OK to get the ball rolling here's a little placeholder. Pretty sure I could tighten this chain up, but it'll do for a start:
ilxor Stevie D(eux) with Tavi Gevinson: link
Tavi Gevinson with Gloria Steinem: link
Gloria Steinem with Roberta Flack: link
Roberta Flack with John Lennon: link
John Lennon with Ringo Starr: link
Ringo Starr with Vivien Leigh: link
Vivien Leigh with George Bernard Shaw: link1, link2
― Eyeball Kicks, Monday, 14 October 2013 14:44 (ten years ago) link
Very reassuring to see that I would have been completely destroyed by the last two even if I'd made it through the planes/trains/automobiles round.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Monday, 14 October 2013 19:20 (ten years ago) link
Chain of 7, with 17 people in photographs - very good!
― Maps, Monday, 14 October 2013 19:55 (ten years ago) link
We never did get to see the entries for last round, did we?Who got first place?
Anatol (229) chose public hygiene route: http://postimg.org/image/69qbd7lvr/
Lex (589) and EK (202) chose collage option: http://postimg.org/image/8kiwuhl19/ and http://postimg.org/image/xmn87n0az/
A thousand cats!
― Maps, Monday, 14 October 2013 20:05 (ten years ago) link
ilxor VegemiteGrrl with Orlando BloomOrlando Bloom with Jack BlackJack Black with Shirley MacLaineShirley MacLaine with Anthony Asquith (page with identity confirmation)Anthony Asquith with George Bernard Shaw (page with identity confirmation)
― lex pretend, Monday, 14 October 2013 20:14 (ten years ago) link
so many cats!
― lex pretend, Monday, 14 October 2013 20:16 (ten years ago) link
Small clarifications re: round 6
The route also cannot go through any of the candidates - if Lex has photograph of himself with Lloyd George, he cannot use even if his 'ilxor' is a photograph of someone else.
Celebrity ilxor must be 'verified' in some sense - assumed to be parody unless strong evidence otherwise. Dr Freud - not convincing.
― Maps, Monday, 14 October 2013 20:16 (ten years ago) link
Might have to resign myself from the battle, since I don't come back from holiday till it's over, and I'll probably get sacked if I try too much beforehand. One last push tomorrow I think and then I'll be done.
― Eyeball Kicks, Monday, 14 October 2013 20:43 (ten years ago) link
trawling WDYLL threads felt a bit weird but this is possibly the most enjoyable round for me, love finding connections between celebrities - kind of wanted it to go through personal favs though *side-eye at Jack Black*
― lex pretend, Monday, 14 October 2013 20:51 (ten years ago) link
EK, if you find a really good entry I can reserve it for later posting on Sunday?
― Maps, Monday, 14 October 2013 20:52 (ten years ago) link
ilxor White Chocolate Cheesecake with Susanna Hoffs (far right)Top photograph: Susanna Hoffs with Michael Ontkean in The Allnighter (1987)Michael Ontkean with Wendy Hiller in Making Love (1982)Wendy Hiller with George Bernard Shaw in or related to Pygmalion (1938)
Chain of 4. Total head count: 6 + 3 + 3 + 3 = 15.
― anatol_merklich, Monday, 14 October 2013 21:02 (ten years ago) link
Oh wow, that one is hard to top!
― Tuomas, Tuesday, 15 October 2013 07:50 (ten years ago) link
Tuomas, if you were still in this competition you'd be looking at a LOT of old pictures of yourself!
I imagine those of us still competing are busy googling very similar pools of people. In anatol's possibly unbeatable entry, Susanna Hoffs and Wendy Hiller are names I've typed a lot lately - well done for connecting them. There are other names I could mention that I'm sure anatol and lex would recognise right now. So far I can match the chain of 4, but with a total head count of about 22 - 15 of those in one crucial picture (again it would not surprise me if at least one of you knows what I mean by this).
― Eyeball Kicks, Tuesday, 15 October 2013 17:27 (ten years ago) link
OK, I will post the above-mentioned chain, even if it's not a winning entry, just to book my ilxor:
ilxor kingfish 2.0 with Patti SmithPatti Smith with Marianne Faithfull (and 14 others goddamit)Marianne Faithfull with Denholm ElliottDenholm Elliott with George Bernard Shaw (and one other)
Chain of 4, with 2 + 16 + 2 + 3 = 23 faces.
I am sure there must be a picture of PS and MF together, but I haven't found it yet. I won't have time to do any serious research while on holiday, but I am hoping the picture might come to me (I have even tried to contact MF herself), and if it does I might get a chance to improve this entry. Otherwise, I'm done.
Good luck to the other contestants!
― Eyeball Kicks, Thursday, 17 October 2013 18:19 (ten years ago) link
Closes in a few hours!
Is anatol champion, or will the quiet Lex steal the title?
― Maps, Sunday, 20 October 2013 19:43 (ten years ago) link
ilxor Ned Trifle II with Neil Kinnock[Removed Illegal Link][Removed Illegal Link]Winston Churchill with Arthur Balfour
total people in photos: 2+ 4 + 3 + 2 = 11
I would like to take this opportunity to spit on the Royal Fucking Family, would far rather my path went through the photo of Tracer Hand with Eve that I found (that took five links though) *guillotine face*
― lex pretend, Sunday, 20 October 2013 20:42 (ten years ago) link
SIGH let me try that shit again
ilxor Ned Trifle II with Neil Kinnock[Removed Illegal Link]The Duke of Edinburgh with Winston ChurchillWinston Churchill with Arthur Balfour
― lex pretend, Sunday, 20 October 2013 20:44 (ten years ago) link
FUCKING HTML
ilxor Ned Trifle II with Neil KinnockNeil Kinnock with the Duke of EdinburghThe Duke of Edinburgh with Winston ChurchillWinston Churchill with Arthur Balfour
The webpage for the second image is http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/about/history/royalvisits/y2000/[hidden]dukewiththeuniversitypresidentneilkinnock/index.html - I think it's the weird square brackets in the url that make it ~illegal
― lex pretend, Sunday, 20 October 2013 20:45 (ten years ago) link
COMPETITION CLOSED
― Maps, Sunday, 20 October 2013 23:59 (ten years ago) link
Lex entry - CONFIRMED.
― Maps, Monday, 21 October 2013 00:01 (ten years ago) link
RESEARCH HAS A KING
:D
I think I have been the Ruby Tandoh of this series...
― lex pretend, Monday, 21 October 2013 06:22 (ten years ago) link
Don't be so down on yourself Lex, everybody doesn't hate you.
― Ian Glasper's trapped in a scone (aldo), Monday, 21 October 2013 07:45 (ten years ago) link
Long live the new king!
― Øystein, Monday, 21 October 2013 08:11 (ten years ago) link
NB: there is actually a possible chain of 3. I only noticed after I'd got my final entry and it would've involved glomming off anatol's entry too much, but basically - there's a picture of an ilxor with Michael Ontkean.
― lex pretend, Monday, 21 October 2013 08:37 (ten years ago) link
WELL DONE LEX!! :-D Special kudos for ending up with someone not Shaw, ie someone who died more than twenty years before him.Chain of 3: woah, crazy.
More than happy to reach a podium place in this company. Thanks, Maps!
― anatol_merklich, Monday, 21 October 2013 13:12 (ten years ago) link
Huge congratulations, lex, I feel honored to have shared the arena with you
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Monday, 21 October 2013 14:43 (ten years ago) link
Yes thanks to maps for organising! This was tremendous fun.
Special kudos for ending up with someone not Shaw, ie someone who died more than twenty years before him.
Inspired to try this when I found a picture of an ilxor with a famous retired Canadian hockey player - thought that they must have met the Canadian PM at some point, who must have met...the Queen? who is a pretty good bet to have met a lot of people? In the event I couldn't actually find a photo of that hockey player with any Canadian PM, even though they must exist somewhere, but Queen-Churchill-Balfour were pretty easy links to find - so anyone in an ilx picture who would have been likely to meet the Queen was really the dream. Bizarrely could find no picture of Kinnock with the Queen but her racist husband did the trick.
My actual favourite chain was longer but:
ilxor Tracer Hand with EveEve with Daniel CraigDaniel Craig with the QueenThe Queen with Winston ChurchillWinston Churchill with Arthur Balfour
― lex pretend, Monday, 21 October 2013 15:16 (ten years ago) link
(obviously it was my favourite because 1) EVE 2) daniel craig shirtless 3) corgis)
― lex pretend, Monday, 21 October 2013 15:17 (ten years ago) link
Well done lex. This was all great fun.
― Eyeball Kicks, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 22:51 (ten years ago) link
Sneaking Lex from the shadows was a great drama, because in previous competition semi-final he had winning entry, and held it for the last second, only for JayMC to steal it away! Great to see redemption for map of Arabia.
Once again, thank you to all competitors, and see you for Season 3!
(If any - watchers or candidates - have any final feedback/suggestions for questions etc, please let me know, so I can do better next time!)
― Maps, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 12:07 (ten years ago) link
i didn't intend to hold it for the last minute - just hadn't found any winning entry by fri afternoon and had no research time til sun evening!
― lex pretend, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 12:11 (ten years ago) link
do any research kingz think they could find out how many people have been killed in branches of mcdonalds or as the result of violence inflicted in mcdonalds restaurants, or as the result of culpable negligence by mcdonalds employees or fellow customers?
― Snipers as a breed tend to be supercilious (Nilmar Honorato da Silva), Thursday, 24 October 2013 20:00 (ten years ago) link
enjoyed this a lot maps - thanks v much. impressed to the point of fear by lex's ability despite time to come up with the goods, but all the finalists made me go "ffs you BASTARD" at some point.
xpost
no.
― Fizzles, Thursday, 24 October 2013 20:11 (ten years ago) link
Oh man, definitely not.
For those who were stymied by the initial encoding on the second-to-last round: the reason I recognized it so readily was because it was used a great deal on usenet/newsgroups.Its primary function there was for hiding spoilers etc. It was common enough that most clients for reading news had a shortcut built in to rotate highlighted text. (e.g. in Forte Agent you could press ctrl+3)
What makes rot-13 so useful is that it's cyclical over the 26 letters of the English alphabet. To encode/decode, you just swap each letter with the one 13 places after it in the alphabet -- starting at A again after Z. So ABBA becomes NOON becomes ABBA. For the challenge I used rot13.com.Any symbol not in the English alphabet simply gets ignored, so my name becomes Ølfgrva. Uh, so that's today little history lesson for those who didn't feel like looking it up after it was revealed.
― Øystein, Thursday, 24 October 2013 20:38 (ten years ago) link
it's also used to drop answers on the xword thread so I was a little surprised lex wasn't aware of it.
― Fizzles, Friday, 25 October 2013 05:01 (ten years ago) link
i've never encountered it in a crossword...
― lex pretend, Friday, 25 October 2013 07:02 (ten years ago) link
no, just used in the thread when giving an answer so it doesn't spoil it for people still solving (but might not have been used recently)
― Fizzles, Friday, 25 October 2013 07:22 (ten years ago) link
oh, i don't think it's been used recently but if it was i wouldn't have known what was going on anyway
i was genuinely surprised to find out that these codes were well-known to the point of being obvious for so many people - it does feel good that this raised my awareness of them though!
― lex pretend, Friday, 25 October 2013 07:38 (ten years ago) link
> i've never encountered it in a crossword...
then you've not been on the receiving end of one of ledge's tiny rot13 crosswords...
― koogs, Friday, 25 October 2013 08:41 (ten years ago) link
I... have no recollection of those!
― as a chocolate salesperson (ledge), Friday, 25 October 2013 08:53 (ten years ago) link
^ old age
― koogs, Friday, 25 October 2013 09:28 (ten years ago) link
Damn was this great. Maps isn't on ILX anymore, right? I crave a new season of King of Research.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Friday, 9 August 2019 15:13 (four years ago) link
Yes, I often think of King of Research. Might be the most fun I've ever had on the internet.
― Eyeball Kicks, Friday, 9 August 2019 16:30 (four years ago) link
^same
― conrad, Wednesday, 21 August 2019 17:17 (four years ago) link
I was under the impression 'Maps' was only a King of Research persona for another ilx0r - were they a regular under that name? I bloody loved these threads.
― emil.y, Wednesday, 21 August 2019 19:25 (four years ago) link
This was loads of fun, yeah.
― Tuomas, Wednesday, 21 August 2019 20:07 (four years ago) link
Amazing! This thread just obliterated my afternoon in the best way.
― orifex, Thursday, 22 August 2019 00:29 (four years ago) link