Join us for a special Web 2.0 edition of NerdSalon on April 23, 2008 at the Make Out Room. As usual we’ll have a puzzle, a prize and a special guest. Festivities run from 6PM to 9PM.

Congrats again to Erica, winner of the July 10th puzzle contest.

I’ve posted a set of photos here. Please tag them with the names of people in them, as I didn’t know the names of everyone I snapped!

First, some photos!

Thanks to DJ jovino for the music, to Matt for the GNU radio demonstration and to 111 Minna for the infrastructure.

Congratulations to Erica for winning this month’s nerdsalon puzzle. (photo forthcoming)

The puzzle consisted of two logic questions (no math!):

Five men raced their cars on a racing strip. There were no ties. Will did not come in first. John was neither first nor last. Joe came in one place after Will. James was not second. Walt was two places below James. In what order did the men finish?

You are working in a store where they have been very careless with the stock. Three boxes of socks are incorrectly labeled. The labels say Red Socks, Green Socks and Red and Green Socks. How can you re-lable them correctly by taking only one sock out of one box?

Erica correctly answered the first question James, John, Walt Will, Joe.
Erica also answered second question. Essentially, you take one sock out of the Red and Green box. Whatever color that sock is, must be the color of all the socks in that box, since we know the Red and Green label is wrong. Then switch the other color label and put Red and Green on the remaining box.
The prize was a book of Mensa puzzles.

See you next time!

NerdSalon will be July 10th from 6 to 9 at 111 Minna, an hour earlier than previously announced.  See you then.

Nerd Salon is back!!!

WHEN: Tuesday, July 10, 2007, 6 PM – 9 PM (Note change in time)
WHERE: 111 Minna Gallery, San Francisco (111 Minna St.)

You’ve heard about it . . .

You’ve yearned for it . . .

At last, on July 10, it’s another crazy night of Nerd Salon! Come out
and socialize with your fellow geeks in a mildly intoxicated manner!
This episode of Nerd Salon brings you:

* The circuit board stylings of Matt Ettus (www.ettus.com), who will be
doing a live demo of GNU Radio, the open source software-defined radio
project (www.gnu.org/software/gnuradio)

* A mind-bending puzzle for you to solve for a very special prize.

This irregular evening of mayhem is organized by your nerd captains
Jennifer Granick (www.granick.com) and Annalee Newitz
(www.annaleenewitz.com). Come out and have a drink with people who won’t
make fun of you for hacking, hating on DRM, copyfighting, discursing on
public policy, building nuclear reactors in your garage, reading science
fiction, working in a bookstore, arguing about open source software,
collecting Buffy dolls, dancing with robots, blogging and/or podcasting,
lusting after the iPhone, or getting excited about the new /Hulk/ comic
book.

URL: http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/209727

June’s NerdSalon puzzle winner was Jonathan Lassoff:

Congratulations, Jonathan!

The puzzle was in Rot 13, though there was a typo which may have made it harder for people designing an automated solution to solve. The answer was:

Any of you that have ever felt stepped on, left out, picked on, put down, whether you think you’re a nerd or not, why dont you just come down here and join us! — Revenge of the Nerds

Next NerdSalon will be in September, probably. Till then…

Thanks to everyone for another fun NerdSalon! Special mention: David and Simone for the robot soccer, DJ jovino for the tunez, 111 Minna for the venue, Phil Torrone for the prizes.

Here’s the puzzle. Answer and photo of the winner later on today.

nal bs lbh gung unir rire sryg fgrccrq ba yrsg bhg cvpxrq ba chg qbja jurgure lbh guvax lbher n areq be abg jul qbag lbh whfg pbzr qbja urer naq wbva hf — rriratr bs gur areqf

Next NerdSalon will be sometime in September.

Credit: Robogames.net

At Tuesday’s NerdSalon and just in time for the World Cup we’ll have mechanical guest stars Team Robonova soccer, music by DJ jovino and DJ Mermaid, and, of course, the puzzle. See you there!