Anyone good at solving codes?

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I'm trying to figure out an encrypted message.
It goes like this (random symbols inserted to represent graphic symbols):

7o P%3?P=
KFY@ {@
oF?%@Y {V
(S AF?o @{
W( @%Wo
V&{W PKQW

Each symbol represents a distinct letter.
I've come up with this so far, but it's not making much sense:

(B, H, W)e -a----
---n on
e--an- of
-r--
y- ---e no
my name
from ---m

Can anyone help out a bit?

― Melissa W, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

new answers, and some clarification since it's hard to see spaces on this format...each underscore represents a space between words here...

7o___P%3?P=
KFY@___{@
oF?%@Y___{V
(S___AF?o___@{
W(___@%Wo
V&{W___PKQW

― Melissa W, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i am rubbish at this, sorry. but to clear your head, do something else for a bit. you'll come back to it refreshed!

― katie, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

are you a spy, Melissa?

― m jemmeson, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yes, yes I am. :)

― Melissa W, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

what time is it over there? surely too early to get one's brane around such trickery

― m jemmeson, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

9:20AM. Are you still in love with me?

― Melissa W, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

maybe... (he says, coyly)

― m jemmeson, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

aw come on. is this from some adventure game? i can't follow the substitutions you already made?

― Alan Trewartha, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I only made substitions in the second one (with the dashes to denote letters I can't figure out). In the first one, I haven't made any substitutions at all, and every symbol/letter/number stands for a distinct letter. It's for a sort of game... A very strange game.

― Melissa W, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yeah you've got -r-- in the middle which doesn't correpsond. 6-line code + 7-line plaintext = confusion on the part of ILE.

― Sam, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Argh! You are right.

7o___P%3?P=
KFY@___{@
oF?%@Y___{V
L&QP
(S___AF?o___@{
W(___@%Wo
V&{W___PKQW

― Melissa W, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

yeah: what sam said

i guess words are not necessarily spelt right (roXoR?) but with i and u the unassigned vowels so far i don't quite believe in the words y- -r-- and ---m (actually the last one is perfectly possible: scum, skim, plum, slim, quim... )

― mark s, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It's perfectly possible that what I've figured out is wrong, it's just what I keep coming up with over and over again.

― Melissa W, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It all starts with that "{@" / "@}" nonsense. Are there any other two-letters that can be transposed to create two different words (besides "on" and "no")?

― David Raposa, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

"we" and "ew"

― mark s, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

'oh' and 'ho'

― RickyT, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

"em" and "me", if sender is a printer
"IP" and "pi"

― mark s, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

'at' and 'ta'

― RickyT, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

once upon a time you dressed so fine you threw the bums a dime in yr prime didn'y you?

― Geoff, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Try the etiam shrdlu order of frequency substitutions?

― Sterling Clover, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

ETAOIN SHRDLU. I tried it. Then I declared the problem insoluble.

― Sam, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

From what I can make out, it says: Buy
More
Radiohead

Where did that message come from, anyway? ;)

― Mark, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I'm afraid it might be suspiciously similar to that. It's a pathetic game Radiohead have set up on their website to entice poor masochists like me. So far they've all been impossibly unsolveable, but I fancy myself good at codes so I'm trying this one out. Now the truth is told. www.waste-game.com

― Melissa W, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

R. Crumb has a character called ETAOIN SHRDLU - didn't know the name existed elsewhere too.

― Andrew L, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

And Etienne Shrdlu is a character in a Pynchon short story. (IIRC)

― , Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I have a cool book on ciphers called "THE CODE BOOK" by Simon Singh. It's relatively new and is nicely designed. Yeah, too bad I didn't learn anything other than some neat history... well, no I learned a lot of different types of encryptions that were amazing, but I forgot each and every last one.

― Nude Pork (gasp! put some clothes on that ham), Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

This should explain the mysterious phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU...

― Brian MacDonald, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Please help!
http://www.waste-game.com/dig/1.jpg

And now a new one:
http://www.waste-game.com/dig/2.jpg

― Melissa W, Thursday, 18 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I prefer the Unown out of Pokemon I have to say.

― Tom, Thursday, 18 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

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