With this whole hit-counter spinning like mad, it turns out that Uncle Sandy and his pal Craig were getting me back for something I did years ago.
Back in 1999 or thereabouts, SETI @ Home came on the scene. SETI, the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence, had created a downloadable screen-saver that helped the Search for ET by having your computer crunch radio-astronomy data, looking for organized information in the random radiation pouring down on us from space. Very geek-cool.
Not only could you download this screensaver and crunch data for them, but you could have an account of sorts with Seti@Home, and they would keep track of how many individual crunches or analyses you had done. That way, if your computer crunched two or three sets of radio-astronomy data, you could see if your friends had done the same. Of course, that meant having friends so geeky that they would download the Seti@Home screensaver. Too.
And that's not all! You could form teams and compete with other teams! There were top Seti@Home data crunching teams who had "analyzed more individual packets of radio-astronomy data for signs of alien life" than any other team. Woo Hoo!
This is all silly-sounding Internet geeky stuff, just like weird stuff out of Wired magazine, and all this happened almost 10 years ago.
Well, Sandy, Craig, and I were on a team with a bunch of other friends. Or maybe we were on several competing teams. I don't really recall.
I had a fast computer with a good Internet connection, and I could crunch numbers very quickly. I had a pretty high score. I recall that Craig, in particular, wanted to get the best score. He figured out that if you put several computers to work on the task, each with the same Seti@Home account, you could crunch Seti's astronomical data even faster! Craig's score started moving up fast.
I got into the competitive spirit and harnessed half a dozen computers around the house (I'm the type who *has* half a dozen computers kicking around the house). That pumped up my score and I kept my lead.
So then, Craig set up an entire training room at work with 30 computers and had them all start grinding away at the task. His training computers were slow, but they were an army. Craig's army started chugging 24 hours a day, completing maybe 10 analyses an hour, and his score roared past mine. I didn't know what to do at this point. I could not physically match the large amount of computing power Craig was using, but I didn't want to lose.
So, I hacked the Seti@Home program. I looked at what it did each time it did a download and upload. I figured out how to spoof the Seti@Home website into thinking I had completed my packet as soon as I received it. I scripted this spoof and turned it on. Suddenly, on a single computer, I was "completing" one analysis every second. Craig's army could do 10 analyses an hour. On a single computer, I was spoofing Seti@Home at the rate of 3600 analyses per hour! Craig would need literally 10,000 computers to go *that* fast. Heh heh.
My score shot past Craig's, then doubled his score, then 10 times his score, then 100 times his score. It became impossible for his army to catch my score even if they ran for a year.
While this was happening, Sandy and Craig talked to each other on the phone... "Ww-ww-ww-wwhat's happening!!!! Like, OMG!!! How is it possible that his score is, like, growing so fast!!! He is totally demolishing us! Oh Nooooooooooooooooo!!"
As soon as I reached some threshold, (Craig times 1000 or something), I killed my hack, and closed down my Seti@Home account. I had spoofed their system, beaten Craig and Sandy, and so it was time to walk away. I retired undefeated.
Until now....
So, I guess some time in the last 24 hours, Sandy and Craig finally had their revenge. They discovered that I had a counter on my blog and their faces curled into evil-Grinch smiles. They scripted something to hit my blog, over and over and over, until I started noticing the huge number of hits. They haven't admitted to doing so, exactly, but Uncle Sandy has hinted at it. For instance, Sandy emailed me a taunt that included the photo of the fighting goalies just minutes after I had posted it on my blog. I'm sure they enjoyed my consternation earlier today. I even went crazy right on the blog below, wondering what was going on, fighting with Patrick Roy.
They got me back. And so they win! For now.
