rm445 3 days ago

So... someone has been posting cryptic adverts annually from 1981 through 2026, which together constitute logic puzzles and obscure references.

The main thing I think is quite cool, besides the sheer persistence, is that anyone noticed and there's a community following this. Everyone has stuff going on in their lives, this seems so obscure that you'd almost expect people to shrug and ignore.

CamperBob2 2 days ago

From the April 3, 1999 entry at http://www.maydaymystery.org/mayday/update.html :

This week sucked, so nothing really got updated, but I took a cue from one of the previous emails and decided to blow off about 3,000 important things I should have been doing and read Magus (link to Amazon product page) instead.

I have my complaints about Amazon, but you know what I respect the hell out of them for: that 27-year-old web link still works.

sans_souse 3 days ago

I just want to be the first to make this connection to "Digger" 2026 starring Tom Cruise and no I'm not joking I'm just really deep in this rabbit hole

  • sans_souse 3 days ago

    The term "Diggers" historically refers to "The True Levellers" - 17th-century radical Christian agrarian group that fought against the English establishment and believed the earth was a "common treasury" for all.

    See also; edited liquor bottle image referencing the Eagles' "Hotel California" ("We haven't had that spirit here since 1969"). Pop culture reference

    • defrost 2 days ago

      Their peer group the "Ranters" can perhaps be tied into another Tom Cruise film, the one directed by that A Clockwork Orange director.

      That's assuming we agree on the Winstanley take on Ranter principles as amounting to the excessive enjoyment of "meat, drinke, pleasures, and women".

      • sans_souse 2 days ago

        I'm coming back up for air, these rabbit holes go deep.

readthenotes1 3 days ago

It looks a lot like what one of my schizophrenic relatives does

misterdj1 22 hours ago

The Spirit of these ads is implicitly (and sometimes explicitly) anti-Catholic. As someone raised Catholic, but who drifted from The Church up until recently, I have to wonder if The Church is being used as a scapegoat in this person’s (or organization’s?) paranoid delusions.

Or maybe there is something wrong with The Church? Who knows! :P

gfaure 2 days ago

Have there ever been sections of this that the community would consider "solved"? If not, these seem less like logic puzzles and more like complete nonsense...

sans_souse 3 days ago

Ok, someone, anyone, explain?