Mahir Cagri Kisses You
Late in 1999, a Turkish teacher named Mahir Cagri had a friend put
up a simple website with some photos and personal commentary which
began with "Welcome To My Home Page!!!!!!!!! I Kiss You!!!!!" But
due to a "trick of technology", things spiraled out of control and
Mahir ended up in the Guinness Book of World Records for the most
visits to a personal homepage, with an estimated 12 million hits.
Perhaps the whole truth will never be known, but Mahir claims that
his page was copied, modified without his consent and before long
the "I Kiss You" guy was famous enough to be spoofed on the Saturday
Night Live comedy show. You can see the original site here:
http://www.ikissyou.org/indeks2.html
...and Mahir's new site with background and related sites here:
http://www.ikissyou.org
Craig Shergold - Still Getting Carded at Age 25
Although Mahir Cagri may claim to be the world's first Internet
celebrity, Craig Shergold beat him by ten years. In 1989, Craig
was a 10 year old boy hospitalized with a brain tumor. His doctor
noted the abundance of get-well cards strung up above his hospital
bed, and he suggested he go for the Guiness Book of Records.
A family friend contacted local companies and newspapers to get
the campaign rolling. Within months, over a million cards had been
received. At some point, the campaign started spreading by email
and cards began to pour in by the ton, year after year. Even though
Craig was cured in 1991 and his family made public appeals for the
cards to stop, their pleas were no match for the power and longevity
of the email chain letter.
Over the next 15 years, over a hundred million cards were received
from well-wishers who believed they were helping to grant the wish
of a dying child. In reality, they were filling the recycle bins
in and around Carshallton, Surrey, UK. The Craig Shergold chain
letter morphed and spawned a wave of "sick child" emails that have
caused untold grief to other families who were the targets of
pranksters, as well as financial harm to charities such as the Make
A Wish Foundation. Read more about it here:
http://urbanlegends.about.com/od/errata/a/craig_shergold.htm
"There is no try..."
In November 2002 a 15-year-old in Quebec was having a little fun,
videotaping himself practicing his Star Wars light saber technique.
Ghyslain never intended for his video to be seen by anyone, but most
unfortunately he had borrowed the videotape from a friend. After
returning the cassette, his friends discovered the contents and
uploaded it to Kazaa, the popular file-sharing service.
Millions of people downloaded the funny but embarassing video and
Ghyslain became The Star Wars Kid, and another unwilling celebrity.
His parents are suing the families of the classmates who uploaded
the video, and the poor kid is under psychiatric care. More here:
http://www.waxy.org/archive/2003/04/29/star_war.shtml
Numa Numa!
The Daily News calls Gary Brolsma's performance "like William Hung
channeling the Star Wars Kid." It's another case of home videos
taking on a life of their own, and embarassing the heck out of a
teenage boy. Gary videotaped himself expertly lip-synching the words
to a Romanian pop song, while performing an arm-flailing, eyebrow-
twitching dance -- without ever leaving his chair.
Well, he DID upload the video to the Internet all by himself. So
don't cry too many tears for this guy. Read the story and see the
video here:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6987134/