The Ovilus - My Commodore 64 Can Do That Too!
Back in the 1980's when I had my beloved Commodore computer, the RND command was one of the early BASIC commands I learned. It was for simple things like simulating a dice roll of numbers between 1 and 6, or generating a random number to use in a POKE statement to generate different tones. Combine the RND statement with the READ/DATA combo filled with words like Family, Dinner, Funeral, Library, Dog, Ghost, Knife, Satan, Window, Police, Blood, Rusty, and of course Death. I think you see where I am going here. Put in a statement to generate one of these words every time you hit the space bar. Save it to disk and go journey to the paranormal destination of your choice.
Set up your Commodore 64 at the haunted location, LOAD "*",8 this program, and then type RUN. Go ahead and ask a question.
"Is there anyone here?". Press the space bar..."Library"
You take a look around the room and see a bookshelf with a few books on it. AHA! "Yes, we see books. Was this the library when you lived here?" Press the space bar..."Family"
People obviously lived here, so that makes sense. "Was your family killed here?" Press the space bar..."Dinner". Hmm, that doesn't make sense. Oh wait, "Were you having dinner?" Press space bar..."Window"
"Could they see your bodies through the window?" Press space bar..."Death"
Holy dogshit! The spirits are letting us know what happened. Follow the logical conclusion here and asking more questions, you would get responses such as "Police". From that you could think, "Oh yeah! The police showed up after the murder. How about "Rusty" followed up with "Dog" or "Knife"? Now we have a predicament. Do you go with the knife was rusty that killed the family during dinner, or do you go with the dog's name was Rusty. Of course when "Funeral", "Blood", or the most ominous of Ovilus words comes up, such as "Satan" or "Death", those seal the paranormal deal and you magically know what happened. The dead have spoken. Or have they?
My wife and I did an overnight investigation at the Sallie House in Atchison, Kansas back in 2017. Using the iPhone Ovilus app, we would get words like Legion, Telepathy, Threat, Prayer, Husband, Ghost, Child, Astral, and so on. Most of those could easily fit our situation. Fine. One year later, we did an overnight investigation at Malvern Manor in Malvern, Iowa. Starting the night in the lobby area, we get pretty much those same words we got at the Sallie House a year earlier. I did not realize this until we get back home and I look at old logs. It is at this point, I'm calling bullshit on the iOvilus app. Much like my nonexistent yet possible Commodore 64 random word generator, I now believe all the iOvilus app does is spit out preprogrammed words, much of which are spooky. Seriously, what better way to freak out people in an allegedly haunted location and have "Demon" or "Murder" come up, sprinkled in with a few common names like Mary or John.
For an interesting web version of this, see for yourself. Go the to the random word generator site and be amazed at the paranormal possibilities. I literally just did this and some of the random words that came up were Cemetery, Baseball, Curtains, Throat, Deport, Poison, and Smoke. These could easily be Ovilus words and be interpreted any number of ways.
I have no experience with the actual Ovilus, but I lean more on the side that is operates on the same theory. It is a random word generator. Supposedly it works on the theory that spirits can manipulate the database of words and communicate. I guess I'm a little skeptical because how would someone from the 1800's know how to do that? Heck, I'm from the 1900's, went through Marine Corps Electronics School, spent the last 25 years in IT field, and I wouldn't know how to do that. It's not like there is a box with index cards of words and the spirits can go through them and pick out a word. No. It is a piece of electronic equipment and most likely the words are stored on a microchip in the form of 0's and 1's. If I died I would have no clue on how to come back and manipulate an electronic database of 0's and 1's to generate words like "Computer", "Guns", "Dogs", or "Marine" that would be pretty specific to let me know it was me. Or maybe when you pass on, you get knowledge of interpreting electronic circuits.
Nope, not a fan of the Ovilus, because it is too easily faked. Faked is probably the wrong word, more like deceptively designed. Step 1: Program "spooky" words in it. Step 2: Randomly display them. Obviously I have no insight into how the Ovilus was designed, or the programming behind the iOvilus app, but unless there is a rational explanation of how spirits can see what words are in the database located on a computer chip, by putting on their ghostly spectacles, view the 0's and 1's, and decide an order of those which translate into a word, I'm calling shenanigans on this piece of paranormal equipment. But wait, there's more. I just saw an Ovilus that apparently is not a random generator, but rather uses energy in the environment to choose the words. Make up your minds please. Is it the spirit choosing the words, or is it the environment?
And for the love of Pete, why does Zak Bagans insist on pronouncing it "OV-you-luss"?
btw, quick disclaimer. Technically my first computer was a Commodore VIC-20 and not a Commodore 64. It had even less onboard memory. A whole 3,583 bytes free to be exact. So even the most primitive of computers could replicate receiving messages from the spirit world.
