SOLVED - FREE DVD: Song of the South

[Doramius]

This one is quite a bit harder than the previous ones posted. So as a bonus, if this is solved within the first 3 days, I will add the 2 Ewok movie DVDs (battle for endor & caravan of courage). I will give a hint after the 3 days, at that point the bonus will be reduced to just one DVD of THX-1138 if solved within the next 4 days. AFter the first week I will give a second hint and only the Song of the South DVD, with no bonus, will be up for grabs after that. Good Luck. Try and post YOUR key on how you solved it so others can understand how you worked it out. This one is advanced and should kick out traditional trial and error.


Hint 1: https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1024842#1024842

Hint2: https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1028004#1028004

Answer: https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1029446#1029446

[adam]

The release dates for those two Star Wars DVDs were only just announced. These are obvious bootlegs. Please use a little tact and common sense. These things are not allowed here. If you want to give someone a prize for solving your puzzle then you need to give them something that you actually own.

I'll leave all these threads open for the puzzles but please no more offers of bootlegs.

[Doramius]

The release dates for those two Star Wars DVDs were only just announced. These are obvious bootlegs. Please use a little tact and common sense. These things are not allowed here. If you want to give someone a prize for solving your puzzle then you need to give them something that you actually own.

I'll leave all these threads open for the puzzles but please no more offers of bootlegs.

They were only recently announced and will be remastered. For all of those who want to make sure it's all legal -

The section of American copyright law known as “The Berne Act” states: films unreleased in the United States, including original version of films altered and/or edited for release in the United State, are not protected by American copyright; thus they are considered public domain.

Since the release dates are only announced, AND these are all unremastered versions that were not released in the United States, I am in full compliance of any legal statutes. I will not offer anything of an illegal nature nor do I encourage it. As for stopping such illegal activities other people are doing - My a** is covered. Do what you want. :P

[stiltman]

Fine, my thread gets locked for being in code, same as these puzzle threads, and mine didn't even mention bootlegs...Hmmm

[Doramius]

Fine, my thread gets locked for being in code, same as these puzzle threads, and mine didn't even mention bootlegs...Hmmm

:P

You can have the credit for giving me the idea of setting up the puzzles.

[adam]

The section of American copyright law known as “The Berne Act” states: films unreleased in the United States, including original version of films altered and/or edited for release in the United State, are not protected by American copyright; thus they are considered public domain.

Since the release dates are only announced, AND these are all unremastered versions that were not released in the United States, I am in full compliance of any legal statutes.

If this is what you genuinely believed when you posted these puzzles, then that is fine. But you are still mistaken.

First off, both of those Star Wars films WERE released in the United States. They were made for tv movies and aired on ABC. I remember watching them. That right there is considered a US release. I also know that the battle for Endor film was released on VHS as well in the united states.

Anyway, this is still irrellevant. There is no "Berne Act" section of US copyright law and I can assure you that the language you quoted does not appear anywhere under US copyright law. That is a misquoted provision of the Berne Act, which is a national treaty which the US signed and which alot of our copyright law is based on.

That quote you posted is also completely taken out of context and draws the completely wrong conclusion. The actual quote is this...

films unreleased in the United States, including original version of films altered and/or edited for release in the United State, are not protected by American copyright

Whichever site you are looking must have misinterpreted this language and tacked on the "thus they are considered public domain" part. What that section really means is that you can't take a film released by someone else only in, Japan for example, and then release it yourself in the US and then claim US copyright protection. It does not mean the material is in the public domain, because obviously if it was released anywhere at all then it would qualify for copyright protection from that country. Furthermore, you can always file for copyright protection without publishing the work in any country.

Basically, its cool. You didn't know and are just mistaken. But I can assure you that those films are indeed bootlegs. So please just don't distribute them on this forum as it could definitely get us into trouble.

[Doramius]

Here's the First Hint:



Wow, this one made it 4 days without answer, so I extended the hint a little to make it easier. We're in Phase 2. 3 Days to figure it out for SOTS with just the THX-1138(unremastered) bonus.

[adam]

I dont understand the hint. All of those symbols are identical but they represent different letters? I'm definitely out.

[ViRaL1]

Nothing says a symbol by itself has to represent a specific letter.

[Doramius]

It can be figured out without having the key and much easier now that you have a hint. But I knew this would throw a curve-ball to those who normally look for identical characters. I told you I upped the challenge on this one.

don't worry, the next hint may utterly confuse you until you realize the pattern.

adam -

EDIT - When I first learned this type of code sytem, it took me about 2-3 days to figure it out without a clue. Using a clue should take about a day straight of figuring the method out and working the alphabet to match it. If you had a pattern finding software, it may still only decrypt the puzzle to something you wouldn't understand. But you would then be able to figure it out by yourself in the last part. The reason why I can offer so much help on this is because I have a feeling most people will have difficulty figuring this one out.

[adam]

Like I said, I'm out. I have a hard enough time decrypting my own handwriting.

[Doramius]

Now don't go crazy thinking I just gave everyone the answer to the puzzle. This is only the Mod-Key.
This is the Second hint so only the SOTS DVD is up for grabs now. This hint will either help you or throw you completely for a loop. Good Luck.

Capmaster's Mind - F**K ME!

[Pwyll]

The question is:
Name two of
the three
main animated
characters

answer: Br'er Rabbit & Br'er Fox

How i solved it:
This unfortunately is going to be hard for me to explain....

Once the Mod-key was posted it started to make sense. I noticed that the t & r in three were the same sybol & were seperated by a symbol. The same was true for the E in animated, and the C & A in characters. I noticed that the actual T symbol in the Mod-key was 14 characters from the F (G to T is 14)character which was used for all those character in the question. R was 12 (G to R is 12) away. So i figured the one in between must be 13 characters away. I counted forward 13 characters and ended up on H. Going forward from the last two characters was 11 and 10 and both end up on E. I continued until I got to 0 (T in animated) and then started to go backwards -1, -2, -3 etc. so C in characters was -3 symbols from F (E, D, C).

If you start at the N in Name as 0, the A is -1, M is -2, etc....until you hit 25, then start over.

Doramius, you can probably explain this better than I can.

[Doramius]

No Problem. I'll break it down in parts so people understand how I figured out a similar puzzle, using the same characters and techniques, in only a few days. I took a small class on this back in college.

Step 1: All the characters shown have some similarities and a few differences. If you look at the Mod-Key (Modified Key) characters across the top and the left side going down the characters in the middle are all variations. Character H is a comniation of C & F's characters. (red cross section) You had to use a little logic to figure this one out and understand the pattern, it's actually not that hard, but not one of the first guesses most people think of. Again, once you figure out the pattern you would be able to make a row along the top and left side of broken down characters (brackets in green). If you remove A and Z's characters you can get an idea that it's a 5X5 diagram allowing 25 characters. # 1 & 26 would not match any of the broken down characters. The only 2 letters you may not have been able to figure out are A & Z, but it leaves you only 2 options.



Once you built your general table of characters, you can now decrypt the puzzle into letters. But to prevent common method of trial and error to figure out the puzzle I used something similar to a ROT scale.

Step 2: It would take a little time, but once you have the Mod_key you can start to use traditional trial and error. There are 26 letters, and most people think forwards, so I worked backwards. The first character would be itself as 0, the next character would be -1, then -2, -3, -4. If you decrypted the letter B and it was the 19th letter in the entire puzzle, you would go -18 bringing you to letter K. After you get to -25 you've gone through the alphabet 1 whole time so the 27th letter in the puzzle will be exactly what it's supposed to be, just like the very first letter in the puzzle.

This is what you should have come up with.

NAME TWO OF THE THREE MAIN ANIMATED CHARACTERS