CompoundIntelligence

**Group Link** | {{{Group Link}}}

## Introduction

CompoundIntelligence (commonly known as "CI"), a Chapter on Bungie.net, is a "private group" with open admission to any bungie.net member. CI was originally formed to be devoted solely to discussion of Iris, the Alternate Reality Game("ARG") and viral marketing campaign (VMC) for Halo 3. After the Iris ARG ended, CI repurposed itself to become the largest group dedicated to both archiving of the Iris ARG as well as discussion and theorization about Halo storyline, plot, backstory, and universe elements.

## History

### The Beginning

CI was born just a few hours after AdjutantReflex posted for the first time on Bungie.net. The group was founded after group leaders x Foman123 x and WhiteRaven119 had an MSN Messenger conversation and came to the conclusion that Bungie.net's public Halo 3 Forum was becoming overcrowded with discussion about AdjutantReflex rather than about Halo 3.

To redirect some of the traffic, x Foman123 x and WhiteRaven119 began CI as a private group open to all and dedicated to discussion of the AdjutantReflex incidents, which were, at the time, not yet known to be called "Iris" and was not yet confirmed to be an ARG or VMC.

### CI Grows

Through strong advertising, word-of-mouth, and the Community's desire to discuss the ARG in more depth, membership in CI grew rapidly. Although the group's founders prefer to focus on the group's ability to contribute to solving the ARG rather than membership count, the numbers are hard to ignore; membership exploded, gaining 1000 members within the first four days of its existence.

Through strong, focused membership, dedicated administration, and close alliances with other forums such as args.bungie.org, Unfiction.com, and WikiBruce, CI's abilities to contribute to solving the ARG grew.

Throughout it all, CI's administrators insisted that the Iris ARG was not a competition, and that members should embrace other forums as good sources of further information and a place to expound on theories and ideas. CI's open-armed and friendly policies were strictly enforced and appreciated both by CI members and the administrators of other Iris sites.

Major increases in membership occurred when AdjutantReflex sent Private Messages to x Foman123 x and when Servers opened. As word spread that CI was the place to go for Server openings (which provided Iris swag for some lucky participants) theories, and information, CI's reputation, membership, and activity continued to experience positive gains.

### CI Becomes the Premier Place for Iris Discussion

A mere one month after its inception, CI was the largest group on Bungie.net, and activity in the forum at times of high ARG activity was comparable to the Bungie.net public forums. A strong and capable contingent of moderators,

    all of them members known and trusted by x Foman123 x and WhiteRaven119, kept the forums in line. Despite high numbers of locked threads, the number of users banned or blacklisted never exceeded 25 (ten of them being alternate accounts created by a single user).

CI became the undisputed king of solving the ARG when a few members began an Internet Relay Chat ("IRC") channel dedicated to CompoundIntelligence. At the arg-irc.com server, the channel #CI became the primary source for extremely fast-flowing information, dedicated problem-solving, and coordination of CI efforts. Thanks both to CI's dedicated forum and its IRC channel, the vast majority of discoveries in the Iris ARG were made by CI members and posted first on CI.

## CI Today and in the Future

CompoundIntelligence was ultimately very successful in its ultimate goal of solving the ARG. Now that the frenzy of Iris has concluded, CI has been repurposed into both an Iris archive as well as a place to intelligently and rationally discuss the Halo storyline, plotline, universe, backstories, and theories without the spam and overly fast pace of the public forums. Also we have become a place to talk about all ARGs including the recent Superintendent ARG.

Activity remains at a high level, though predictably not nearly as high as during Iris, when CI's activity levels approached those of the public forums. CI's leaders and moderators continue to keep a close eye on CI, as it remains a target for spammers and malicious users. But CI's membership remains strong and committed, with the fond memories of Iris still easily conjured from browsing CI's archives.

## CI's Structure

CI's main security roles are named after those of a Forerunner installation, with several custom security roles for especially valued members of the CI community.

* **Installation Monitors**: CI's leaders are x Foman123 x and WhiteRaven119. The group was founded and set up by x Foman123 x, who also shouldered much of the administrative work during the early days of Iris as WhiteRaven119 was on vacation and unable to log in frequently. This led to a common misperception in the group that x Foman123 x was the only administrator in the group. This misperception was difficult to correct due to the group's large membership and frenetic activity, and was heightened when AdjutantReflex began sending private messages to x Foman123 x. Upon WhiteRaven's return from vacation, however, balance was restored and the group's membership realized that the group had two Installation Monitors. The residual effect remains, however, that x Foman123 x receives the bulk of the private message traffic regarding CompoundIntelligence.
* **Sentinel Majors**: CI's Sentinel Majors are its moderators, effectively locking bad threads and issuing temporary bans to wayward rulebreakers.
* **Sentinels**: CI's Sentinels are its members, who fill CI with thoughts, findings, theories, reasoning, and investigation results. Among the most intellectual and accomplished members on Bnet, CI's Sentinels are always ready to help out fellow Halo fans with theories, ideas, thoughts, and research.
* **Custom Roles**: Several members of CI have custom roles, such as Achilles1108's custom role of "Ehrenfest Operator." Most comparable to the public forum's roles of "Master Forum Ninja," these custom security roles usually grant different or greater privileges to their owners, allowing permabans, thread/post deletion, and approval of news items.

## Trivia

* CI's logo (see above) was designed by WhiteRaven119 and voted in an open poll to be the best out of a contest containing over 70 nominations
* The tenth Bungie.net user to join CI was AdjutantRefIex -- an alternate account using a capital "i" instead of a lower-case "L." The account was immediately permabanned.
* CI has almost as many moderators as the public forums have Forum Ninjas.
* CI was originally going to be named "System Integrity Confirmed," but the the name is one character too long.
* Rumor has it that CI's membership includes several Bungie and/or Microsoft "spies," who use CI to keep track of users' progress in Iris.
* CI members were so dedicated and tenacious that they found several elements of Iris before Iris's creators even intended them to. An internal Microsoft email (thought to be real) purportedly sent by a Microsoft employee claims that Iris's creators had to quickly install placeholder material on a website that was found weeks too early!
* Thomas Sanatos, a character in Iris, joined CI months after Iris's conclusion. Noting that the account actually belonged to a representative of AKQA (the ARG company that ran Iris), Thomas Sanatos posted to thank the CI community for its tenacious participation.
* CompoundIntelligence was the largest group on Bungie.net, until Lower the Guns took that title.