MONDAY, MAY 1
  . . .
Cryptographer: The Davinci Code hits the big screen this summer. Renowned cryptographer Elonka Dunin was on the show. She was one of those trying to break the code. She's also involved in trying to solve one of the most difficult codes in history..the Kryptos Sculpture at CIA headquarters.

Not quite as eloquent a summary as on the MSNBC site, but at least they're trying. :)

This particular interview, btw, was one of the most stressful ones for me, since it was Live. I showed up at the studio, and they basically took me in to the room where the news anchors were already broadcasting, they waited until there was a commercial break and then waved me in to sit down, clipped a microphone on me, and we were on the air within minutes. No prep, no, "Here's what we're going to ask you," just sit down and go. But they were obviously prepared with graphics, which they inserted at the proper moments as I answered the various questions they fed to me. A couple times I couldn't tell what they were wanting me to say, so I'd watch the woman anchor, who when off camera was giving me very helpful signals like a big nod and smile when I was on track. Sometimes though they'd ask me a question and I couldn't tell what it was they were looking for, so I just winged it. Then 5 minutes later we're done, and off-camera again as they switch to another video, and I take my microphone off and scurry off stage and back to my car with this vague sense of, "Damn that was fast!" Almost a kind of "walk of shame" feel. ;) Overall though, it was a fun experience.

For anyone who wants to see an actual video stream, check here. And for the station website, check the meme link.

Elonka :)

Elonka Dunin on FOX 2 St. Louis

This episode is hosted by P(?)NYB(?)Y and Elonka Dunin. The topic of the show is Cryptography and the Kryptos sculpture. In an obvious attempt to gain listeners, i feel obligated to tell you that this episode of BellCoreRadio contains clues, both to the Kryptos code as well as a code in Elonkas new book, that have
never before been released to the public!

I co-hosted the latest episode of BellCoreRadio, after having met the host, P0nyb0y, at the Notacon hacker conference in Cleveland. The "show" is basically an hour of the two of us chatting about Kryptos, the K2 announcement and related media attention, and my book.

Caveat: The audio levels on the podcast are a bit erratic, so keep your volume control close at hand while listening. If you can work through the sound quality though, it's (IMHO) an interesting conversation.

Elonka :)

Click on the "MP3" or "OGG" link at this URL, as appropriate:

Hacker Media - BellCoreRadio #32

April 21, 2006:

LONDON (Reuters) - Dan Brown's follow-up novel to his global bestseller "The Da Vinci Code" won't be ready by the end of the year as originally expected, his publisher said on Friday.
"We don't know when it's coming, but it's out of the schedule for this year," said Larry Finlay, managing director for Transworld Publishers in London, a division of Bertelsmann-owned Random House.
"At one point we were hoping for it around October or November, but now it's looking like 2007," he told Reuters, confirming a report in the Bookseller trade publication.

Hmm, perhaps the delay is because of the Kryptos announcement? Brown has to rewrite the Kryptos section now... ;)

'Da Vinci Code' sequel delayed

Book news
FROM LOCAL AND WIRE SOURCES

04/23/2006

Author update

A local code breaker is getting closer to cracking Kryptos, a sculpture on the CIA grounds in Washington with an embedded code that has stumped experts for years.

Two weeks ago, the Post-Dispatch featured Elonka Dunin, a St. Charles computer game company executive, about her new book of codes and puzzles. She co-moderates an online group devoted to solving Kryptos. The group has figured out three of four parts.

This is an interesting milestone for me -- my name showed up in a newspaper article, without me having talked to the reporter ahead of time. Granted, it's a local St. Louis paper that is just posting an update based on recent media attention that I *do* know about, but still, it was kind of an odd feeling. Like a new "fame" stepping stone.

Elonka

STLtoday - Entertainment - Books - Author update

The Da Vinci Code is currently being adapted into a film by Columbia Pictures, with director Ron Howard; the film will star Tom Hanks as Robert Langdon, Audrey Tautou as Sophie Neveu and Sir Ian McKellen as Leigh Teabing. It is scheduled for release on May 19, 2006.

Brown is working on a new novel, called The Solomon Key, which will reportedly take place in Washington DC, and feature the secret society of the Freemasons. Exact release date has not been announced, but the most common media speculation says late 2006 or sometime in 2007.

Brown's promotional website states that puzzles hidden in the bookjacket of The Da Vinci Code (including two referring to the Kryptos sculpture at CIA Headquarters in Langley, Virginia) give hints about the subject of the next novel.

Dan Brown says that he currently has outlines for at least 12 future books, one of which involves a famous composer's "all factual" associations with a secret society.

I am memeing this not because the article is interesting, but because the wording is. The last few paragraphs are *my* phrasing, lifted word for word out of the "Future Projects" section of the Dan Brown Wikipedia article, about 80% of which was written by me.

Fashion Monitor Toronto - Dan Brown Clear of Da Vinci Code Plagiarism Accusations

Regarding Baigent/Leigh's 1982 Holy Blood, Holy Grail, and Brown's 2003 The Da Vinci Code:

The respective figures for the two books are around 2m copies and 36m - still rising and set to rise even more sharply with the imminent release of the film version.

The claim by Mr Baigent and Mr Leigh is that "the central theme" of their book has been borrowed for the novel. The two men were noticeably not flanked by minders from their publishers: they are suing not Dan Brown but his publishers, for breach of UK copyright in the UK editions of the book. In a coincidence almost worthy of a conspiracy theorist, because of a string of takeovers in the industry, the books share the same publisher, Random House.

I'd noticed that traffic to my Kryptos site had doubled, with this time a sizeable percentage coming from a Guardian article that was published several months ago. Looks like this story is the reason: Brown is currently getting sued in the UK, and the Guardian article about it has a "see also" section referring to the Kryptos story.

There's speculation that the trial may delay the release of the movie. I wonder if that'll change the release date of my book! It's a strange feeling, seeing my own fortunes tied so closely to far away headlines...

Elonka

UK Guardian: In a packed high court, a new twist in The Da Vinci Code begins to unfold

With worldwide sales of more than 40 million copies, including 4 million in Britain, The Da Vinci Code and its blend of conspiracy theories, shadowy secret societies and thrilling adventure has already spawned an industry of its own.
  . . .
“Disguised on the jacket of The Da Vinci Code, numerous encrypted messages hint at the subject matter of Dan Brown’s next Robert Langdon novel.”

A faint grid reference written in reverse on the cover leads, with an adjustment of one degree, to a sculpture called Kryptos in the courtyard of the CIA’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia. Kryptos is covered in about 1,800 letters of code, much of which is still a mystery despite its location at the workplace of some of the world’s shrewdest cryptographers.

I wonder if the folks at the NSA cringe every time someone refers to the CIA as being the crypto agency. Or whether they see it a good "cover" for their own mission. ;)

UK Times Online: Codebreakers rack their brains to solve Dan Brown's new poser

Page view odometer rolled over to 1.4 million this week.

Total   618,288
Average Per Day   1,373
Average Visit Length   1:55
Last Hour   28
Today   262
This Week   9,613

PAGE VIEWS

Total   1,400,234
Average Per Day   2,422
Average Per Visit   1.8
Last Hour   61
Today   534
This Week   16,955

The Kryptos site, incidentally, is *not* the draw. It's been holding pretty steady around 400 visitors/day. The huge traffic lately has been almost exclusively for my "Unsolved Codes" page. Traffic quintupled last week, and the #1 culprit is the "StumbleUpon" service. I don't know what this means exactly... Perhaps they changed their algorithm, or perhaps my site got enough "thumbs up" votes that it was bumped up a notch in viewability, or maybe StumbleUpon itself just got more popular, and my site is riding the wave with it . . .

Referring pages, ranked by website:

2,147 stumbleupon.com    53.7%
521 google.com    13.0%
57 google.ca    1.4%
48 google.co.uk    1.2%
41 elonka.com    1.0%
41 en.wikipedia.org    1.0%
37 search.yahoo.com    0.9%
26 matt-thornton.net    0.7%
24 google.co.in    0.6%
18 google.com.ph    0.5%
12 google.com.sg    0.3%
12 google.de    0.3%
11 google.com.au    0.3%
11 images.google.com    0.3%
9 google.se    0.2%
7 members.aol.com    0.2%
7 search.msn.com    0.2%
7 wired.com    0.2%
6 aolsearch.aol.com    0.2%

Google google google. I don't even know what country that half those suffixes are, heh. .ph, .sg, .se . . .

elonka.com Odometer

lmcelhiney wrote:

Brief review:

Elonka Dunin, one of the sharpest cryptographers of this or any other age, has created a superb tutorial of cryptography --an entire classroom in a single book! A reader can be at any level of skill in crytography and achieve full enjoyment of this marvelous work. Excellent coverage of the latest in cryptograms, including Da Vinci codes and the hardest puzzle to challenge experts in a decade: KRYPTOS (Google it!) This book could be your training ground for solving the best of unsolved cryptograms of this and recent centuries.

Wow, thanks! I hope all the reviews are as positive. :)

The Amazon U.S. page is not accepting reviews yet, but the Amazon UK page is. Would you be interested in adding your advance review there?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/026-8355631-3534830

RE: Books: Mammoth Book of Secret Codes and Cryptograms

The most detailed photo of the CIA campus that I've ever seen. Go to the link, zoom in, and then click on the "Birds Eye" icon on the left.

Looks like they're deleting some images of "sensitive" government buildings in other parts of the map, so this might not be around long. If you're interested, take a look now.

Elonka :)

Birds-Eye View of Kryptos