Star Wars easter-egg hidden in a traceroute

The awesomesauce merchants at BeagleNetworks.net have engineered an appropriately epic set of internal routes, such that a traceroute to 216.81.59.173 produces the introductory crawl from Star Wars:

TraceRoute from Network-Tools.com to 216.81.59.173 [fin]
Hop (ms) (ms) (ms) IP Address Host name
1 0 0 0 206.123.64.42 -
2 0 0 0 64.124.196.225 xe-4-2-0.er2.dfw2.us.above.net
3 3 3 3 77.67.71.165 ae2-109.dal33.ip4.tinet.net
4 36 36 36 89.149.181.117 xe-1-2-0.atl11.ip4.tinet.net
5 37 35 38 77.67.69.158 epik-networks-gw.ip4.tinet.net
6 21 21 21 216.81.59.2 po0-3.dsr2.atl.epikip.net
7 58 58 56 10.26.26.102 -
8 61 57 58 206.214.251.1 episode.iv
9 59 63 62 206.214.251.6 a.new.hope
10 59 58 61 206.214.251.9 it.is.a.period.of.civil.war
11 Timed out 58 60 206.214.251.14 rebel.spaceships
12 58 66 65 206.214.251.17 striking.from.a.hidden.base
13 60 60 60 206.214.251.22 have.won.their.first.victory
14 61 57 57 206.214.251.25 against.the.evil.galactic.empire
15 61 57 56 206.214.251.30 during.the.battle
16 61 58 60 206.214.251.33 rebel.spies.managed
17 57 59 62 206.214.251.38 to.steal.secret.plans
18 60 60 56 206.214.251.41 to.the.empires.ultimate.weapon
19 62 60 58 206.214.251.46 the.death.star
20 60 60 57 206.214.251.49 an.armored.space.station
21 61 64 61 206.214.251.54 with.enough.power.to
22 59 58 60 206.214.251.57 destroy.an.entire.planet
23 63 62 65 206.214.251.62 pursued.by.the.empires
24 62 59 Timed out 206.214.251.65 sinister.agents
25 59 61 60 206.214.251.70 princess.leia.races.home
26 62 60 62 206.214.251.73 aboard.her.starship
27 61 61 68 206.214.251.78 custodian.of.the.stolen.plans
28 64 60 62 206.214.251.81 that.can.save.her
Trace complete

Traceroute, Ping, Domain Name Server (DNS) Lookup, WHOIS express 216.81.59.173: (via Hacker News)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

MORE: dns • happy mutants • tcpip • Technology • web theory

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Sigmund_Jung

good old tracert on windows command line worked just fine
- http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Dr. Chronobiologist
  
  Which OS?
  - http://twitter.com/dantobias dantobias
    
    It worked for me in Vista.
- Sigmund_Jung
  
  Win 7, but any should do with cmd.exe
  
  tracert 216.81.59.173
Gogs Davies

the IP address is wrong in the opening text for me. I needed to use 216.81.59.173
- http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Dr. Chronobiologist
  
  Yep, worked for me (in Debian). THANKS
  - Gogs Davies
    
    No problem I had to try twice for the same reason :)
http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Dr. Chronobiologist

Anyone able to replicate this? On Debian I tried some variations of flags on the given IP and also EpikIp.net but no luck. Windows XP tracert also failed.
- swattz101
  
  Make sure you use as the endpoint. The first couple of time I used 206.214.251.81 which is at the bottom of the screenshot above, but it’s cut off. I expect all the interior hops don’t exist, which is why Destination Host Unreachable error for them.
- Jonathan Miller
  
  Here is the video showing the Star Wars traceroute easter egg: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPJELwSV1P0
Frank Cox

you need to increase the hops to see the whole thing:

tracert -h 80 216.81.59.173
…
51 131 ms 136 ms 131 ms 0—0 [206.214.251.158]
52 136 ms 152 ms 130 ms 0–0 [206.214.251.161]
53 131 ms 130 ms 133 ms 0-0 [206.214.251.166]
54 149 ms 134 ms 136 ms 00 [206.214.251.169]
55 132 ms 131 ms 129 ms I [206.214.251.174]
56 135 ms 131 ms 130 ms By.Ryan.Werber [206.214.251.177]
57 135 ms 130 ms 132 ms When.CCIEs.Get.Bored [206.214.251.182]
58 146 ms 133 ms 136 ms CCIE.38168 [206.214.251.185]
59 133 ms 133 ms 146 ms FIN [216.81.59.173]
- http://www.brainwavez.org/about/people/watson_mandy_j.html Mandy J Watson
  
  Yes. Some of the final text is different in the final hops I saw and it’s credited later on in the hops to Ryan Werber (as above) / http://beaglenetworks.net/ [206.214.251.185].
- Gogs Davies
  
  thanks hadn’t realised that lol
  
  Linux is traceroute -m 80 216.81.59.173Just in case anybody needed it :)
http://twitter.com/RyanWerber Ryan Werber

Thanks for the story guys. Epikip.net is the upstream donor ISP for the PTR Records, however It was all me @ Beaglenetworks.net . You can read how I did it there.
- s2redux
  
  It’s nice to see a young person using traditional materials like a C block. But, that said, this display of inter-domain routing hijinks is utterly classless.
  - swattz101
    
    LOL
- http://twitter.com/#!/Topperfalkon Topperfalkon
  
  Looks like the traffic’s taken your site out…
  - http://twitter.com/RyanWerber Ryan Werber
    
    No, that was some jerk DDoS’ing my site again. Ive moved it over to a tumblr.
- swattz101
  
  Congrats, looks like it’s not working
  :/
Gtmac

Great easter egg! Clearly not the original theatrical release version though (episode iv). /pedantry
http://twitter.com/digitalArtform Joseph Francis

Whoa! That is amazing!!!!
wtf is a traceroute?
- http://deansli.st/ Dean Putney
  
  You may know of it more commonly as “Tracer T”.
  - http://www.facebook.com/Fallingwater Lucio Libertini
    
    …Tracer Tong?
    - http://deansli.st/ Dean Putney
      
      Nah, Tracer T, man: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXmv8quf_xM
      
      This is how you hack dem innernets.
      - http://twitter.com/#!/Topperfalkon Topperfalkon
        
        Oh god, why?
      - http://deansli.st/ Dean Putney
        
        Why is the sky blue? Why is the sea also blue? Why are blue M&Ms?
- shutz
  
  You know how to post a comment on BoingBoing, but you don’t know how to do a simple search on Google (or whatever search engine you choose) ? It’s not like it’s an obscure and hard-to-find subject…
  - http://twitter.com/digitalArtform Joseph Francis
    
    Search … engine?
    Is that some kind of Steampunk thing?
    - Antinous / Moderator
      
      Get with the program. It’s a TSA thing.
rob_cornelius

And the winner of the internet this week is….
http://doran.pacifist.net/ Doran

This is actually why traceroute was invented.
http://www.facebook.com/kirk.comrie Kirk Comrie

traceroute and ryan werber FTW! :) This made my nerdy heart sing.
http://twitter.com/rvitelli Romeo Vitelli

I keep getting a REQUEST TIMED OUT message.
http://www.facebook.com/joeheyming Joe Heyming

Has anyone tried this: telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl
Its got way better graphics ;-)
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1405479307 facebook-1405479307

xlnt hack!
http://twitter.com/xincontriadulti XincontriAdulti.It

Cool! I love this stuff ,thanks!
http://www.facebook.com/jeric.josephson J Eric Josephson

Looks like it is down or now being blocked. Worked yesterday afternoon for me. Enyone else?
- swattz101
  
  Ryan said his site is being DDOSed. Someone out there doesn’t like it. :-(
  - http://twitter.com/missshenna Lithi
    
    Goddam it, George.