If a mega-celeb exposed themselves on the SDMB...

Cafe Society
21

Something like this happened on a British message board I frequent. There is a British consumer electronics company called Amstrad, and in a thread criticising their products a poster appeared calling himself “Alan Sugar”. Sir Alan Sugar, founder and CEO of Amstrad, is famous in Britain - he is in the Donald Trump role in our version of The Apprentice, and has long been a well-known business tycoon.

Anyway, “Alan Sugar” started vigorously defending Amstrad products, brusquely dismissing posters who he said knew nothing about the industry, and did seem to know quite a lot about the business and Amstrad’s history. But the universal reaction was a derisive “Alan Sugar? Sure, and I’m Rupert Murdoch”. One of the more sceptical posters announced that he would call his bluff by phoning Amstrad and asking to speak to the great man. “Alan Sugar” said sure, go ahead. Next day, the poster sheepishly came back into the thread to say that he had called Amstrad HQ, Sir Alan had been expecting his call, and they had had a nice little chat about the thread.

22

Author Tom Clancy has posted a number of times in the newsgroup alt.books.tom-clancy. You can search for it on Google Groups (author:“Tom Clancy” group:alt.books.tom-clancy) and some of it is pretty interesting. It’s clear it’s him, it would have to be a extremely clever and persistant impostor otherwise. He’s gotten in arguments about his insurance career and all sorts of more relevant things. I didn’t follow the group, but I think I read something about the group having confirmed his identity somehow.

I read some audio forums. There are a number of big names in audio who have posted with their real names. For instance, the editor of Stereophile magazine, John Atkinson, posts sometimes at the Audio Asylum. Someone from one of the big driver makers, either Scan-Speak or Seas, joined and made 2 or 3 posts. There are others. Speaker engineer Ken Kantor is posting in another forum, where I had the privilege of complaining about the sound of his NHT SuperOne.

23

Just curious: how can you know the prevalence of celebrities on the web?

24

wasn’t poster aha a minor 60’s rock singer with a single hit in rotation on 60’s radio?

Why wouldn’t a celebrity post if they liked this place? Especially an actor or someone on the road a lot.

25

Here’s a thread about a Celebrity Lurker

John Lloyd Young was a regular poster on Talking Broadway’s All That Chat Board untl he got the lead in “Jersey Boys” and won the Tony.

26

Oh. Well, I can’t, I suppose, if they keep quiet. It fudges the numbers.

But when I’ve heard them talk about being on the internet, in interviews and such, they often say they lurk but don’t post. And I do know plenty have a website of their own. I’m extrapolating from that and making a guess.

27

Not really a mega celebrity at the time, and it wasn’t on the SDMB, but. . .

. . .back when I was in middle school/early high school, there was this show being aired called Space Cases. I, being 13-14 at the time, was a pretty big fan. Hey, it was scifi, it was kid-like. . .and it had a girl with rainbow hair.

Most of the people who actually bothered to click on that link will recognize the name–it’s Kaylee from Firefly! Strange thing, though. . .I had the crush thing going on back then (remember–it was age appropriate! I was a young teenager!). In fact, the thing that finally convinced me to watch Firefly after much cajoling (I don’t normally like western stuff, and the whole Joss thing didn’t seem like enough to redeem it) was that she was in it.

Of course at that point, she wasn’t Kaylee. She was a teenager. With an AOL SN. That, somehow, my fangirl self managed to find and correspond with a few times using her mother’s screen name. Just. . .random me-being-a-fangirl-but-trying-not-to-ACT-like-one stuff. Shooting the shit. Then my dad stopped my mom from letting me use her SN, and I went back to my old no IMs account.

I thought it was pretty awesome at the time, though I wasn’t entirely sure it was actually her. Then, YEARS later, after I’ve watched and gotten into Firefly, I found a cite for the fact that the SN I was talking to her on was in fact her SN.

My husband is still jealous.

So. . .if something like that happened, I’d believe them. Of course, this was back around 97-ish, and I found the cite in 2004, so there’d be a good seven years of doubt. Call it a tribulation ;).

28

I’m Spartacus.

29

Take the total number of people who claim they are celebrities online and divide by one million?

30

No I am Michael Jackson!

31

Jim Beaver? From Supernatural? shrieks and faints away

32

In response to Angel’s post, I want to state my unequivocal support for the idea of Jewel Staite exposing herself her on the SDMB. I don’t know how exactly they’ll post the graphic files but I’m sure we can work something out.

33

Kind of like if someone by the screen handle of “Ed Zotti” came on and tried to convince
us all that he was really Cecil Adams.

Hmm wait a minute…

34

I’m Brian and so’s my wife.

Last year, on the Rotten Tomatoes website chat board, a posters was dissing the opening box office for Clerks II, a new user going by the name of ThatKevinSmith, came on and ripped that poster a new one. It was hilarious! He proved who he was by posting a link to his website saying essentially “Yes, it’s me.”

You can read the exchange here.

pure gold.

35

And We Are All Kosh.

Nah, that’s not even the right name. :smiley:

Joe M Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5, posts fairly often in rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated, giving updates on what he’s up to, the progress of the latest Babylon 5 productions (B5: The Lost Tales, coming out in July! Squeee!).

One time he even ripped me a new one for comparing B5 to LotR. Yay! JMS ripped me a new one! Squeee! :smiley:

36

Yes.

37

Nah, you’re okay as long as you follow the two-click rule.

38

Jewel, if you’re out there, I have some web space available. E-mail the pics to me, and I’d be glad to host them.

Yeah, Legend of the Rangers wasn’t up to nearly the same quality as the original series.

39

I need new glasses. I read that as “two-dick rule.” :eek:

40

Hey, two heads ARE better than one! :smiley:

OK, I’ll stop now.

No no, I mean… you know what? Nevermind. :stuck_out_tongue: