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konklone
I wrote up a post on the whole architecture here: http://konklone.com/post/the-making-of-isitchristmas-dot-com...
ErikAugust
Cool stuff. Cool technology. All kinds of possibilities.
busted
This is a really great writeup, thanks for taking the time.
mnutt
Very nice writeup. For the GeoIP part, there are actually libraries that will load up the entire Maxmind database into memory. Though it bloats your node app's memory usage as you would expect, it's extremely fast and almost always worth it. We use this library:

https://github.com/kuno/GeoIP

konklone
Yeah, I'll definitely be doing that next time. Thanks for the tip.
dhconnelly
PSA: check out the js console on the main site to send messages to other visitors.
RaphiePS
while (true) { say("foobar"); }
ben174
me.country = "HELL";
TazeTSchnitzel
Please don't do that. Seeing "HELL.png failed to load" every 5 seconds isn't fun.
jarrett
If you read the page source, you can see how easy it is to write your own chat bot for this app. Just paste the code back in to your JS console (which may not like newlines, FYI).

I won't tell you which chat bot was mine :)

TazeTSchnitzel 

   x = setInterval(function() {rawSend(JSON.stringify({ _event: "chat", country: "KP", name: "Kim Jong-Un", message: "Die US imperialist scum!" }));}, 250);
jandy
I love these kind of limited interaction situations, and what behaviour you see coming out of it. I moved around for a minute in a slow deliberate path, and others started following me; then I stopped completely still, and others lined their flags up next to mine in a square. Amusing, and all with no communication.
huffman
When I was there, all the American flags were just chasing Canada.
hybrid11
isitdown.com ?
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omershapira
Just spent 2 minutes on that site with 6 other people. We're all idiots.
iKlsR
haha. ikr, about a dozen of us went over each other and were clicking for abt a min
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Arkeus
Newline characters make for some interesting spoofing here.
readme
You can forge messages from others:

rawSend(JSON.stringify({ _event: "chat", country: "US", name: "Any Guy", message: "expletive deleted" }));

jarrett
It's even easier. You can set your name arbitrarily using the public API, e.g. rename('whatever');. Names don't have to be unique.
readme
True. Currently occupying myself by hooking on('chat')
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Zoophy
Is it possible to move other flags server side by using the following?

rawSend(JSON.stringify({ _event: "motion", c: "xx", id: "xxxx", x: 0, y: 0}));