DARPA challenge -- find 10 red balloons, win $40,000

DARPA is holding a competition to find ten large weather balloons. Winner gets $40,000!

To mark the 40th anniversary of the Internet, DARPA has announced the DARPA Network Challenge, a competition that will explore the role the Internet and social networking plays in the timely communication, wide area team-building and urgent mobilization required to solve broad scope, time-critical problems. The challenge is to be the first to submit the locations of ten moored, 8 foot, red weather balloons located at ten fixed locations in the continental United States. Balloons will be in readily accessible locations and visible from nearby roadways.
The first person to identify the location of all the balloons will win a $40,000 cash prize. The balloons will be positioned on December 5, 2009.

I predict Pascal to be the winner.

More information and rules here

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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Anonymous

I’ve already set up a system to weed out fake requests with predictive model to guess the most probably locations. I will be giving out $27,750 to 30 people. If you guys would be interested let me know.

The site is http://3dstoneage.com
Zan

@Ted8305 There will be DARPA reps attending each balloon. The rules don’t cover popping, but it does say that if a balloon cannot be deployed then there will be only 9 balloons needed to win and if a balloon must be moved that both locations will count.

@LittleJohn Actually, the flight time depends on time zone. 6 hours EST, 7 hours CST, 8 hours MST, and 9 hours PST.

Also note that the submitter must pay income tax on the prize, so the distribution would be significantly less than $40k. Still, I would also propose that if BoingBoing puts together a team that half the money would go to the EFF and the rest split between the first submitters.
Ted8305

Maybe DARPA got a little jealous of the Heenes?

10 roter Wetterballons
Auf ihrem Weg zum Horizont
Hielt man fuer UFOs aus dem All
Es war ein Medien-Notfall
Eine Bloggerrstaffel hinterher
Alarm zu geben, wenn es so war
Dabei war da am Horizont
Nur 10 roter Wetterballoons
SamSam

Anonymous: Your idea looks pretty good, but it will take you tree times as long as any other team to submit the answer.

Also, how do you prevent against the same person submitting three times?

Finally, you are anonymous here and I don’t see your name and contact details anywhere on your site. What makes you think people will trust you?
Concept

I don’t understand how it will be possible to verify all 10 balloons location in a number of hours.

I forsee a lot of fake twittering as well. People saying they saw balloons etc.
Anonymous

I thought the war machine got upset about 99 red balloons.
anansi133

If I were part of a group who could tackle this challenge, our anonymity would be far more valuable than a mere $40,000.
ciregh

This team seems to be the most organized so far:
http://balloon.media.mit.edu/speigg
dasanjos

That’s why I <3 BB! Discovering new wonderful things!
Thanks for sharing this awesome movie!
Ted8305

@Scuba SM, @Sceadugenga: What if anonymous was the one to plant fake red balloons? I’m also curious what happens if a balloon pops. Will somebody from DARPA rush out and replace it right away?

Oh, also, THE GAME.
- JoshuaTerrell
  
  I was doing about 3 months before this comment. I am angry.
  
  THE GAME.
plasmator

@ sceadugenga – That was my first thought as well.

Now, where to get a bunch of Red weather balloons?
ispyred

We have a nice team (I Spy a Red Balloon) that is giving all of the prize money to charity (Red Cross). If you see a red balloon in the sky on Dec. 5th, let us know at:

http://www.ispyaredballoon.com/
or at facebook
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=201028633372
or
text: (262) I-SPY-SPY (262-477-9779)
Axx

DARPA Challenge: Find 10 Red Balloons!

DARPA Internal Report: How Problematic Will the Internet Be in the Event of a Civil War?
El Zilcho

I Love Bees
I mean Balloons
Anonymous

Forget splitting the money- it’s not worth it after taxes/how do you judge the likelihood that one team is more likely to win than the other, there’s not enough time/money to invest in a strong enough infrastructure.

We’ve got a better idea. Forget splitting the money- If we win we’re going to use it to build a giant 30′ tall flying cupcake entirely out of balloons. Seriously! Go see for yourself-

http://findtheredballoons.com/

And if you want, you can even fly a cupcake over most any website you want using our flying cupcake-inator: http://airigami.com/cupcake/

Life is too short, lets have fun!
Anonymous

Iâ€™ve established a team of my own, called Team DeciNena. We will win because we have the wittiest name. ;)

And we are â€œcupcake-freeâ€.

No, seriously, whomever wins will be using a mixture of all sorts of tactics from team recruiting to passive data mining. I’m sure there will be a lot of disinformation out there, and it will be important to combat it.

The tax issues are solveable — by running it through my LLC, I don’t have to pay gross taxes on the income that I immediately turn around and pay out to the team members. Each of them is liable for taxes, but only on their smaller amount, which due to the progressive rate schedule, usually works out for the better.

Join us, it’s free, and you could actually win something. We’re even sharing some reward money with those team participants who DON’T themselves find a balloon.

http://decinena.com
SamSam

Hey: since this is clearly an experiment about team-building, why don’t we make a BoingBoing team? People can post if they see a balloon or otherwise know of its location, and then ten people who post correct locations can split the prize. Maybe $1000 to BB as well.

Of course, then all the other elements of this experiment come into play. For instance, it should probably be on an invite-only forum, so that passer’s-by who stumble on this thread wouldn’t find out the locations of the nine balloons already posted here…
Anonymous

I say you report the balloons to the local police as suspicious possible WMDs and watch the local authorities freak out and shut down the nearby highways just to be safe. Although winning my tax dollars back this way is far more desirable than any number of other evil things DARPA could do with it.
wentzlaf

We have started a team and website with information about the balloon scavenger hunt. DARPA Team Superfunhappy
Anonymous

I don’t get it. Are there clues? You’re supposed to just stumble upon these things?
Sceadugenga

First task for the BoingBoing team:
Jam the other teams by placing 100 fake red balloons in readily accessible locations, visible from roadways…
Anonymous

location of #3
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=200414562396&ssPageName=ADME:L:LCA:US:1123
IndexMe

This may develop into a contest between many teams which actually are not looking for balloons.

Instead they would be searching for announcements about balloon locations, from TV, twittering, etc.

I’d recommend leveraging the BB name to gather people to actually look for balloons, or to quickly tell BB about balloons they hear have been found nearby. BB has trust enough that an email address being provided would be enough to make the finder feel sure of payment.

BB is warm and open. But there is a conflict with the need to maintain secrecy, an interesting problem. Also the team has to be open to as many people as possible, even non-elite people on the street calling it in on a cellphone number.
- How to gain maximum number of people from general public?
- Is it enough for members to sign up while pledging they will not give Team BB info to other teams or the public?
- Policies need to be worked out. Some examples could be:
. Payment for information rises with time
. Extra paid to keep lone finds secret
. Secret information to be given only to a single person (leader of Team BB). That info to be kept secret based on preset policy, so its location/existence cannot be given to other teams.
. Creation of alliances with other teams (e.g. how to share balloon locations while maintaining ambiguity of location)

BB should use the time to prepare, and perhaps run ads prior to the event to attract other groups which can join in an alliance.
It may all be over by 11am Saturday EST.

A small website should be created including:
- explanation
- member signup
- policies
- assignment of tasks, such as creation of tools, coordination, phone answering, and monitoring of eBay, CraigsList, Google
- server should be hardened against hacking
- a threaded message board. Ordinary single thread BB is not enough.

What will the winning team be like? So far I have:
- Has members competent in these areas:
Technical skills, monitoring auction and news sites, typing and collating information, brainstorming, policy creation
(who also will be up before 7AM in California)
- a somewhat trusted front, especially if offering a premium for info which is to be kept secret.
- not just a strong brainstorming group but also a strong leadership that can update publicized rules and negotiate quickly.

What do you think?
http://www.darpaballoon.com Anonymous

How about using DARPA’s defense spending for peaceful purposes?

Darpa Balloons for Peace will use the $40k to promote peace.
Anonymous

no offence but the vlogbrothers have a huge advantage. they have about 150,000 people all over the US
Baldhead

put a 6- year- old in each balloon and i’m in.
Anonymous

I’m a pre-cog. Don’t bother, I already submitted the answers.
Anonymous

MIT and the DARPA NETWORK CHALLENGE

Hi!

You might be interested in our scientific project for the DARPA
Network Challenge [networkchallenge.darpa.mil.] We are a group
of researchers from MIT interested
in understanding how information flows in social networks.

Find all the information about our approach at
[balloon.mit.edu] and please write us at balloon@mit.edu if
you want to chat with us and find out more details.

Hope you find it interesting. Thank you!
SamSam

… actually, the idea of accountability was why I first suggested a closed forum or group. If you have an invite-only Google group, anyone who’s submitted a location (accompanied by pic?) can see every message sent, so it’s harder to be the one who runs off with the money without telling anyone.
Anonymous

There is an iPhone app for this! It’s awesome!
http://www.armyofeyes.com/
IndexMe

@SamSam: Yes exactly. At least I was able to discover via Google who wentzlaf is in RL. I would trust him based on that, not that I have any special feeling that his team would be competitive. Still I would prefer BoingBoing to make a team. Problem is anybody managing it would be totally inundated and have to move into the basement for the duration. And when will that end? ;)
zikman

supposed to highlight team building… but the first individual to submit the locations gets the money?
- Little John
  
  zikman@#7: “supposed to highlight team building… but the first individual to submit the locations gets the money?””
  
  Yes, it’s the American way of doing things. Talk big about community spirit and civic service and the public good, but seek the champion, praise the hero, the saviour, the one man in his badge and white hat, his shining armor, his expensive suit who can save us from the evildoers, rescue us from all peril, deliver us from yea, even ourselves.
  
  I don’t want to sidetrack a thread of comments with a political commentary, but I see the pattern too obviously in DARPA’s approach not to point it out.
  
  Topic change: Did you folks actually look at the rules?
  
  “All balloons are scheduled to go on display at all locations at 10:00AM (ET) until approximately 4:00 PM (local time) on Saturday, December 5, 2009.”
  
  These balloons are displayed for only six hours, somewhere in the continental U.S. (i.e., not Hawaii, PR, etc.). We’ve then got 9 days to use Twitter or FB or homing pigeons and our secret decoding rings from the clubhouse to divine the locations and submit them to DARPA.
  
  “Latitudes and longitudes [must be] entered in degree-minute-second (DDD-MM-SS) format … with an error of less than one arc-minute to be accepted.”
  
  DARPA appears to anticipate that not all ten will be found. Finding five would still qualify for the cash payment (to the one person registered as a participant).
  
  Good luck, you guys.
- SamSam
  
  @ zikman#7: I have a reply that is many times less cynical than LittleJohn’s: the individual is awarded the prize because that’s part of the experiment.
  
  It’s an experiment in team building, but it doesn’t explicitly tell you to build a team. There are no provisions for that. But one person can’t solve this by themselves — they have to form a team.
  
  But how do you form a team? Is all of BoingBoing one team? And if I send an email to 10redballoons@gmail.com, how do I know that person won’t just make off with the money? Should I ask smonkey to prove his identity? Who do I trust?
  
  This whole experiment is about social networks, circles of trust, and unrestricted team building. It’s a lot more interesting than “send your ten-person team name to DARPA in order to compete and we’ll make sure you all split the money.”
Anonymous

Join this team on Facebook. We’re giving 1/4 to charity, and the people who spot the balloons can get 3/4 of the prizes.

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=207554627104
smonkey

so I grabbed 10redballoons@gmail.com
so lets talk team boing boing
anybody sends that email a balloon location
and we’ll split the cash
and give a share to monochrom (cuz I like them and so does BB).

Does this sound like a plan?

10redballoons@gmail.com

oh, and yes, you just gotta trust that we’ll split the cash evenly.

but without willy-nilly trust there’s not much possibility of a win now is there.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  smonkey,
  
  Congratulations. You now have an e-mail address that will get 10K pieces of spam per day as the bots search BB comments.
- Scuba SM
  
  smonkey,
  
  I’m in. I’ll keep an eye peeled for balloons in the suburbs of Detroit and the Ann Arbor area. I’ll fire off an email if I see anything.
  
  On a related note, wouldn’t it be hilarious if 4Chan found all the balloons?
- SamSam
  
  That doesn’t quite work. You get a cut of the cash for making an email address? Hey, should I get a cut for being the first person to mention a “Team Boingboing?”
  
  How about: you have the email, but the ten people who submit balloons split the cash? (If one person submits n ballons, they get n shares.) Of course, that means you’re managing the team for free, unless you spot a balloon, so that’s not so good.
  
  How about: the first BB member who spots a balloon mentions it here and takes change? And further finders should also mention it here, so there can be some accountability?
erniesalmi

Please send me an email if you spot a tethered, red, 10 ft weather balloon with a number hanging off of it on Saturday Dec 5th.
Include exact location and number
The balloon is part of the DARPA Network Challenge Sat Dec 5

ErnieSalmi@gmail.com

Thank you, and good luck spotting
RandalC

Someone just stumbled onto something. Were ever these things go up:
#1. People will freak out.
#2 They will call their local law enforcement.
#3 Local cops will have to explain it (don’t worry – its just the super secret arm of the military industrial complex conducting an experiment – nothing to see here … move on).

Ergo- wait for the minimum pandemonium to set in and mass call police departments, or highway patrol offices, news stations etc.

That, my Boing Boing friends, is strategery! Lets use 10redballons@gmail.com and get a map api or something where we can post. I’d rather a BB conglomerate win than someone else. If Boing Boing were REAL COOL they would set up a small corner of space for this project!!!!! (Please!!!)