u/Adept-Property2259

I know "friendliest DEF CON ever" is not exactly a metric anyone can measure, but I said it out loud today and then heard someone else say basically the same thing later.

So maybe there's something to it.

Today was one of those days that reminded me that as much as I love the talks, villages, badges, hardware, challenges, and all the ridiculous projects people bring here, the best part of DEF CON has always been the people.

I spent most of the day wandering around with my ridiculous fox-hunting rig, and I honestly lost count of how many people stopped just to say hi.

Some recognized the Artemis fox from Reddit. Some wanted to talk about the badge genetics stuff. Some wanted to compare hardware or show me what they were running. Some wanted to talk fox hunting. And some just saw a giant pile of antennas strapped to a guy and understandably had questions. Haha.

And every one of those conversations was great.

I met people running Kismet rigs, custom phones, Pis, homemade hardware, badges covered in mods, and projects I never would have thought to build myself. People were constantly showing each other things, explaining how something worked, helping troubleshoot problems, trading ideas, swapping stickers, and introducing complete strangers to other complete strangers because, "You two need to talk."

Also, shout out to JF for building such an awesome SDR badge. That thing is seriously cool. Getting to see what other people have built and then hearing the story behind it is one of my favorite parts of being here.

And genuinely, thank you to everybody who stopped me today to say hi, ask about Artemis, show me something you built, hand me a sticker, or just talk for a few minutes. There were a lot of you, and every single interaction added something to my day.

There are thousands of people here with wildly different backgrounds, skill levels, specialties, interests, and reasons for coming to DEF CON.

But everywhere I went today, people seemed genuinely excited to meet each other.

No gatekeeping.

No "you should already know this."

Just:

"What are you building?"

"How does that work?"

"Here, let me show you something."

"You need to meet this person."

That's DEF CON at its best.

Maybe you can't actually measure which DEF CON was the friendliest.

But this one sure as hell feels like it.

At least to me.

Also, apparently I walked 11.18 miles today.

DEF CON continues to be the world's nerdiest endurance sport.

Just wanted to say how much fun day one was.

Thanks to everybody who stopped to talk about the badge genetics, compare light patterns, ask about Artemis, or just say hi. I met a ton of cool people today.

One of my favorite parts was seeing how many different light patterns had already started spreading through the Human badges. I saw several of the shooting-star variants in person, bred with a few of them, and spent way too much time comparing everybody's lights.

A few people even recognized the Artemis fox from Reddit, which was surreal and really cool.

I also somehow managed to walk almost 9 miles, cover a ridiculous amount of ground, and collect about three days' worth of stickers in one afternoon.

Between the villages, the badges, the random conversations, the projects people brought, and just the overall energy, today was exactly what I love about DEF CON.

Thanks to everyone who made day one such a good one.

See you tomorrow. 🦊 🏹

ETA: I am calling it the "low-lin special variant" or "shooting-star variant" in casual terms, instead of the "eyes" variant.

I dug through the public DC34 badge source last night and found some really interesting stuff about the light-pattern breeding system.

The mutation levels are actually defined in code:

Baseline = 25%

Elevated = 39%

Radioactive = 55%

Apocalyptic = 94%

Those are per-gene mutation rolls, and higher levels also make the mutations themselves more aggressive.

The meter really does decay from Apocalyptic → Radioactive → Elevated → normal. One useful thing buried in the code: once you hit Apocalyptic, press LEFT or RIGHT to show your QR. That calls lock_rate() and saves that mutation level for the exchange, even if the meter visually drops afterward.

Same badge types also get an extra mutation pass. Human-to-Human breeding gets at least Elevated on that second pass.

You can preview offspring and Revert if you don't like it. Revert restores your previous genome, and nothing I found prevents you from breeding with the same donor again for a fresh roll.

Different badge types also start with different genetic ranges, so cross-breeding actually matters.

And the coolest find so far: the light renderer literally has a comment for a rare ~3% variant. If diploid.lin drops below 88, it enables an alternating eyes/chaser effect.

Uber badges have especially low native chaser values, so they look very interesting for breeding toward that rare variant.

Still digging through the source for more hidden traits. I'll post anything else interesting I find.

Built a little wearable WiFi/Bluetooth fox-hunting rig for DEF CON.

Raspberry Pi, custom software and UI, LCD, LED tracking feedback, multiple antennas, fold-down iPad workstation, hot-swappable batteries, and an irresponsible number of zip ties.

It is very much a Mk-I build, but it works.

See you at the Con.

It started with me wanting to just make 4 loaves. Then I realized I had doubled my levain amount by accident. So I made use of it. Jalapeño cheddar in one battard, roasted garlic, Gruyère, and Italian herbs in the other, Asiago cheese in one boule and sesame seeds on the other boule. Some didn’t rise quite like I wanted but the were all delicious and the crumb was soft and perfect, to me.

4 hearth loaves (≈1000g each)

1 bowl loaf (hearth style)

1 cast iron loaf

1 Pullman loaf

🥖** 🅰️ MAIN HEARTH DOUGH (MADE 4 LOAVES**)

Ingredients

1800g bread flour

200g whole wheat

1500g water

60g holdback water

400g levain

40g salt

Process

Mix flour + 1500g water → rest 30–45 min

Add levain

Add salt + 60g water

Bulk ferment:

3–4 folds early

stop at ~50% rise

Divide → 4 x ~1000g

Shape

Add inclusions during shaping

Tight shape

Into bannetons / bowls

Fridge overnight

🥖** 🅱️ EXTRA HEARTH (BOWL LOAF**)

Ingredients

450g bread flour

50g whole wheat

360g water

30g holdback

100g levain

10g salt

Process

Same as above

→ Shape into boule

→ Into towel-lined bowl

→ Fridge

🍞 🅲 CAST IRON LOAF

Ingredients

425g bread flour

50g whole wheat

335g water

~35g holdback

190g levain

9g salt

Process

Same mix

Bulk to ~50%

Shape tight boule or log

Into pan

Fridge

🍞 🅳 PULLMAN LOAF

Ingredients

600g flour

420g water

~50g holdback

120g levain

12g salt

Process

Mix

Bulk to ~40–50%

Shape tight log

Into pan

Proof / fridge

❄️** PROOFING (ALL LOAVES**)

After shaping → rest 20–30 min at room temp

Then → fridge overnight

🔥 BAKE

Hearth loaves

475°F

20 min lid on

20–25 min lid off @ 445°F

Cast iron

425°F

20 min covered

20–25 min uncovered

Pullman

375–425°F

40–55 min