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What's going on at TAM?

AdMan

Penultimate Amazing
AdMan
Joined
Feb 10, 2010
Messages
10,293
Live, RIGHT NOW (11:16pm local time) at one of the TAM conference rooms. No one seems to know what's going on behind the signed and sealed doors (the $1M challenge demonstration is on Sunday). Hmm...

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So everyone just abandonded you and slammed a door in your face? You're not cool enough to be part of their club?

Ward
 
wardenclyffe said:
I know. Why aren't you on the inside? Was it all a super secret surprise?

Ward
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Uhmm... It's a sealed room. No one knows what is inside or what is going on.

The doors to Penn's party are open, so it's bacon and donuts for a bit. :)
 
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But there was a point before those doors were sealed. There was no announcement like "hey everyone, we're doing a test for the million dollar challenge in 15 minutes"?

Ward
 
Nope.

Richard Saunders and DJ Grothe stepped out of a workshop session early due to something "exciting" related to the MDC, but that's all that was announced, AFAIK.

ETA: To be clear, no one in the TAM audience was let into the room before it was sealed. There is still an MDC event scheduled for Sunday, but we don't know how whatever is sealed in the room is related.
 
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OK. Thanks. I was confused. In the past, the MDC "event" was pre-announced and pre-scheduled, right? This is weird. Exciting and weird.

Ward
 
AdMan said:
Nope.

Richard Saunders and DJ Grothe stepped out of a workshop session early due to something "exciting" related to the MDC, but that's all that was announced, AFAIK.

ETA: To be clear, no one in the TAM audience was let into the room before it was sealed. There is still an MDC event scheduled for Sunday, but we don't know how whatever is sealed in the room is related.
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Just read your ETA. That explains something. I'm not sure what, but it satisfied my curiosity....for now.

Ward
 
It could just be that the signs are up in preparation for the "$1M challenge demonstration ...on Sunday".

Speaking of which, who/what are they testing?

And did you try opening the door?
 
Orphia Nay said:
It could just be that the signs are up in preparation for the "$1M challenge demonstration ...on Sunday".

Speaking of which, who/what are they testing?

And did you try opening the door?
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The doors were sealed and shut with signatures to ensure they aren't opened. They say not to open, so why would anyone do so, unless they want to sabotage things?

I have no idea what they may be testing.

But it does seem as if they're keeping something in there safe in preparation for the MDC test on Sunday, and I thought the sealed door was interesting.
 
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Oh, yes, it's very interesting! Damn you, TAM, for being so exciting! :( :)

ETA: I didn't realise that was gaffer and signatures over the door crack.
 
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So, at this point, we are assuming that there are things sealed in that room and not people, right? So will the challenge be to guess what's behind the sealed door? Is there really a room at TAM that's used for nothing other than to conceal----I don't know----a model airplane?

Ward
 
wardenclyffe said:
So, at this point, we are assuming that there are things sealed in that room and not people, right? So will the challenge be to guess what's behind the sealed door? Is there really a room at TAM that's used for nothing other than to conceal----I don't know----a model airplane?

Ward
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I heard Richard Saunders talking about this room. Yes, there are some mysterious items in the room, and apparently the person being tested needs them to be completely undisturbed for 3 full days, while he remote views them.
 
I hear that the "do not disturb" sign has been upgraded to something more "official" looking.

Ward
 
At lunch today, Randi said it was a guy identifying 5 sealed items out of 25 possible known items (paraphrased). Given that, remote-viewing sounds like the most-likely MDC.
 
HawaiiBigSis said:
And so... What happened?
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The challenge is going on right now.

Check out #TAM2013 on Twitter for live updates.

(A group of us are at Penn & Teller's show, which I predict will be much more entertaining :p.)
 
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A gentleman from Algeria was attempting to remote view 3 numbered items (out of a known list of 20 items) in the sealed room. Part of the protocol was that the room be sealed for three days -- this was per the applicant. I don't have the full list of items that they worked from.

He stayed in Algeria. During the live challenge, he was contacted by phone by his representative who was present here in Las Vegas. Translation was required.

He guessed number 5 - Paper Towels, 13 - Coat Hanger and 22 - Chips. The door was then unsealed to reveal that the items were a 11 - Necktie, 10 - Stuffed Elephant and (someone correct me) a 23 - Coaster?

He accepted the failure with the caveat that this is the holy month of Ramadan which may have affected his "vision" -- also, he usually works from a list of items that he prepares. But he and his representative were gracious and noted the professionalism of the JREF team.

Because of the Ramadan issue, the JREF announced that they were prepared to wave the 12 month wait for a retest and would be willing to test him after Ramadan and it appears this was accepted and they will work together to set a date.
 
They almost had to cancel: many technical difficulties with reaching the applicate over Skype caused the judges to huddle, and decided they would try a couple more times and then have to cancel the test. Luckily, during those couple more tries they got through over the phone (no video though).

Odds of guessing all three items were announced as 1,140 to 1. So they mentioned that given the number of people at TAM, if we all took the challenge, one of us would probably get all three right out of chance.

This time anyway, it wasn't the applicant.
 
gerdbonk said:
A gentleman from Algeria was attempting to remote view 3 numbered items (out of a known list of 20 items) in the sealed room. Part of the protocol was that the room be sealed for three days -- this was per the applicant. I don't have the full list of items that they worked from.

He stayed in Algeria. During the live challenge, he was contacted by phone by his representative who was present here in Las Vegas. Translation was required.

He guessed number 5 - Paper Towels, 13 - Coat Hanger and 22 - Chips. The door was then unsealed to reveal that the items were a 11 - Necktie, 10 - Stuffed Elephant and (someone correct me) a 23 - Coaster?

He accepted the failure with the caveat that this is the holy month of Ramadan which may have affected his "vision" -- also, he usually works from a list of items that he prepares. But he and his representative were gracious and noted the professionalism of the JREF team.

Because of the Ramadan issue, the JREF announced that they were prepared to wave the 12 month wait for a retest and would be willing to test him after Ramadan and it appears this was accepted and they will work together to set a date.
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He usually prepares the list or he usually prepares the actual items? And under what circumstances has he prepared such a list before? I know you are only reporting what you know. You might not have the answers to these questions.

Ward
 
wardenclyffe said:
He usually prepares the list or he usually prepares the actual items? And under what circumstances has he prepared such a list before? I know you are only reporting what you know. You might not have the answers to these questions.

Ward
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They explained this. He would provide only the list (examples: chair, ball), not the items. The tester would then procure the items.

There was no mention of when he has provided a list before. His representative stated "that's what he usually does", translating the applicant's post-test response.

Nevertheless, prior to the test he was specifically asked about his confidence level with the JREF protocol and he replied (again, through translation) that he was very confident.
 
gerdbonk said:
They explained this. He would provide only the list (examples: chair, ball), not the items. The tester would then procure the items.

There was no mention of when he has provided a list before. His representative stated "that's what he usually does", translating the applicant's post-test response.

Nevertheless, prior to the test he was specifically asked about his confidence level with the JREF protocol and he replied (again, through translation) that he was very confident.
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True, but given that he also stated at the outset that he had never tried it during Ramadan, I'm surprised the JREF decided to test him at this time. Well, maybe not surprised, since they wanted to test during TAM, but everyone in the room knew he would chalk up his failure to the holiday even before the test started.

Oh, and #23 was a small plate, not a coaster-- like a bread plate from a restaurant.
 
I thought one of the most interesting aspects was the language maze that resulted-- the test-ee spoke Arabic and French, so during the test he was required to speak in French, presumably so someone on the panel would understand him, but his representative and translator doesn't speak French very well, so he asked the questions in Arabic and then translated the French answers to English.

After the test, I think they both spoke in Arabic, although I admit my ability to differentiate between Arabic spoken through a phone and French spoken with an Algerian accent through the phone is limited.
 
Was his representative someone who lives in Vegas? If they re-do the test will it have to be in Vegas again for that reason?

And was there an explanation of why JREF did not allow him to make his own list this time?

Ward
 
gerdbonk said:
A gentleman from Algeria was attempting to remote view 3 numbered items (out of a known list of 20 items) in the sealed room. Part of the protocol was that the room be sealed for three days -- this was per the applicant. I don't have the full list of items that they worked from.

He stayed in Algeria. During the live challenge, he was contacted by phone by his representative who was present here in Las Vegas. Translation was required.

He guessed number 5 - Paper Towels, 13 - Coat Hanger and 22 - Chips. The door was then unsealed to reveal that the items were a 11 - Necktie, 10 - Stuffed Elephant and (someone correct me) a 23 - Coaster?

He accepted the failure with the caveat that this is the holy month of Ramadan which may have affected his "vision" -- also, he usually works from a list of items that he prepares. But he and his representative were gracious and noted the professionalism of the JREF team.

Because of the Ramadan issue, the JREF announced that they were prepared to wave the 12 month wait for a retest and would be willing to test him after Ramadan and it appears this was accepted and they will work together to set a date.
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Is there video uploaded anywhere?
 
wardenclyffe said:
Was his representative someone who lives in Vegas? If they re-do the test will it have to be in Vegas again for that reason?

And was there an explanation of why JREF did not allow him to make his own list this time?

Ward
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His rep wasn't from Vegas. He was also Algerian. I see no reason a retest would need to be in Vegas. BTW, the rep went completely tourist with a South Point hat, sun glasses and a TAM t-shirt.

I don't recall any explanation regarding why JREF made the list instead of the applicant.
 
So, does his representative live in Algeria and he just came to Vegas for the test? If they went to that kind of trouble, why didn't the applicant show up himself?

Ward
 
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