Wednesday, February 28, 2007

-15 02.28

The hd-dvd and blu-ray inserts for the nine inch nails live concert video release "Beside You in Time" reveal another new website:
Three words 'solutions' 'backwards' 'initiative'
Typing solutionsbackwardsinitiative.com or solutionsbackwardsinitiative.net redirects to:
http://www.securebroadcastinformatics.com/

Emailing Francisco@securebroadcastinformatics.com obtains an auto-response:

"As I write this, cops are coming to arrest me and my friends for trying to make
America a better place to live. I'm an IT specialist, they are mostly
scientists, ranging from graduate students to eminent professors. None of us
are soldiers. None of us wanted to hurt anybody. We weren't in favor of
violence-just the same free speech that used to be your right under the
constitution.

If you look down, you will see an email I got two days ago. Is this the kind of
country you want to live in? Are these the choices you want to make?

If you wanted a job here at SBI, ask yourself *which America do I want to
defend?*

If you think about that for even a little while, be careful: the cops will be
coming for you next.

Francisco Parro
IT consultant

PS I'm sorry, Elaina. If they had come to me even a little sooner, I would
have betrayed my friends to save you. Now it's too late for any of us.

Als sie mich holten,
gab es keinen mehr,
der protestieren konnte.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

From:
To: Francisco@securebroadcastinformatics.com
Content: hidden bandwidth

>>Dear Sir:

>>>>It has come to the attention of the Bureau of Morality's Internet Monitoring
Taskforce that several of the clients for whom you handle IT seem to show
bandwidth loads that do not match their formally submitted audit numbers.

We have asked for clarification of this matter on three occasions. Your replies
have been either evasive or insufficient or simply late. Frankly, speaking as
one human being to another, it has been as bad as dealing with a health
insurance company.

>You may be aware of that frustration yourself, in the lengthy delays you have
encountered trying to process the papers for your wife's breast cancer
treatments. So I know you understand our frustration, and will be motivated to
do your very best to explain these bandwidth discrepancies.

>>>>>>>>>You may submit any information in the full confidence that it will
remain anonymous.

Perhaps your wife will start feeling better soon.

>A friend"


The German is from a poem that reads:

Original
Als die Nazis die Kommunisten holten,
habe ich geschwiegen;
ich war ja kein Kommunist.

Als sie die Sozialdemokraten einsperrten,
habe ich geschwiegen;
ich war ja kein Sozialdemokrat.

Als sie die Gewerkschafter holten,
habe ich nicht protestiert;
ich war ja kein Gewerkschafter.

Als sie mich holten,
gab es keinen mehr, der protestieren konnte.

Translation
When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

By assembling a flash puzzle on that website, A username and password are revealed in a login window:
carolina
matt:26:45-46

This leads to:
http://www.solutionsbackwardsinitiative.net/pilgrims/

The text in the background of the SBI sites is from Huckleberry Finn (Mark Twain).

Darren Kroupa, previously pictured on http://www.nin.com/current/ in an image on 1/25/2007, is mentioned as being arrested on the SBI site.

It was revealed that the sites were sent back in time 15 years and the background images should each contain text from a banned book.

Sunday, February 25, 2007

-15 02.25

Blocks appear next to In This Twilight on http://yearzero.nin.com/

Trent gives members of The Spiral a really rare treat. Instead of early entrance to see a soundcheck, Spiral members cell phones and recording devices are collected and they get to eat pizza and drink soda while listening to the full Year Zero album. "Soundchecks are boring - listen to this." - Trent Reznor

A USB flashdrive containing In This Twilight and invitation.jpg is found taped to the center barricade, attached to an Art is Resistance flyer at the Manchester, England concert.

The invitation.jpg leads to http://hollywoodinmemoriam.org/

The site being discovered on 2/25 is relevant in that it discusses events that take place during the 81st Academy Awards, and the site was first being explored by fans while the 79th Academy Awards were being presented live.

The text in the background of Hollywood in Memoriam is discovered to be from Caution (Walt Whitman).

Silence, an actual film currently in production, is mentioned to have won the picture of the year award.

Thursday, February 22, 2007

-15 02.22

A video is added to http://yearzero.nin.com/ including The Presence and another clue 0024, which leads to the album cover (http://yearzero.nin.com/0024).

Wednesday, February 21, 2007

-15 02.21

A picture of Trent Reznor wearing a jacket with a strange flag symbol on the sleeve shows up on http://www.nin.com/current/

A flyer is passed out at the Paris, France concert that leads to:
http://www.artisresistance.com/
which links to:
http://anotherversionofthetruth.com/artist.htm

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

-15 02.20

The text in the background of USWiretap is discovered to be from Slaughterhouse-Five (Kurt Vonnegut).

Monday, February 19, 2007

-15 02.19

Blocks appear near me, i'm not on http://yearzero.nin.com/

Another red herring shows up http://inthistwilight.com which was never intended to be a part of the game.

A USB flashdrive containing Me, I'm Not and an mp3 that sounds a bit like crickets chirping is found in a bathroom stall in Barcelona, Spain.

Spectrograph analysis of the "crickets" reveals another phone number 1-(216)333-1810.
Calling it leads to an answering machine message that starts out "USWiretap Case Identifier 71839J" which lead to
http://uswiretap.com/71839J
http://uswiretap.com

Survivalism makes its live concert debut in Barcelona.

Friday, February 16, 2007

-15 02.16

Trent posts on The Spiral:
"02/16/07 : everybody's got one
Exciting times. Maddening times. Somebody needs to get the internet working in Europe for one.
The term "marketing" sure is a frustrating one for me at the moment. What you are now starting to experience IS "year zero". It's not some kind of gimmick to get you to buy a record - it IS the art form... and we're just getting started. Hope you enjoy the ride."

Survivalism makes its radio debut.

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

-15 02.14

The fake sites start up. The first red herring is http://opalescenthaze.com which was later revealed to be a fake with this text:
"This was an experiment to see whether contextual clues could convince people over technical facts: i.e., how far down the rabbit hole can one fall?"

NINWiki is set up to track the world of Year Zero, and to not get Year Zero's entry on wikipedia banned.

Another USB flashdrive containing My Violent Heart is found in a bathroom stall in Madrid.

Fans discover a spectrograph analysis of the static at the end of the mp3 file reveals an image of The Presence.

The text in the background of the sites is determined to be from The Hobbit (J. R. R. Tolkien).

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

-15 02.13

A link was added to the (Cops Murder Muslim Kid) thread:
http://www.anotherversionofthetruth.com/audio/nohurry.mp3

Many relate "The Presence" to these lyrics from "The Wretched":
The clouds will part and the sky cracks open
And God himself will reach his fucking arm
Through
Just to push you down
Just to hold you down

The Spanish in the opalo.mp3 was translated:
"when i was a girl things weren't easy, but now it rains and rains. we haven't even dried the coca leaves and then they left. they say its because of global warming. 2 years ago the river took my brothers house, it took my brother his wife, my nephew, and the baby girl. we found her covered with mud and when she dried out she resembled ashes. last year was difficult but the men who by the coca leaves told us to grow what we could. and we did it and they they took it. we waited and we waited and then finally they told us that they could not pay us. because nobody wants to by coca leaves. *baby crying in the background* (talking to it) shhhhhh... there there pretty girl. this year the rains returned and we could not grow anything. now the people say that nobody will buy the coca leaves, its not worth anything to anyone. in Bogotá they only want OPAL. they buy OPAL in the United States and they bring it to Bogotá... OPAL"

Blocks appear near My Violent Heart on http://yearzero.nin.com/

A USB flashdrive containing My Violent Heart is found in a bathroom stall in Lisbon, with a link to anotherversionofthetruth.com in the ID-3 file.

Another tour t-shirt spells out a phone number 1-(310)295-1040.
Calling it leads to an answering machine message that also mentions "another version of the truth" and includes a small clip of Survivalism.

Monday, February 12, 2007

-15 02.12

IAMTRYINGTOBELIEVE discovered on NIN Performance 2007 t-shirt.
http://www.iamtryingtobelieve.com discovered.

Emailing water@iamtryingtobelieve.com obtains an auto-response:
"------------------------AUTO_RESPONSE--------------_--
Thank you for your interest. It is now clear to me that Parepin is a completely safe and effective agent developed to protect us from bio-terrorism. The Administration is acting purely in the best interests of its citizens; to suggest otherwise was irresponsible and I deeply regret it.

I'm drinking the water. So should you."

Unfiction gets involved and discovers several other sites in the same IP block.
http://bethehammer.net/
http://anotherversionofthetruth.com/
http://105thairbornecrusaders.com/
http://churchofplano.com/
http://deadcop-opal.com/ *not yet active

echoingthesound creates a Year Zero forum and a summary of the activity going on is created by Merzbau.

A post (Opal/Cocaine thread) on http://anotherversionofthetruth.com/forum/ leads to:
http://www.consolidatedmailsystems.com/nooneimportant/
http://www.consolidatedmailsystems.com/
http://www.consolidatedmailsystems.com/citizen_unknown/

More anotherversionofthetruth goodness:
http://anotherversionofthetruth.com/audio/opalo.mp3 (Opal/Cocaine)
http://anotherversionofthetruth.com/audio/ballgameOver.mp3 (Violent Resistance)