) is circled with a handwritten note below:
Former AT+T Bldg.
X55654

First thing I noticed was the "L. Kitsune". Putting an "O" after the "L" gives us L.OKItsune. Maybe a nickname.... You ready for the next part? Looking up the last flight (AK - Alaska Airlines (flight 394)) at www.alaskaair.com/airport/flightstatus/FlightStatus.aspx shows us that it is a daily flight from Seattle to San Jose. So we search San Jose for a former AT&T building. After a little searching at Google, you find that this is AMD's headquarters (phone #1-800-538-8450). Enter in the extension x5-5654 and we get another voice mail from Loki:

"Hi, this is Loki - or rather, her electronic footprint left behind on this machine. Funny how the inanimate world retains traces of things long after they've disappeared, isn't it? If you're calling about the murmuring rock project, it's on hold indefinitely. Unfortunately."
Someone named josh has uploaded this to: www.windowsconnected.com/files/folders/misc/entry5565.aspx

Entering "Murmuring rock project" at wikipedia shows us the translation for murmur into German is loosely: "lureln" and for rock: "ley" or Loreley (also written Lorelei). So I guess Loki's real name is Lorelei Kitsune. From here, I will take "on hold indefinitely" to mean that there will be no update until one of the following events or puzzle sets (but I could be wrong, let me know if you see something).