doranchak, Subject: Did Zodiac use Kahn’s “Codebreakers” book?    Sat Jan 05, 2013 5:20 pm

Some ramblings about Graysmith’s shenanigans:

http://www.zodiackillerciphers.com/?p=256

Jem, Subject: Re: Did Zodiac use Kahn’s “Codebreakers” book?    Sun Jan 06, 2013 1:21 am

Good work, Dave. I’m surprised no one has ever tried to verify this before, and glad you did now. You’re right, there’s no good reason to believe that Z actually used The Codebreakers.

glurk, Subject: Re: Did Zodiac use Kahn’s “Codebreakers” book?    Sun Jan 06, 2013 4:54 am

doranchak-

Great work from you, as always. It’s curious, though, isn’t it. Graysmith has never been known for his accuracy, or his truthfulness. But why this? It doesn’t do a bit to help his ‘case’ against ALA, it is a completely
inaccurate "stretch." as you say, and it proves nothing. Even the first three matches you found are not really matches at all, since the L is reversed.

Using both p->C and C->p is ‘not normally the way it is done’ either, paraphrasing Nick Pelling. Perhaps Graysmith ‘sort-of’ found the seven, decided eight would "make his case stronger," and wrote that to fill up more pages!

Personally, I have always felt that Z just "made them up." It is so trivial and just so easy to write out a random alphabet and add some drawn symbols that I see no reason to even consider that they "came
from a code book." Some years ago when I was developing ZKD, I first solved the cipher (below) posted by Ray from Tom’s old message board. It’s just OBVIOUS that while Ray used some symbols that were used
by Z, that there were many he just made up on the spot. It’s not hard to do. I don’t even think an artistic background is necessary.

There is no need to ask Ray from where he got his symbols, he’s told me already, "Oh, I just made them up."

So, as I have said before, I don’t think that searching for books that Z used in constructing his codes will bear much fruit. Z just made them up.

-glurk

P.S. (anyone) Noting that creating symbols to make a ciphered message is TRIVIAL, do you see anything important in the bottom right corner? No, you don’t.

doranchak, Subject: Re: Did Zodiac use Kahn’s “Codebreakers” book?    Sun Jan 06, 2013 6:32 am

Great work from you, as always. It’s curious, though, isn’t it. Graysmith has never been known for his accuracy, or his truthfulness. But why this? It doesn’t do a bit to help his ‘case’ against ALA, it is a completely
inaccurate "stretch." as you say, and it proves nothing.

At a minimum, it makes his story a bit more interesting. Detective stories where the protagonist is thwarted at every turn by reasonable doubt aren’t all that much fun to read. And perhaps he was just throwing it out there as setup for his much bigger whopper: claiming to have a solution for the 340.

There is no need to ask Ray from where he got his symbols, he’s told me already, "Oh, I just made them up."

So, as I have said before, I don’t think that searching for books that Z used in constructing his codes will bear much fruit. Z just made them up.

-glurk

I tend to agree. But I still wonder if there’s something about the 340’s funky construction that he may have picked up somewhere. We can’t really rule it out completely until a solution is known.

glurk, Subject: Re: Did Zodiac use Kahn’s “Codebreakers” book?    Sun Jan 06, 2013 7:04 am

doranchak-

Fully agree with your post above. And I should have clarified that what I posted was "IN MY OPINION ONLY." I believe that 90% of what Graysmith has ever written was to ‘make his story more interesting.’ Quite a few of the people writing about Z are more involved in writing a good story than looking at known facts. Facts are boring, LOL.

-glurk