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This article was posted to the Usenet group alt.hackers in 1995; any technical information is probably outdated.

Re: Backwards Message Hack


Article: 7373 of alt.hackers
From: eburton@buphy.bu.edu (Erich Burton)
Newsgroups: alt.hackers
Subject: Re: Backwards Message Hack
Date: 13 Feb 1995 21:34:25 GMT
Organization: Boston University Physics Department
Lines: 24
Approved: Lcanter@cyber.sell.com
Message-ID: 3hoj91$ocg@news.bu.edu
NNTP-Posting-Host: buphy.bu.edu
Status: RO

madst38+@pitt.edu (Mark Denovich) writes:

:ObCorrectWayToHackPlayer:
:
:Take the tape head out and flip it, remount.  Worked flawlessly on older
:Panasonics.

Yup, that works.

I once bought an obscure Sonic Youth tape -- all the songs were backwards.
Not like their untitled album on which side 2 was side 1 backwards, I
mean _all_ of it was backwards.  Even the _live_ performances.  Weird.

ObHack:  I carefully took apart the cassette shell, swapped the position
of the reels (without flipping them over), 'rewound' the tape the other
way, and then flipped the reels.  End result: the inside of the tape
(away from the playback head) was now the outside, and the tape played
"correctly" -- forwards.

And ever since, "Freezer Burn/Now I Wanna Be Your Dog" has been in
heavy rotation on my walkman.
____________________________________
Erich Burton  3-2602  eburton@bu.edu
Boston University Physics Department



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