back to article Alice, Bob and Verity, too. Yeah, everybody's got a story, pal

Once there were a million A&B stories on the Naked Web. Now there are a million-and-one. Alice and Bob are two commonly used placeholder names. They are used for archetypal characters in fields such as cryptography, game theory and physics – Wikipedia I had caught the H[redacted] bus heading east (via Turd Park, Central …

  1. Chika

    tl; dr

    Am I missing something?

    Am I missing something?

    Am I missing something?

    Oh, hang on.

    Am I missing something?

    1. Valerion

      Re: tl; dr

      I'm assuming the proof reader is still hungover from the weekend.

      1. Kydoimos

        Re: tl; dr

        I assumed the doubled story was the secret message.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: tl; dr

        > I'm assuming the proof reader is still hungover from the weekend.

        This being a Verity Stob story about crypto I can't help but feel it's a joke I am too hungover to understand :/

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: tl; dr

          @AC: I think I may just be too sober to understand it!

          1. Cynic_999

            Re: tl; dr

            Are you guys thick or something? It's quite obvious that the bus driver's name is Charlie, and the bus is going to stop at Mornington Crescent.

            Sheesh!

      3. Pascal Monett Silver badge

        I think the proof reader is still locked in the basement. Whether or not he is still hungover is irrelevant since it is quite obvious everyone else is.

        And now I'm in a hurry to get there as well.

    2. Oh Homer
      Holmes

      Re: "Am I missing something?"

      Yes, the story is a slightly amusing but extremely long-winded allegory for the futility of controlling the dissemination of shared information.

      The key word being "shared". Once someone (be it one person or a million) other than you has your formerly private information, the genie is well and truly out of the bottle, and you have no reasonable expectation of cramming him back into it.

      This is a fact that neither cryptography users, the copyright lobby, nor Elton John seem to comprehend.

  2. Alister

    Yay, Stob!

    A fascinating tale of sex, drugs and cryptography. All very relevant to today's leading topics.

    1. Chris King
      WTF?

      At least it didn't involve DevOps.

      (WTF icon, because we're missing a "Where's the DevOps angle ?" icon)

  3. Bc1609

    Even Stob can fall victim to the El Reg sub-editor

    As an impoverished undergraduate, I once bought a copy of The Way of the World for a penny from Amazon using the free Prime trial. It was missing pages 69-104 and pages 121-150 were repeated where pages 170-199 should be. Neither Stob or Congreave bore the treatment particularly well.

  4. Dan Wilkie

    What the hell did I just read...

    Seriously Reg, are you as I am drunk?

    1. NotBob
      Pint

      It must be Monday.

      Now I need a drink.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      > What the hell did I just read...

      Not bad for the first outing of "Artificial Intelligence Stob", but I think the humour setting needs to be turned up a couple of notches.

  5. Anonymous Blowhard

    I know everyone wants twice as much Stob, but this isn't what we meant...

  6. Joe Harrison

    Literary prize material

    Reg's allegorical use of language paints an opulent image of a corroded steampunk landscape, bringing an irridescent yet simultaneously jejune perspective to the deceptively traditional denizens of stygian cryptographical mythos. Coyly concealed beneath an intentionally pellucid framework of the familiar "London Bus" we see the unfolding of a breathtaking panorama of quantum

    [contd. p.94]

    1. Uncle Slacky Silver badge
      Alien

      Re: Literary prize material

      <Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz>

      "Death's too good for 'im"

      </Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz>

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Literary prize material

      I didn't know Umberto Eco was transmitting from Heaven. Could we have it in the original Italian please, I think something got lost in translation.

  7. Uncle Slacky Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    Gotta-getta-double-seat

    Nice Ben Elton reference - also a sort-of Jasper Carrott "nutter on the bus" reference too...

    1. Tommy Pock

      Re: Gotta-getta-double-seat

      I'm only in the comments to see if anyone clocked the Ben Elton reference before I posted it.

      Bugger.

  8. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken
    Coffee/keyboard

    Perfect timing, that was exactly what I needed right now!

  9. ganymede io device

    I tried differential analysis on the double-transmitted apparently plain-text that begins "to secure my gotta-getta-double seat" but there's no hidden message to decipher - just unfixed errors of typographical composition like missing "to her" in " to invite her to her next Anne" and a missing "to" in "not to write his password on a post-it,"

    Shame, I was looking forward to throwing hashcat at it. Right, back to re-implementing keccak style sponges to hide some more secrets in plain sight.

  10. Stevie

    Bah!

    I believe this is a parable on how it is pointless for just some of us to use cryptography for our e-goings on, or for us to only use it in certain cases.

    But then, Bob never sent me his public key.

    1. Anonymous Blowhard

      Re: Bah!

      Have you checked your settings in roberts.txt?

    2. TitterYeNot
      Coat

      Re: Bah!

      "But then, Bob never sent me his public key."

      This can only be a good thing, if Bob's private key is anything to go by. This was, of course, also procurred from Love Honey, and fits a lovely pair of fluffy handcuffs that come in a rather fetching shade of pink...

    3. Uncle Slacky Silver badge

      Re: Bah!

      Maybe he's really Little Bobby Tables?

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Not bad

    Quite enjoyable, really. My only gripe is that it seemed to end abruptly : I really wanted to know what else the nutter had to say.

    I normally loathe 'Alice and Bob', but there were some lessons in this story. The main one being that there's no point in having the shit-hottest communications security if you don't really know the person you're communicating with.

    And the bit about gossip in the smoking shed - spot on. I was always surprised at how open people were in their conversations, as if socialising amongst fellow outcasts was for some reason a timeout from normal confidentiality rules.

    1. TeeCee Gold badge
      Happy

      Re: Not bad

      ...socialising amongst fellow outcasts....

      There's a (for once) decent neologism for such. It's "snoutcasts".

    2. Terry 6 Silver badge
      Unhappy

      Re: Not bad

      Even before coffin nails were made illegal indoors there were plenty of organisations where the smokers had their own private communication network, which sometimes was more important than the official one.

      It was where some people got to hear about jobs going ( in both senses) before anyone else, as well as that latest gossip, management plans and so on.

      It kind of depends/ed on whether the important boss was a smoker or not.

      Smokers were, and often still are apparently, entitled to take regular addiction breaks together while other workers have to keep on with the job. And while they are enjoying their sanctioned extra breaks they share all the organisation's confidential information with whoever happens to be around.

      Why is there no icon for " embittered and resentful"?

  12. Simon Harris

    Jennifer, Alison, Phillipa, Sue, Deborah, Annabel too...

    I thought the article was going to turn into a reworking of a Beautiful South song!

    1. Steve Foster
      WTF?

      Re: Jennifer, Alison, Phillipa, Sue, Deborah, Annabel too...

      Aargh! Now I have *that* tune in my head for the rest of the week. So annoyingly catchy that even a very large thimbleful of scumble isn't going to be enough to expunge it.

      1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
        Happy

        Re: Jennifer, Alison, Phillipa, Sue, Deborah, Annabel too...

        I wouldn't put scumble in thimbles if I were you!

        It eats through the metal ones, and what it does to the glazes of ceramic ones (swiftly followed by your insides) is best not thought about.

        Stick to swigging it neat out of the bottle. Much healthier.

  13. Chris G

    Parabolic?

    Or an apologue perhaps?

    To teach that no matter how strong your encryption is, if one end or the other is less than perfectly secure; the bit in the middle is worthless.

  14. David Roberts
    Coat

    All I've worked out so far..

    ..is tha Bob is back dooring Alice.

    (I think).

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Don't forget the rest of the staff

    Alice, Bob, Carol, Dan, Erin, Faythe... how about the security guard George, the human resources expert Harry, the CTO Ian, the night-cleaning supervisor James, the networking administrator Kathryn, the sales manager Leon, the parking lot security guard Mike, the accountant Nolan and his assistant Olivia, that Irish translator Patrick, the intern Quincy (nobody knows what he's supposed to do), the new hire Roberta (what department does she work in again?), the systems administrator Simon (what a bastard, and watch out for his PFY assistant), the CEO's executive assistant Tina, Ulysses the cook (who seems to specialize in Greek tragedies), Victor and Xavier, twin business analytics, Yvette the receptionist, and Zach the product manager?

    1. Toastan Buttar

      Re: Don't forget the rest of the staff

      Where's Wally?

      1. Alex Vincent

        Re: Don't forget the rest of the staff

        Wally the window washer? He's a contractor, he doesn't work for us.

        1. Michael H.F. Wilkinson Silver badge
          Big Brother

          Re: Don't forget the rest of the staff

          And don't forget Simon. NOTHING is safe from Simon. Simon is watching you. Even when he is at the pub

          I feel there is an icon missing

      2. jinnentahnix

        Re: Don't forget the rest of the staff

        I believe you mean Waldo...

    2. Mark 85

      Re: Don't forget the rest of the staff

      But what of Mary Lou? <plays heavy organ music><screen fades to black>

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Police Stob alphabet going through Verity.

  17. dajames

    Erin and Faythe?

    You can't have "Erin" because 'E' has already been used for "Eve" ...

  18. /dev/null
    FAIL

    Slightly disappointed...

    ...to see that you didn't take the obvious opportunity to photoshop your stock photo so that the button read STOB instead of STOP....

  19. Andy Davies

    Melanie (second name encrypted) suggested this:

    Alice had a brand new pair of roller-skates

    Bob had a brand new key

    Bob put the key in a strongbox and padlocked it - he kept the Key

    Bob sent the box to Alice

    Dick intercepted the box but couldn't open it, so sent it onwards

    Alice double-padlocked the box and kept her Kkey

    Alice sent the box to Bob

    Dick intercepted the box but couldn't open it, so sent it onwards

    Bob took off his padlock with his Key

    Bob sent the box to Alice

    Dick intercepted the box but couldn't open it, so sent it onwards

    Alice opened the box with her Kkey

    Alice took out the key and put on her roller-skates

    The rest is musical history ffolks.

  20. bimaloy30

    As well as rearranging events in a ludicrous way, the movie oozes anachronistic dialogue from every pore, reinterprets wildly the characters of the principals and generally makes free with its source material. I am not alone in such observations.

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