Edit: generated with: http://oranchak.com/zodiac/webtoy/

Hey Daishi45,

I like the idea of seeing the "+" symbol also denoting "and" in the cipher. I also think, like yourself, that he did something with the 340 to keep it from being solved so easily as the 408. Here is where the psychological approach might pay off. Because he probably knew/saw how they solved the 408 and then probably did something clever in return to how. You are suggesting annagramming here, while possible it is not my cup of tea, I just might be the world’s worst annagrammer.

Lately I have been thinking that he must have had an extensive background with cipher stuff.

Welcome to the board rick.

But anagramming while simultaneously assigning unknowns is a VERY complicated and time consuming art, and incredibly difficult to stay with for long periods.

I don’t think that it is an art, per se. I have another word that I would use, but it would be inappropriate to post here.

-glurk

Posts should have a like button.

Welcome aboard Daishi45. I will look at your interesting work tonite or tomorrow.

I am the founder of AA. Yes that is Anagrammers Anonymous. My name is AK, I am an anagrammer, and I have been 3 years sober. 3 years with no wide anagrams. I still do an occasional very tight anagram. The problem in general with anagrams is they create so many possibilities it is impossible to know which one out of hundreds was intended.

Let me look at your work and what jarlve did and I will give you my thoughts tonite or tomorrow.

I am the founder of AA. Yes that is Anagrammers Anonymous. My name is AK, I am an anagrammer, and I have been 3 years sober.

As Larry the Cable Guy would say, "That right thar’s funny… I don’t care who ya are."

At this point in the Z case you have to have a sense of humor just to stay sane Up2something.

There is a lot of interest in your psychological approach setting aside our probable disagreement on anagrams for the moment. And not sure if you are aware of this but some elements of your solution are similar to parts of the raw Graysmith, a solution I think may have some merit in parts [a minority opinion. Lonely are the brave ]. I also agree with you about the JTR letter. Remember it was FROM HELL…

I will give this a full look tomorrow. Thanks for posting and thanks to Jarlve for his post with the code filled in.

Thanks for posting this. Some questions.

Where are the names, anagrammed or not, like Herb Caen and Paul Avery? I must be missing them as I don’t see them. You can indicate by calling horizontal lines rows and vertical lines columns, such as saying "Herb Caen starts with B at Row 5 Column 7" or whatever. Another way to do it is to take what Jarlve posted, put it in paint/photo shop, and circle the names.

I find your opening interesting but unsupported. In other words, even thinking psychologically that Z was obsessed with certain themes – hunting, couples, maybe Jack The Ripper, etc. – there are still hundreds of possible openers. Can you tell us more what your thinking was on this opener?

I think the + + is LL for reasons gone over before, including the great work by quicktrader and some supporting work by glurk, doranchak and myself, and for which I will do a new post on soon. But you think ++ stands for AND? can you elaborate?

Most of the code still seems unsolved.

Also have you looked at the Raw Graysmith? Have you looked at my analysis of the possible influence of JTR and the FROM HELL letter in Z opening the 340 with something like I GIVE THEM (or I CAME FROM) HELL TOO. See my work here viewtopic.php?f=81&t=260

Finally, have you seen the work by NIN (and me) on possible tie ins between the My Name Is code and the 340? Here viewtopic.php?f=81&t=298

Hi, all

I’m very familiar with all here, I’ve been reading everybody’s ideas here for a long time, it’s just you all don’t know me yet.
My approach to cracking the codes and ciphers was to go in Z’s head and see them through his eyes, like John Douglas and Robert Ressler of the FBI used to do. Since his 340 and Bus Bomb code couldn’t be cracked, if I were him, I’d start dropping clues, and this is what he did (but most have been misread). I then said "how would I plant these clues?" and went on a search. I found he planted so many clues everywhere that it’s ridiculous. I then used these clues he gave and cracked the 340 and Bus Bomb code. As for the ‘My Name Is" code, I solved it as either ‘A Verey Angry Man’ or "A Very Angerey Man’, depending on his misspell of the day, I guess. The real clue is the reference to the 340 where he goes directly to ‘My Name Is’. THIS is the clue to the last line of the 340, I saw M-N-S in the last line leading up to siggy. He even was nice enough to put the S uncoded right where it belonged. He knew from these words deciphered the first line could be deduced if the solver was up to the challenge, and after cracking that, the last full sentence could be cracked. This is what I did. Then I moved on to ‘The Game’, his anagraming. I did it all old school, pad and paper. Hit and miss. I stuck with it for a very long time and have it all pretty much deciphered, but I’ve found it’s the basic same old stuff he used to write, no great clues or anything. My main concern is verification. How can this be done if he anagrammed? The ONLY way I can see is that enough people have to decode it and get the same message INDEPENDENTLY of each other. There is no other way. If I give my solution it’ll bias the solve and independent verification becomes impossible….

Now try this, I’ve just seen it: Robert G was on the right track with the HER and Herb Caen, but fell into Z’s trap. RG continued to the right after HER when he should have gone down to the B diagonally then to the reverse C. HERE is where Zodiac made his snake path. I feel a message snakes through the 340, either one long one or many short one. These are the odd ‘To Die By’ ‘Shot Boy’ ‘Kilt God’ etc….they are read snaking through the code and they are of three types of codings, but you have to solve the 340 in order to use the letters. He uses the regular letters, 408 solves and 340 solves all connected together in snaking fashion. This is why he used many of the 408 symbols, they decode to the 408 in his snake message. I deduced this from the 3 symbols under the reversed C in Herb C. Decode these three symbols to the 408 and you get AEN. So from HER to Diag B down to reversed C, down 3 decoded to the 408 you get Herb Caen. Folks, the 340 is a true masterpiece of codework if this is valid, unlike anything ever created before or since. It explains much of the odd format, the weird look and many other things. But it has to be decoded properly to be found! Then after Herb Caen I went to the F next to the N and snaked ‘Fat Lier’ through the solved 340 right where ‘Fat Lier’ decodes in the 340, it goes though the F and ends on the exact R in LIER that is decoded in the 340. This all is unbelievable, but it’s all there. I’ll give you a bit more of the solve to help you understand: The famous S99 is indeed ‘SEE’. It says ‘See to fat riel’. He calls Herb Caen ‘Fat Lier’. The snaked Fat Lier snakes through this area of the decode. It’s sheer genius! My hats off to the Z man….

Now consider this: X marks the spot. There are only two X’s in the 340. There are only two places where GY appear together.
Both X’s appear only at the GY areas, adjacent to the G’s. X solves to K (I’ll give you another decipher). This K, in both places is the K in Rick. Yes, in both of these areas Rick Gyke and Rick Gycc snake through the 340. The lower on is more easily seen, RI revese C to X to GY reverse C, reverse C. The top right is more coded, it has to solved to read ‘Rick’, it horseshoes in perfect symmetry through the reverse K of Gyke. It’s all here, and who knows what else may be hidden? And my deep sympathy here to all the anagrammers that have been through what I’ve been through, I feel your pain! Don’t have much time, I could talk for hours on all this, but it should all give many out there much to think about and discover with the mythical 340.

"My main concern is verification. How can this be done if he anagrammed?"

My honest opinion? It can’t. Not a snowball’s chance in hell that any independent solves will reflect your "solution." Too many possibilities and not enough solvers.

Sorry to sound pessimistic or dismissive, but I fail to understand how this is any different from countless other forced solutions. Go ahead and post your "solution." I promise I won’t be "biased" by your methodology. Also, I don’t recall Richard G ever referred to as "Rick" by anyone.

Daishi45: "The ONLY way I can see is that enough people have to decode it and get the same message INDEPENDENTLY of each other. There is no other way. If I give my solution it’ll bias the solve and independent verification becomes impossible…."

Well that makes no sense. The Hardens gave their solution and it was verified. If you have in fact correctly solved the 340 it can be verified in terms of the main body of the non-anagrammed solution. The anagram parts are always subject to different interpretations and are pretty well impossible to verify as the one correct solution, as up2 notes above. Any one anagram has dozens of possible correct solutions, several anagrams have hundreds of possibilities. If all or most of your solution is anagrams, then you have no solution. The parts of your solution that are non-anagram should be posted by you, and the people here can collectively analyze your work. If you have indeed solved even part of the 340 that can be verified.

I posted my code work here, and through criticism from others I dropped parts like wide anagrams and other mistakes and it made my overall code work sharper. In regards to a code I though I found in the Tylenol case, getting other points of view here from glurk, doranchak and others led me to realize that my work was mostly in error. When I had sent in my info on that case with the code work it was ignored by the FBI. After the benefit of criticism and discussion, I dropped the incorrect code work and resent my info on Ted K, geography and other evidence to the FBI, and they took it seriously enough to ask Ted for a DNA sample, an event that made headlines. All thanks to some tough criticism and analysis from people on this board.

And yes he only ever called himself Richard or "Dick" "Gaik". Never, not once, "Rick" or "Gyke".

You have the publicly available emails for the FBI, CAL DOJ & SFPD. If you are not going to show us your work go ahead and send it to them. If you post it here in the Cipher section or the members only Suspect section (ask Morf first but I am sure he will OK) then you will get the benefit of experienced members looking at your work. If after analysis I feel your work has merit I will give you the personal email of the FBI Code Unit Chief who I have been in communication with.

If you are not going to post a substantial part of your proposed 340 and map solutions, how can we help you? And why did you join here?

Hi, all

Thanks for the input, I’ll definately consider it. I have to stick to my guns on the independent solves, only if multiple independent solves are found (that say basically the same thing) can the 340 be verified. As for the X Marks the Spot and Rick Gyke, I am not accusing anyone of anything, just stating what is actually there and just one interpretation as it relates to the Zodiac case. And too I’ll stick to my guns that the creator of the 340 put MNS in the last line right before his name as THE clue to get started on the solve. Since no one picked up on it, he had to write it out a few months later to hopefully get people thinking and looking. Still no one figured it and I suspect he may have moved on after that. But I find I’ll stay with my solve and continue studying the possible imbedded ‘snake path’ that I now see. Perhaps the REAL message is there… If anyone wants to follow my template of the solved lines and attempt to assign solves for the unknowns, as I did, they are more than welcome. You have to go with your gut on if it feels right and if it clicks. The best guide for a solver is their gut. One troubling aspect of the entire Zodiac case is that in everything about it there is no way to get a 100% lock on ANYthing. There is always at least a .01% unsurety somewhere that never allows for a complete lock…..
Too I feel the Zodiac knew that the first thing people were going to do was to try a decode to the 408 decode and he had fun with that, and even set traps. This is why RG’s decode is so downright bizarre and forced. Zodiac never wrote that way and how it’s even considered as the right path has always made me wonder. Oh, and too, I find Z also used a type of shorthand in the 340, he actually omits letters, no doubt as a frequency foil. If the letters are not there, they cannot be analysed and a crack by frequecy reps is not possible. He also purposely misspells words by either adding and/or subtracting letters (like in ‘fireing’ and spelling liar as ‘lier’). My solve was done completely independent of RG’s, I never even really looked closely at it, my gut said it was a trap, and I approached my solve with no biases whatsoever. I merely decoded as I went along with no preconceived notions and went where it lead me. And ‘Averlly’ is that nightmare mess at the start of line 5, anagrammed, preceeded by the end of line 4’s ‘lapu’ (Paul). "See to fat lier + Paul Averlly. And too, I feel he writes ‘of’ as ‘uv’ and similar tricks. It’s apparent when contexted in the message, but again, makes decode a lot tougher. I’ve already given all here all the unanagrammed parts of the message that I’ve found. It’s up to the reader to decide whether it’s the proper solve or not. Zodiac’s ‘game’ here was the anagramming and if it can never be verified, then it can never be officially solved. I’m just curious as to what it says! Cheers!

Zodiac’s ‘game’ here was the anagramming and if it can never be verified, then it can never be officially solved. I’m just curious as to what it says! Cheers!

This is the problem though. Or at least the problem as I’ve experienced it and (maybe) understand it lol. it’s not just a case that it can’t be verified if we get into anagraming. We can’t even be sure if it says what we think it says or what we see is actually the solution until we get a solution that can be verified. Never mind getting into anagraming.

And … is it anagraming? Or did he jumble it? Let’s say he anagramed it. Well then he would surely have anagramed the whole thing, yes? In that case he would have or should have tried to stick to some sort of rule. i.e not moving words out of sequence because he would have known that would make it virtually unsolvable. I’m thinking of today though with our wonderful computing power. I’m not even sure an anagramed h.sub cipher would have been even viable back then. Could it have been decoded to the correct anagramed state?

It’s become apparent that it’s not a straight forward h.sub. He did something to it. As to what exactly we are still trying to discover but we have to hope that it wasn’t something that makes it un-solveable. There is something about it that makes the anagraming thing a real temptation. Believe me, I’ve found words and partial sentences and more in this thing approaching it as an h.sub and some of them are so compelling that you would think there must, MUST, be something to it. There isn’t. I wanted there to be. Who wouldn’t but the reality is that the damn thing in its present state will feed us combinations of jumbled words and phrases and readable words and phrases from now until the end of time and each one more alluring than the last.

Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe one of these attempts will crack it. We haven’t seen it yet though. What we have seen is Einstein’s definition of insanity being played out. "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." Here’s one of my last attempts at insanity. I haven’t posted this before. I ran it by some ‘uninsanes’ because reality was starting to get through even my thick skull.

It’s compelling…ish. Even has some minor anagraming. Doesn’t amount to a hill of beans and rightly so.

So it’s not that we’re being dismissive or elitist. It’s that we’ve not only seen similar approaches in the past, we’ve also tried them and ‘believed’ in them …for a while.

Hi, Traveller1st

Nice reply, Thanks! Very good info there, I like it. Yes, perhaps ol’ ‘criminal mastermind’ went and made the 340 SO hard to decode he defeated his own purpose of having it read! Maybe it is even just ‘bussy work’ and doesn’t say a thing. Perhaps it is unverifiable. Personally, the whole reason I got into the ciphers was to try and see if he mentions Donna Lass, I live out here near Tahoe and took her disappearance kinda personal. That’s the whole main reason. Then I got into tracking clues and having a blast, so I stuck with it. And I don’t feel if he did anagram he would have to anagram it all. He had to let it be know he was playing ‘the game’ and then end with a clear, readable taunt, I feel. I further feel he HAD to have dropped clues to the crack after he saw no one could crack it. For me, it was all about finding his clues and appying them as I read he meant them to be perceived….good luck and STAY WITH IT!