Many people think that Microsoft does all of its product
development up in Redmond, Washington. Not true. There are several
other locations where the MS products you know and love (well, you
probably know them at least 
) are made. One of the largest locations is
right here in Silicon Valley. It's known as the Silicon Valley
Campus, or just SVC.
Groups located down here include:
- Powerpoint
- Hotmail
- Microsoft TV
- MSN TV (the successor to WebTV)
- Xbox (most of this is based in Redmond, though)
The cache is located at N37 2A.BCD W122 0E.FGH.
To determine the actual coordinates of the cache, you'll need to
learn a little more about the campus and some of the companies that
are the ancestors of the groups here.
A: Showing great foresight, Microsoft bought the company
that made Powerpoint quite a while ago. The name of the company
makes you think of a number. That number is A.
B: Microsoft bought the company that made Powerpoint in
the eighties. The last digit of the year in which they purchased
the company is B.
C: One of the founders of WebTV (and a really wonderful
guy) died at a tragically young age not long ago. The last digit of
the year he died is C.
D: WebTV Networks was purchased for XYZ million
dollars.
D = X + Y + Z - 3.
E: Microsoft established its Bay Area Research Center in
19XY. (Note that I am not referring to Microsoft Research
Silicon Valley here.)
E = X - Y.
F: F is the fourth digit of the zip code of the Silicon
Valley Campus.
G: The street number of the main street address of the
Silicon Valley Campus is WXYZ.
G = Y - Z - W.
H: The Silicon Valley Campus opened in 19XY.
H = X - Y.
Happy googling! If you're feeling adventurous, you could even
try searching for the answers on Microsoft's new search engine:
search.msn.com.
[4/16/05 -- Sounds this one is harder to find than I expected,
so I added a bit of a hint.]
[4/18/05 -- More of a hint on the final location. This one isn't
supposed to be that hard.]
