I solved it using a different method. I was not familiar with the function of the XOR operator, I don’t have many tools on my system, and visual C# studio is great timesbersome.

I tried, on a whim, replacing all of the 1s with 0s and all of the 0s with 1s, then using http://www.roubaixinteractive.com/PlayGround/Binary_Conversion/Binary_To_Text.asp to convert the output to text. I had to delete the last 5 characters of the binary code to make groups of 8(bits).

Those with limited computing skills, like myself, can use a word processor to ctrl+f find and replace 1s with As, then 0s with 1s, and finally As with 0s, delete the last 5 characters (should be 1s) and feed the result into the binary to decode field at the site linked above.

I’m fairly certain that wasn’t how the puzzle was intended to be solved, it just seemed the easiest thing for me to try.