[GASM] Robotic High Weirdness by Mail

[Cramulus]

This is a multi phase plan which will generate and send weirdness by mail to random people in America. After the infrastructure is set up, it will run autonomously for all time, requiring no effort or upkeep from us.

This requires a wee little bit o botwork from you tech nerds, if you're hip to it.









--Golden Apple Corps develops weirdness-by-mail.
There are two types: Letters, and postcards.

All the files for this weirdness (images, pdfs, text files) will be tagged via delicious with [RWHMGASM] (which should really confuse RWHN). _{NOTE PROJECT NAME SUBJECT TO CHANGE WHEN WE COME UP WITH A SLICKER CODE NAME}.

--we set up a paypal account and teach the bot how to check it

--the bot also gets an e-mail address and an account with POSTFUL. This allows it to send snail mail whenever it can pull a buck (for a letter / PDF) or 52 cents (for a postcard).

--When we turn it on, and there's a few bucks in the account, the bot will pick a random address. It will generate weirdness by mail based on stuff tagged via delicious (this allows us to change/modify the set later very easily). Then it will mail a letter to that address. The return address is an office in California, there's almost no way to trace it back to us.






So how do we get money in the kitty to fuel this weirdness bot?

Well obviously it can take donations. If you donate five bucks to it, you're guaranteed that you just made three or four people's days a little bit weirder. But that's not self-sustaining. So...

We generate some sort of media or product that people would want to buy. It might be a communal-property resource that we already have. For example we can use lulu or magcloud to sell hard copies of the Black Iron Prison, postergasm packs, or a new project. The profit goes into the paypal account, which is in turn fuels the bot to drop surreal moments into random stranger's lives.




here's a diagram:

[Rococo Modem Basilisk]

There's probably a way to connect an adsense account to a paypal account. If so, if we can insert a url at the bottom of the hardcopies and a site explaining the initiative (with an ad or two at the bottom) it can probably be self-sustaining just by having some of the confused people visit the URL plus whatever impressions we can get from random wanderings.

Alternately, we compile a bunch of the high weirdness into a book-sized PDF and sell it on cafepress with all the proceeds (arbitrary markup) going directly to the paypal account for the mailings.

[Cramulus]

There's probably a way to connect an adsense account to a paypal account. If so, if we can insert a url at the bottom of the hardcopies and a site explaining the initiative (with an ad or two at the bottom) it can probably be self-sustaining just by having some of the confused people visit the URL plus whatever impressions we can get from random wanderings.

Alternately, we compile a bunch of the high weirdness into a book-sized PDF and sell it on cafepress with all the proceeds (arbitrary markup) going directly to the paypal account for the mailings.

maybe a few of the hardcopies could have a url, but generally I'd want to avoid giving the recipient a neat answer to what they just received.



maybe it could be a password to get into that hidden discordian party page we set up. (the one with no way in)

[Cramulus]

What kind of Weirdness By Mail do you guys think would be fun for our hypothetical robot to send?

[Cainad (dec.)]

At the top: a weird/funny picture with a completely unrelated memebomb in a big font

As the body: a selected Verwirrung blog post or an essay (I think almost anything used in Intermittens should be up for grabs, but we should also look for stuff we haven't used yet). Probably kinda short; long ones might be hard to fit.

At the bottom: something signature-ish. Long and narrow, like maybe a cut-out moustache or something like that (interactive fun!)



AND/OR


A piece of paper with a heptagram (7-sided star) in the center and some wonky madjiqual symbols, with instructions to perform a completely bogus Discordian ritual.


EDIT: I just realized that this involves creating and laying out something ourselves, rather than having a bot pick it up and mail it. Whoops.

[Cainad (dec.)]

Could a similar but separate bot + merchandise system be used to promote the ARGGASM?

[Cramulus]

that's a really cool idea - involving people in an ARG without their knowledge.

maybe not best for aporia

but once we've got a working bot, I like the idea of finding ways to engage people in weirdness by mail




maybe we can send them CODED TRANSMISSIONS which point them at a hidden message in the Principia Discordia. (Instructions for your mission are found within)


or we could use some cold-reading techniques to make it seem like a secret organization has been monitoring them, and has selected them for service

[Rococo Modem Basilisk]

Could a similar but separate bot + merchandise system be used to promote the ARGGASM?

I like this.

It'd be like spam, but not, because people would participate in arggasm just to figure out what it is.

[Cramulus]

yeah... the game IS finding out about the game

by going on the internet and looking up some word or phrase we give them, they are taking the first step. If WE control the info they're searching through, that IS playing the game, not looking up info on the game...


tangent-
we could even set up a form or something that acts like a mission terminal. If you feed it the password you got in your letter, it'll give you a mission every week. It seems like humans are writing the missions individually, but the're actually randomly generated. Those participants that actually find themselves completing the missions will feel like cool operatives of our secret society. Each mission contains one discordian code word... if you do five or six missions you'll have enough google fodder to get more info. and maybe even find the origin... but it'll be a wild ride to get there.

[Cramulus]

I just realized that this comic was the kernel for this idea.

[Cain]

Yeah, I noticed that too.

Also, I probably still have half the old Neurocam and Yellow 1 assignements stored on one of my hard drives, if you want to go ahead with this.

[Cramulus]

potential python resources marked for later:

http://code.google.com/p/pypaypal/ paypal api

http://www.programmableweb.com/link/ebay-php-perl-python-developer-center  ebay api

http://www.postful.com/help/integration postful api

[Rococo Modem Basilisk]

It seems like humans are writing the missions individually, but the're actually randomly generated.

Are you suggesting that the entire mission is computer generated (like, word for word) or that it's randomly chosen? Or templated? The latter two are easy, but the former may or may not require solving the Hard Problem.

[Cramulus]

templated

it would be like

[appellation]
[introductory bit]
[mission]
[warnings]
[clue]
[signature]

OPERATIVE NINE:

There is a schism taking place within our ranks and we want to make sure that when this is resolved, you are on the right side.
This mission may sound confusing, but it plays an important role in the schema 2515.

[randomly generated mission which involves doing something in real life or on the internet]

Be careful - the crows are waiting for the ides.

If you have any questions, please call [always busy phone number]

If you succeed, you will be cleared for FNORD access.


Frater XXIII

[Rococo Modem Basilisk]

Neat. There is probably room for totally randomly generated misisons as well, but we would have to say that they are riddles or encoded or something, to make up for the lack of sense. I am unsure if that fits with the ARGGASM thing, though.