
Conspiracy and an off-by-one error - TazeTSchnitzel
https://gist.github.com/klaufir/d1e694c064322a7fbc15
======
anatoly
Very nice writeup!

To finish the puzzle, consider the following comment in one open-source mp4
library:
[https://github.com/l-smash/l-smash/blob/master/core/box.h](https://github.com/l-smash/l-smash/blob/master/core/box.h)

"According to ISO/IEC-14496-5-2001, the difference between Unix time and Mac
OS time is 2082758400. However this is wrong and 2082844800 is correct."

MP4 stores timestamps by Mac epochs. The wrong value of the difference between
Unix and Mac epochs is wrong exactly by 24 hours and is hardcoded in the
MPEG-4 reference software, from which it made its way into a number of
libraries.

(I work for Google and have contacted the right people in the attempt to
address this bug soon).

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agf
Off by one errors affecting geopolitics. That's a scary thought. Any other
examples out there? There are things like false missile launch positives
during the Cuban missile crisis...

~~~
Demiurge
This doesn't really affect geopolitics any more than any other conspirology.
No fingers changed direction because of this.

~~~
agf
I agree, but change the context just a little and the same error could have
convinced people the evidence was faked. The potential is there.

------
powertower
Excellent review and analysis!

I watched the original video (about the time-stamp) yesterday and someone in
the comments section said about the same (that there is a bug in the system).

But I wouldn't label the original poster a conspiracy theorist over this.

It's perfectly normal for someone to assume YouTube is working as it should,
in which case, seeing the early time-stamp should definitely set off some
question marks.

In combination with the current regime's use of indiscriminate violence,
misinformation, and downright lies, it reasonable to question anything they
put out.

~~~
ajarmst
When "elaborate multi-agency government conspiracy" and "off-by-one bug in
non-critical section of code" are your two competing theories, both Occam's
Razor and Hanlon's Razor (two important rules of reasoning) compel the
selection of the latter. So it's not really "normal" (if by that you mean
reasonable) for someone to assume that YouTube is elaborately bug free if that
requires the existence of shadowy conspiracies that are unsupported by other
evidence.

~~~
A_COMPUTER
There seems to be two ways to apply Occam's Razor. The first, used by people
actually tasked with investigating something, is to prioritize exploration of
simpler explanations before more complex ones. The second, more commonly used
by Internet bystanders, is to treat it like an iron law, immediately cut off
all alternate avenues of inquiry and give people degrading labels. Occam's
Razor is best as an investigatory rule of thumb and not a thought-terminating
cliche.

~~~
makomk
In this case, even the most cursory attempt to explore the simple explanation
would've shown it was the right one, though.

------
konstruktor
Great technical analysis, but poor choice of words. Why does the author deem
it necessary to sensationalise it by using terms like _conspiracy theory_ and
_conspiracy theorists_? Those are rather derogatory and loaded, but introduce
no actual information except that a conspiracy is involved:
[http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory)

Note that both the currently most accepted hypothesis (rebels armed by the
Russians did it) as well as the Russian party line (Ukranians did it to frame
the Russians) involve government conspiracies and are, thus, conspiracy
theories.

~~~
gizmo686
Isn't the general hypothesis that whoever did it mistook the plane to be
military. If so, this does not seem like a conspiracy, as much as a mistake
(or incompetence) followed by a cover up.

~~~
jqm
Exactly. Most likely a military mistake similar to Iran Air Flight 655.

These things can happen. When political leaders seize on these types of events
to promote their agendas however, some people understandably become more
suspicious that a conspiracy is afoot.

~~~
acqq
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655)

"shot down by the United States Navy guided missile cruiser USS Vincennes on 3
July 1988," "All 290 on board, including 66 children and 16 crew, died"

"The Fogarty report stated, "The data from USS Vincennes tapes, information
from USS Sides and reliable intelligence information, corroborate the fact
that [Iran Air Flight 655] was on a normal commercial air flight plan profile,
in the assigned airway, squawking Mode III 6760, on a continuous ascent in
altitude from take-off at Bandar Abbas to shoot-down.""

------
TazeTSchnitzel
The comments on reddit are quite interesting too:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/2b4kpg/conspira...](http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/2b4kpg/conspiracy_and_an_offbyone_error/)

------
jcr

      Ecoded date from the downloaded youtube file:
      Encoded date : UTC 2014-07-17 10:44:19
      Exact upload date using the API:
      <yt:uploaded>2014-07-18T10:43:10.000Z</yt:uploaded>
    

> _" you will find that the encoded date timestamp is 24 hours behind the
> upload date"_

Excellent analysis, but the last statement is reversed. It's probably just a
typo/oversight (like that's never happened to me before (sigh)). The encode
timestamp is 24 hours _before_ the upload timestamp, which is impossible since
it must be uploaded before it's encoded.

~~~
fixermark
"Behind" means "before," depending on whom you are speaking to. Relative-time
prepositions in English are pretty badly messed up.

~~~
harshreality
What's messed up about "before" and "after"?

I don't think native speakers will use "in front of" or "behind" to describe
time coordinates. Those words are used to describe relative positioning of
events, and in such use I think they have the opposite interpretation from
what you suggested.

"Event A occurred behind event B", for example, or "A is behind schedule"
(although you could then argue that scheduling has its own semantics for
"behind"). However, even "I'm running behind" means running late, not early.

Even on a timeline, it's not clear whether the point of perspective for
determining "in front of" or "behind" is a point in the past or a point in the
future.

Simple: use before and after, or earlier and later.

btw, the overall semantics of "a means b, depending on whom you are speaking
to" made me cringe even though I know you meant "A _usually_ means B, but it
depends..." (which I don't think is even true—see above—but that's a factual
not semantic complaint). Taken literally, you could just as easily have
written "a means (not b)..."

~~~
fixermark
"Before" and "After" are fine.

"Behind" is not incorrect in the original text, but it can be terribly,
frustratingly ambiguous. As you've noted, "I'm running behind" means "I'm
running late," i.e. I will arrive after the correct time. But "My clock is
running behind" means "My clock is running slow," meaning it shows a time
before the correct time.

Similarly, when projects are behind schedule (i.e. likely to complete after
the correct time), we sometimes solve this by pushing the schedule back...
Meaning by pushing the correct time into the future, as opposed to most
contexts where "pushing something back" would mean "pushing it further
behind." So we push schedules back to move deadlines forward.

Personally, I usually use "into the future" and "into the past" to be precise.
Treating time with spatial-positional-relative language is fraught with
inaccuracies.

(Fun fact: did you know "biweekly" means either "twice a week" or "once every
other week?" I can't think of any other measurement unit that has a factor-of-
four error built into its very definition).

~~~
roywiggins
There's biannual/biennial: think quick, which means twice a year and which
means every two years?

[http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/biannual](http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/biannual)
/
[http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/biennial](http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/biennial)

~~~
mikeash
Misleading question, since biannual means both!

------
dj-wonk
There is considerable overlap between good investigative skills and debugging
software. I'm glad to see both being used together!

------
eevilspock
Superb investigative journalism. And love the idea of using GitHub, where
anyone else can suggest improvements or additions, and it's all transparent.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Well, it's a Gist, so it's tracked by git and can be forked, but I don't think
you can make pull requests.

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antocv
An astute consipracy theorytician will just claim that Google has changed
their API and changes the timestamps on the fly after their initial blunder
was discovered.

Just to stay, that evidence does not usually persuade beliebers.

