The San Francisco Connection

Shortcut SFCon

General

• In most literal terms, this is a new link which is to connect Perplex City to Earth; specifically, the link will connect to San Francisco, California, USA.
• In a more pragmatic sense, this will be a live event in San Francisco, and will be similar to the London PCAG event.

• The event will take place August 12th, 2006.

• This page will serve as a source for all pre-event information available, until the day of the event. Then, the current existing page at that time will be archived and this page will be entirely used to focus on what took place at the event proper.
• Some early information has already been moved to: SFCon:pre-event

Meetups

As a game, Perplex City has but one rule: Any occassion with more than 2 cube hunters must involve alcohol. In this vein, a number of meet-ups and organized gathering of masses have been planned, both pre- and post- event. As follows:

• A clearinghouse of event coordination is at the unForums.

• Mind Candy is having a "post-event thingie down near the Palace."
  • From the event page:

Q: Will there be any social activities afterwards?
A: We are currently considering organising something afterwards. We're well aware that players will want to get a drink or meet up somewhere, and so at the closing presentation we will at least let all players know about possible places to go.

• Endgame - map - link
  • Friday, August 11th 2-9
  • Sunday, August 13th, 10-5
  • Right around the corner from the 12th Street/City Center BART station (red/yellow lines).

• Pacific Coast Brewing Company - map - link
  • Food, etc., to be had after hanging out at Endgame, on Friday evening.
  • Located across the street from Endgame
  • They have food, drinks, and free wifi (according to the sign outside).

What is Known

As described in the Perplex City Newsletter:

** SAN FRANCISCO LIVE EVENT: NEW DETAILS! ** As announced, there's going to be a massive live event in San Francisco on Saturday, August 12th! With room for around 500 players and 500 spectators, a host of exciting challenges and an official Academy presence, it's the most ambitious Perplex City event yet. It's being held at The Palace Of Fine Arts Theatre, from 10.30am to 5pm, and it's absolutely free to take part in this exciting event - you can even join in the fun online! Read more: http://www.perplexcitysentinel.com/archives/2006/07/iona_interviews_17.html And register: http://www.perplexcity.com/liveevents/index.qbuild

According to Adrian Hon of Mind Candy:

"There are a few reasons," Hon explains. "At the moment, we only have one data link to Perplex City, and that's based in London. It can only handle a limited amount of traffic, and with the number of people using the link in both Perplex City and Earth increasing rapidly, we need another connection for the extra capacity." Beyond that, though, is a firm belief in the prudence of redundancy: "Another principal reason for the new San Francisco connection is simply that it's always smarter to have two links rather than one. It took an awful lot of time and effort to set up that first link, and while I'm no physicist, I do know that the favorable conditions that were required to make the connection do not come around often." In order to celebrate the occasion, Mind Candy is putting on a celebration of some sort. What light can Hon shed on this event and what will happen there? "The event is a big thank-you from the Perplex City Academy and Mind Candy to everyone who's searching for the Cube," Hon says. "It's also a celebration of the activation of the new link, and in typical Perplex City-style, it'll involve an awful lot of puzzles and games." As for specifics, Hon spills the first concrete details regarding the day: "It'll all start on the morning of Saturday August 12th with a presentation at the Palace of Fine Arts Theatre, where everything will be explained. I can tell you now that it's basically a huge high-tech treasure hunt, but with a twist -- unlike the PCAG tournament in London, this treasure hunt will be collaborative, not competitive." Even through the medium of email, one can feel the pride Hon has in this undertaking. "There'll be hundreds of puzzles scattered across San Francisco, involving traveling to landmarks, looking for hidden objects, cracking codes and translating languages. Players will work together to figure out the answers. The answers serve as activation codes for special RFID tags back at the Palace of Fine Arts."

The doomsday message

observed on http://www.boingboing.net/ was the following advertisement:

Seems pretty nice. However, as animated gifs tho, this one's no laughing matter. For less than one second, this cel is seen:

It is braille, and reads: Say goodbye to Perplex City.

Plot Sickens

The meaning of this message began to unfold on 10-AUG-06, when all sites coming out the city were hacked, and replaced with a static image:

References

• The Perplex City Sentinel
  • news in brief, 22-JUN-06 "Academy Mum on New Link"
  • article, 13-JUL-06 "Iona Interviews... Adrian Hon" (link)