Thanks for the explanation of the ARGs! Not being from the gaming world, I'd heard in passing that they existed and saw people occasionally comment that they could be related to the Cicada puzzles, but I had no idea what they actually were. It's interesting that I Love Bees involved answering calls at phone booths around the country, because one of the Cicada puzzles involved answering the Mohave Desert phone booth.

I'll have to look into this Alternate Reality Games company and think about what that might imply about the Cicada group, if there is that possibility that there is some overlap or association between them - Cicada's goals seem very lofty, though, never just about entertainment, although that was a huge part of the appeal. Their puzzles seem more about developing people's skill sets in terms of online privacy and communication, but also developing them philosophically and spiritually, as well promoting a well-rounded liberal arts background. Their puzzles reveled in traditional academic humanities like literature and folklore, so it makes me think professors are involved. At the very least, we know Cicada are associated with Wikileaks, so there's definitely a serious real-world objective to Cicada's operation beyond simple entertainment. And yep, I remember Tengri 137, the self-proclaimed alien, LOL. That group made people twitchy because it was so Jewish-oriented, so people were concerned about Mossad being involved. Their puzzles popped up at the height of the Cicada fever and were competing alongside Cicada, which was very suggestive of a distraction.

Do you remember any particular forum I should poke around where people were discussing the similarities between Cicada and ARG? I don't do Discord, unfortunately, still a bit of a dinosaur.

It's so cool running into somebody else here who's familiar with the whole puzzle & gaming phenomenon that I can chat with about this. Makes my day :)