Attention

Attention video — Attention thread on Unfiction
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Summary

Attention was uploaded on January 10, 2010.
Its description is "."
It is tagged with "marble", "hornets", & "ark".
In total, this clip is 0:14 long.

Stock footage of people riding bicycles through a crowd and an image of a sailor almost throwing something out are accompanied by cryptic messages telling Jay to "return to us", "wake up", and that totheark is "awaiting your arrival", and ambiguous audio.

+ Detailed Transcript

00:00: Black-and-white footage of a large group of people riding bicycles along a road lined with large crowds of people. The video appears distorted, as well as very old.
There is audio, but it is fuzzy and sounds distorted or slowed down.
00:03: It begins to cut to a shot of a pair of high wheel bicycles, but before the shot can resolve, it cuts to a black screen with white text:

Return to us

00:05: Black-and-white footage of a sailor in a public restroom, in front of a sink and mirror. Overlaid on the bottom right corner of the image are the words:

Wake up

There is fuzzy distortion on this clip.
00:06: The sailor picks something up form the soap dish and steps towards the garbage can, raising his hand as if to throw it away.
Further audio cuts in here, a higher-pitched and slightly louder layer of fuzzy noise.
00:09: The footage reverses, so that the sailor steps back towards the sink.
00:10: Cut to a black screen with text. The text appears to consist of white-and-color static-like distortion. It reads:

aiatiwnguoryrarialv

The second layer of audio gets a little higher-pitched.
00:13: A still image of the red tower with the operator symbol scratched in, as seen in Entry #21.
The audio cuts out.
00:13: Video ends.

Related Tweets

marblehornets says on 12 Jan 2010:

I don't like the fact that it says "us" in the video.

Main Theories and Observations

• "aiatiwnguoryrarialv" is an anagram for "awaiting your arrival".
• It is strange that it says "return to us", implying that totheark is working with another person or entity.
  • It could mean totheark and Tim, if they are separate people; it could mean totheark and the Operator, if they are in league; or it could mean totheark and the audience.
  • There is also a theory that the "us" is a group of people that constitute totheark all together, perhaps the "missing" cast members from Marble Hornets — Brian, Sarah, Seth, Alex, or any combination of the above.
  • This is not the first or the last time that totheark refers to an "us": it is also used in Messages and Entry ######.
• The general message of the video seems to be encouraging Jay to go back to the house, or not to give up the search.
  • The shot of the man going to throw something out, and then the reversed shot, could be totheark trying to say "I know you want to give this up, but don't."
• The images of people on bicycles could be telling Jay to get a move on, or telling him that things are afoot.
  • The bicycle parade shown is footage from the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. It took place in San Francisco, and it was a World's Fair of sorts. The website for it is here and the Wikipedia entry for it is here.

Relationships to Other Videos

• The fact that the man is a sailor could tie into the Messages video from totheark.
• The "Wake up" in this video could be related to the November 16, 2010 twitpic, the third of the mysterious three. It has "WAKE up" written on it upside-down.
• The white text used for "Return to us" is the exact same size and font as the text that Jay uses in all of his entries.
  • This has led to some speculation that totheark is a dissociated or split part of Jay's own personality.
  • It could also be a taunt or a jab on TTA's part, mimicking Jay's usual style to mock or goad him.

Further Speculation

"aiatiwnguoryrarialv" is an anagram for "awaiting your arrival". ~ Username pkticker

The black frame with white text reading "Return to us" is made with the same font as, and looks very like, J's title cards in The Entries. ~username unknown

This font is Arial, one of the most universal fonts. However, the similarity to J's fonts looks deliberate. ~FekketCantenel

At the end of the video a picture is seen of the operator symbol on what seemes to be a red wall, most likely the tower wall. -IsaacChai