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Happy Birthday Mark!

We have a winner! Good job! Looks like I really suck at giving good hints, though, either they're too simple or too hard!

[HINT: The way the code letters break up into the solution characters is: AABC, AC and ACC. Again, have you ever seen letter couplings similar to these before? In... history?]

You're not on the right track, I'm afraid, Baron. Oh and, not sure if I understand you right, but I didn't say Alan v. Drake was close, I said someone was close! (the smart puzzle solver now knows it wasn't him, haha)

Okay, it's been a long enough time I guess, so here's the next hint! This one is REALLY telling, I think, and this time I really expect the code to be solved very soon! Let's see...

HINT: The way the code letters break up into the solution characters is: AABC, AC and ACC. Again, have you ever seen letter couplings similar to these before? In... history?

There is actually one very important piece of information that was entirely new in the hint I gave today, if you look close enough!
Plus, it really does point you in the right direction very much!

But okay, one last tip for today: take another look at what people have guessed so far (regarding this code); even though the correct answer wasn't given yet, exactly one person was, while not using the right 'method', still giving an answer that was in exactly the right ballpark!

Haha, nah, it's real characters, no colors or anything mean like that!

And I also didn't manage to encode two characters with three, would be very interesting tho!

[There are 9 characters in my code but they translate to 6! It's neither one 'code character' per 'solution character' nor is it two! How can this be? Have you ever seen this happen before somewhere maybe?]

"square" or "matrix" or "sudoku" ?

In case those aren't just random 6-letter words, I'd be very interested in how you got them from my code!

Okay, so the hint:

There are 9 characters in my code but they translate to 6! It's neither one 'code character' per 'solution character' nor is it two! How can this be? Have you ever seen this happen before somewhere maybe?

I'm pretty sure this makes it kinda easy, in case I'm still underestimating the difficulty of deciphering my code, I will post another hint tomorrow!

[the solution consists of 6 characters]

Nope, it's none of the above! Since it appears to be too hard to figure out without this information, the solution consists of 6 characters!

That hint in a good 12 hours is still going to be posted btw!

AABCACACC

Is it like one of those letter substitution things?  Like A=E, C=S, etc..?

In some form or the other, yes, otherwise it wouldn't be much of a code!

Haha, you'd think there'd be a D in there somewhere, no?

Nah, that wouldn't really be a 'code' I don't think. More like a cryptic abbreviation.

I will be releasing a first hint in ~20 hours assuming nobody gets it until then of course.

Haha, well, it's neither AGS nor DKH but it sure is fun seeing you guys try!

Nope, although I would like to know if there's any method you found to convert AABCACACC to AGS

If nobody has it by tomorrow I'll start dropping hints!

AABCACACC stands for a string of characters, like a word, a phrase, a sentence etc., as you say, it holds meaning, too. It's not nonsense or a sequence continuation or anything like that!

EDIT: I should also mention it IS a 'real' usable code. So the people that know how to decode it (which is extremely easy and quick, no calculations or anything necessary, BTW) will be getting the same exact thing you encoded with it! It's not the first letters to a sentence or anything random like that.

Nope, the first guess I don't suppose was meant seriously, the second one is a neat idea but it's neither chords nor a tone sequence!

Another riddle (dunno if this actually is a riddle):

AABCACACC

I made this code up and I have no idea whether it's incredibly easy, super hard or somewhere in-between to break, so let's see! Can anybody tell me what that means.

EDIT: It's just the 9 characters above, the text before and after has nothing to do with it.

Sweet, PM sent! Thanks!

[composing music for orchestras]

Do we have people here at least somewhat experienced in/familiar with composing music for orchestras? If so, let me know please, I have a couple of questions!

Guys (and Ponch), I have just received shocking information: Ben has ditched us all, the community and the podcast, under false pretenses. He doesn't work weekends, he sold out and applied at Google where he is currently making sure every single Youtube view counter glitches out at exactly 304.

Ben's been sick you monsters! MONSTERS!!

If that isn't there, you're probably using an outdated Photoshop version in which case I can't help you because I updated a LONG time ago!

Size 1, Mode Pencil (this one is important), Opacity and Flow 100%. This works on any new Photoshop, tested in CS4 and CS5.

I don't think Yahtzee minds the single-step problems, it's more the nature of the thing that he doesn't like I'm sure. Use inv item on hotspot would be a more technical and more correct description, but his audience isn't just game makers any more. There's a lot cooler puzzle designs that aren't just USE X ON Y.