42

Part of the Fortnightly Topic Challenge #35: Restricted Title 1

enter image description here

David Starkey
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4 Answers4

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Final answer:

When comparing the image above to the original comic, we can see that...

the text "DRM-free files" at the bottom right is replaced by "0XAmp" (a zero, not an O). Using this instead of "kLvQR" for the post image link leads us to this new image, which has five letters that differ from the original comic:

enter image description here

The letters "KRODF" become "WVNZ2". The correct order is "V2ZNW", with the characters ordered based on their position in their respective text blocks ("W" is the fifth character, "V" is the first character, etc.). Using this in the image link leads to a new image:

enter image description here

If we replace each number 5 8 -5 13 42 with the character at that position in each text block, not counting spaces or non-alphanumeric characters, and assuming negative means counting starting at the end and making it lowercase, then we get "KRiR0". Using this in the image link leads to a new image:

enter image description here

On the surface, this doesn't appear to differ from the original comic, but if you adjust the intensity you can see some ghosted text appear. I processed the image in MATLAB using the code imwrite(uint8(255.*(imread('KRiR0.png') > 245)), 'adjusted.png'); to get this:

enter image description here

And the characters "EdxNK" (read from top to bottom) appear. Using this in the image link leads to a new image with 5 changed letters (4 lower-cased and one removed):

enter image description here

And finally, using "goioF" in the image link leads to the final image:

enter image description here

Phew! All that image stealing made me tired! Thanks to everyone who was solving it alongside me!

gnovice
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    We're at the same point :-) I think that the second thing you've called Z is actually 2, if that helps? (Again, compare with the "2" of "DMCA 1201".) – Rand al'Thor Jun 05 '18 at 17:43
  • @Randal'Thor: You're right, the second one does look more two-ish. – gnovice Jun 05 '18 at 17:47
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    @Randal'Thor Unfortunately there was no Z in the text. However, anytime I could, I grabbed the letters from somewhere in the comic. – David Starkey Jun 05 '18 at 17:57
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    For the order of the characters in your second image, check where they appear in their respective text blocks. Kudos for brute-forcing, though. – David Starkey Jun 05 '18 at 20:16
  • @gnovice, I think the Rot13: ahzoref ersre gb gur yrggre jr arrq gb trg arkg onfrq ba gur ahzore bs punenpgref va gung yvar – Joe-You-Know Jun 05 '18 at 20:20
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    I tried assuming the numbers were how many characters into the sentence we need to go. If we considered a new line as a character and the -5 starts at the end of pirate and works backward that gave K, U, I, R, I. If we don't assume the new line is a character it gives K, U, M, R, I. Trying all permutations of those letters only gives two hits with actual images but neither seem like they are what it should be: https://i.stack.imgur.com/UIRKI.png and https://i.stack.imgur.com/URIKM.png – Dason Jun 05 '18 at 21:12
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    +1, as is customary. – jpmc26 Jun 06 '18 at 11:23
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    @Dason Given how the progression is established, you could probably only count the characters that could be used. You might also consider why one of them would be negative. – David Starkey Jun 06 '18 at 13:34
  • @Dason Also, I think you may have miscounted on the second one. That's supposed to be an 8. – David Starkey Jun 06 '18 at 13:44
  • It looks like @Dason didn't miscount on the second one, he just listed them in an unusual order: 5 13 42 8 -5. Also, he counted every character including spaces. – Jake The Snake Jun 06 '18 at 17:17
  • @gnovice, It almost looks like this last clue is the original comic. I can't find any obvious changes at least. Could this be the end of the riddle? – Joe-You-Know Jun 06 '18 at 17:26
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    I can definitely see very light colored letters in areas, such as on the top person's face and just above the lower person's hat. – ManyPinkHats Jun 06 '18 at 17:28
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    I just used a website to highlight the differences, and there are very clearly 5 letters. https://online-image-comparison.com (use fuzz level 4) – Jake The Snake Jun 06 '18 at 17:32
  • You're right, I can definetely see the letter N – Joe-You-Know Jun 06 '18 at 17:32
  • @Joe-You-Know It's fairly obvious when the end is reached. Just in case there's unrelated links found, all the images are the same dimensions. – David Starkey Jun 06 '18 at 17:33
  • Does this mean anything to anyone? https://i.stack.imgur.com/dExNk.png – Joe-You-Know Jun 06 '18 at 17:36
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    Found it, https://i.stack.imgur.com/EdxNK.png – Joe-You-Know Jun 06 '18 at 17:38
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    @Joe-You-Know: Found it too. ;) – gnovice Jun 06 '18 at 17:44
  • @gnovice Beat me to the end by seconds – Joe-You-Know Jun 06 '18 at 17:45
8

Answer:
After following a series of clues and finding the differences of the last one, you end up with

enter image description here

As the final picture. (I'll update my answer to reflect this)

Update: Found this,

enter image description here

From the work gnovice has been doing.

1st Answer

Okay, I'm not sure if this is just spot the difference but here it is

In the original XKCD, the bottom line read "(If you don't like this, demand DRM-Free files)"
In this puzzle, it instead reads, "(If you don't like this, demand OXAmp), which is as far as I can tell is an anti-bacterial"
Compare
enter image description here
To
enter image description here
I feel there is more to this puzzle than just this difference, hopefully this will help others though.

Joe-You-Know
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7

Joe-You-Know spotted the key difference between the image in the OP and the original XKCD comic:

the replacement of "DRM-free files" by "0XAMP", with the MP smaller than the 0XA.

This suggests

looking at https://i.stack.imgur.com/0XAmp.png - where we find:

new image

In this new image, we can again spot the key differences from the original XKCD comic:

the letters K, R, O, D, F at various points have been replaced by W, V, N, ?, 2. I'm not sure what that fourth character is - R? Z? - or which of these are supposed to be lower-case, but presumably these letters will lead us to the next image.

Rand al'Thor
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0

Using

V2ZNW

you get this image:

https://i.stack.imgur.com/V2ZNW.png

This shows some numbers. If you add them to the letter positions I get this:

k(11) + 5 = p(16)

r(18) + 8 = z(26)

o(15) + 13 = 28 = b(2)

d(4) - 5 = -1 = y(25)

f(6) + 42 = 48 = v(22)

This means pzbyv. Not sure what I can do with this ...

If you rot13 this you get comli, maybe a misspelled comic?

MEE
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  • The -5 should come before the 13, no need to add number positions, and a couple of your letters seem to be off (or I'm not understanding how you reached those letters). For example, if I count 13 with spaces, I get the U in BUY, without spaces I get the R in DRM, but you have an O. – David Starkey Jun 06 '18 at 14:48
  • @DavidStarkey no, this is about their positions in the alphabet. And they are the letters you replaced with other characters in gnovices solution – MEE Jun 06 '18 at 14:50
  • But the 13th letter is M, so I'm still unsure how you got to O. – David Starkey Jun 06 '18 at 14:53
  • I think he's using 0 as A. – Joe-You-Know Jun 06 '18 at 15:00
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    His KRODF comes from the previous step, when the letters KRODF were replaced by V2ZNW. I think we can completely ignore those letters on this step. – Jake The Snake Jun 06 '18 at 17:05
  • @JakeTheSnake That makes much more sense. Oddly coincidental that the first 2 letters are the same either way. – David Starkey Jun 06 '18 at 17:38