Kaycee Nicole is back

September 24, 2012 6:39 AM

Eleven years later, Metafilter and Kaycee Nicole is the subject of today's Now I Know (a daily email that I highly recommend).
posted by saeculorum to MetaFilter-Related at 6:39 AM (114 comments total)

Oh my gosh, look at cute little MetaFilter back then.

"And this comment exists solely to bring us up to a nice round 300. A new MetaFilter record?"
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 6:46 AM on September 24, 2012 [19 favorites]

Then 9/11 changed everything.
posted by Egg Shen at 6:51 AM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

There are kids in the sixth grade now for whom Kaycee Nicole has always never existed.
posted by cortex (staff) at 6:56 AM on September 24, 2012 [110 favorites]

For the ten year anniversary, I tried to get an interview with Julie. I wanted to know what it was like for her then, what happened to Debbie, and how she felt ten years later. It took weeks of research to even find Julie and eventually a reporter friend called her husband to inquire about an interview and she was not interested in discussing it. Oh well.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 6:59 AM on September 24, 2012 [14 favorites]

I admit I never followed all the details of this story. Why would Julie know anything about what happened to Debbie?
posted by DU at 7:06 AM on September 24, 2012

One of the links on that post is to an earlier blog post regarding a sort of predecessor to Kaycee Nicole who was (and still is, apparently) a non-existent Georgia Tech student. I have a couple of family members who went to Tech; I'll have to see what they know about George Burdell.
posted by TedW at 7:17 AM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

cortex, that means in 7 years, that stupid Beloit list will have Kaycee Nicole on it.
posted by deezil at 7:18 AM on September 24, 2012 [6 favorites]

I remember reading about George P. Burdell - I hear tell he has family in Ripton, Massachusetts.
posted by FAMOUS MONSTER at 7:30 AM on September 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

There are kids in the sixth grade now for whom Kaycee Nicole has always never existed.

Kaycee Nicole has always already never existed.
posted by octobersurprise at 7:35 AM on September 24, 2012 [16 favorites]

regarding a sort of predecessor to Kaycee Nicole

Don't forget Ravenhurst, Omar K.
posted by curious nu at 7:39 AM on September 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

Didn't they make a Law & Order about this?
posted by Brocktoon at 7:46 AM on September 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

They should make a movie about this thing which is just a two-hour shot of me staring at my computer going 'WHAAAAAAAAAA'
posted by shakespeherian at 7:47 AM on September 24, 2012 [5 favorites]

Why would Julie know anything about what happened to Debbie?

They were next-door neighbors at the time. I tracked down Debbie too in my research, but wasn't really interested in speaking to a person so messed up they would do this whole thing.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:47 AM on September 24, 2012 [7 favorites]

The turning point of the Kaycee Nicole thread is here.

Followup thread here.
posted by endless_forms at 7:55 AM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

The follow-up New York Times article gave a nice summary of what happened: A Beautiful Life, an Early Death, a Fraud Exposed.

Buried deep in that article is this note: "(Last year an article in The New York Times on computer use by college students included quotations and anecdotes attributed to Kaycee Swenson; the information was based on a telephone interview that resulted from a referral by CollegeClub.com.)"

Looks like the archives of the Metafilter kaycee-nicole Yahoo Group are still online, too.
posted by zarq at 8:02 AM on September 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

Julie as unwinder? What an odd coincidence with another long-term multi-person online faker.
posted by tilde at 8:09 AM on September 24, 2012

Somebody should get Errol Morris on this.
posted by cmoj at 8:14 AM on September 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

Nope, different Julie, different state. Just a weird coincidence.
posted by tilde at 8:14 AM on September 24, 2012

A thread in between the two I linked above
posted by endless_forms at 8:17 AM on September 24, 2012

In the MetaFilter of the future Kaycee Nicole will still have had always already never existed.
posted by iamkimiam at 8:19 AM on September 24, 2012 [3 favorites]

In the grim future of metafilter there is only Kaycee Nicole always already never existing.
posted by octobersurprise at 8:24 AM on September 24, 2012 [8 favorites]

I hope that chode who faked his death...

I find this demeaning to people with penises shaped like tuna cans.
posted by cmoj at 8:26 AM on September 24, 2012 [3 favorites]

Well, there was a time, for one person in the world, that Kaycee already never existed.

Nothing can take that away.
posted by mule98J at 8:32 AM on September 24, 2012

Kaycee Nicole was actually the illegitimate daughter of Duclod Man.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 8:39 AM on September 24, 2012 [5 favorites]

The saddest part is that Kaycee would not today be a healthy 30 year-old woman if she hadn't already never existed eleven years ago.
posted by chococat at 8:44 AM on September 24, 2012 [14 favorites]

Oh god, why was adding a signature line to each and every one of your comments ever a thing for people.
posted by elizardbits at 8:59 AM on September 24, 2012 [9 favorites]

Todd Lokken
posted by shakespeherian at 9:04 AM on September 24, 2012 [35 favorites]

Reading through that thread again, I am that much more grateful for the way the community handled our more recent super-elaborate hoax. Grateful to our gumshoe house cynics for not moving into the original thread and opting for the classier option of contacting the mods, grateful to the mods for having that be the conspicuously classy option, and mostly just really grateful that I never had to be in that terrible space that Kaycee thread was; not knowing if it’s a hoax while wondering if you're a rube for wanting it to be false or an asshole for wanting it to be true while just wanting it all to be over. In this case no one needed to feel the need to bend over backwards defending the asshole, no one needed to wonder if they were saying ill of the dead to the dude’s widow, and almost all of us could all be on the same page together.

My office is getting kinda dusty just remembering how upset I was by the 'death' and then how upset I was by the revelation of the hoax, but I am really glad it was able to turn out as well as it did.
posted by Blasdelb at 9:16 AM on September 24, 2012 [16 favorites]

You know I could post this every time I re-read old threads but I would mean it every time too:

I'm so glad the average tone of Metafilter is every-so-slightly less bitter than it was 'back in the good old days.' I'm not sure if it's a chicken-or-egg thing -- if I've become less able to deal with the nastiness because I don't see it as a much or I wasn't able to deal with it so I felt more comfortable commenting more regularly. But either way, thanks to everybody.

(On preview, I also agree with Blasdelb and my point is related.)
posted by MCMikeNamara at 9:20 AM on September 24, 2012 [4 favorites]

Wow, I hadn't seen that "Nobody knows you're a dog" cartoon before. Really makes you think.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 9:25 AM on September 24, 2012 [10 favorites]

By some sort of weird synchronicity, the Sans Gras thread was linked in the MeTa under this one, and somehow I'd totally forgotten that the thread wrapped up relatively early on and turned into a longboat of friendly idle chatter. While I cringe at my, uh, "contributions" (to be more than charitable) in that thread, I do have to say that that was a rather fun experience in the end.
posted by Phire at 9:34 AM on September 24, 2012 [3 favorites]

Does it? Or does it MAKE YOUR TAIL WAG?

Who's a good simulacrum of a human on the Internet? You are! You're a good simulacrum of a human on the Internet!
posted by drlith at 9:34 AM on September 24, 2012 [21 favorites]

There was a weird stone soup effect to the holdkris99 Metatalk that I still don't know how to feel about.

People said more real things about themselves and their lives than I can remember ever seeing around here in one place, and the revelation of the hoax didn't invalidate those, it enhanced them by shifting the center of gravity to the comments people made rather than the faked tragedy that inspired them.
posted by jamjam at 9:36 AM on September 24, 2012 [6 favorites]

The post that got me to make my first MeFi account.... memories.
posted by L'Estrange Fruit at 10:03 AM on September 24, 2012

People said more real things about themselves and their lives than I can remember ever seeing around here in one place

Well. We have to assume they were real because otherwise existential darkness, basically.
posted by elizardbits at 10:03 AM on September 24, 2012 [5 favorites]

I find it comforting that none of you are real.
posted by heyho at 10:11 AM on September 24, 2012 [5 favorites]

Somehow there's an extra level of wtfery to reading an article about an internet fake, thinking that parts of it sound oddly familiar, and realizing it's because most of the article is based on (almost verbatim in a few spots) what the author ganked from Wikipedia. Bonus points for faking writing about fakes?
posted by badgermushroomSNAKE at 10:12 AM on September 24, 2012

Well. We have to assume they were real because otherwise existential darkness, basically.

Yes, but even then "[elizardbits] appears and [elizardbits] is light to those who dwell in realms of night."

And I mean that.
posted by jamjam at 10:24 AM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

Is anyone else getting a blocked Trojan alert from Firefox when they try to follow the second FPP link?
posted by asnider at 10:25 AM on September 24, 2012 [3 favorites]

How many posters from the Kaycee Nicole era are still around? I recognize very few of the names in those threads, which isn't terribly surprising. But it is an odd bit of Metafilter history.
posted by zizzle at 10:48 AM on September 24, 2012

Kaycee Nicole, Metafilter's personal saint of fucked-uppedness.

"Constricting open hearts since 2001."
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 10:50 AM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

We have to assume they were real because otherwise existential darkness, basically.

It has its uses.
posted by solotoro at 10:53 AM on September 24, 2012

Is anyone else getting a blocked Trojan alert from Firefox when they try to follow the second FPP link?

Sounds painful.
posted by bongo_x at 11:01 AM on September 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

Reading old threads like those make me happy that people are a teeny bit nicer, the mods a little more present, the favorites a tool for finding the most key comments, the whole place just a little more professional.

Although we may always be smugly self-congratulatory, a few of the smart folks will always deserve the congratulations.
posted by ldthomps at 11:11 AM on September 24, 2012

Kaycee Nicole outed May 18, 2001.
eyeballkid joins May 21, 2001.

Coincidence?
posted by eyeballkid at 11:20 AM on September 24, 2012 [3 favorites]

Sounds painful.

Ha. But seriously...

(And, I should correct myself, the alert came from avast! not Firefox.)
posted by asnider at 11:22 AM on September 24, 2012

Coincidence?

No wonder you hate us all!
posted by shakespeherian at 11:24 AM on September 24, 2012

I was around. And boy did I vehemently defend her in a few threads. Yeesh.
posted by Zosia Blue at 11:28 AM on September 24, 2012

Looking at the discussion now, what seems most quaint is that the original thread is only 306 comments (with one person remarking on its length even). Shit, I think arguments over the ontology of favorites have gone on longer that that.
posted by octobersurprise at 11:48 AM on September 24, 2012

I agree that the community seems a little less inclined to jump down each other's throats these days. I wasn't a member back then, but I did come over and lurk on occasion. It's clear from the holdkris99 situation that the community has matured. Or at least that's how it seems to me.
posted by blurker at 12:00 PM on September 24, 2012

Metafilter: the ontology of favourites.
posted by marienbad at 12:10 PM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

Metafilter: sounds painful.
posted by daniel_charms at 12:21 PM on September 24, 2012

mathowie: "For the ten year anniversary, I tried to get an interview with Julie. I wanted to know what it was like for her then, what happened to Debbie, and how she felt ten years later. It took weeks of research to even find Julie and eventually a reporter friend called her husband to inquire about an interview and she was not interested in discussing it. Oh well."

Okay, I'm totally not trying to play the pedant here.. er.. but here I go:

Why? Why would Julie have any interest or desire to talk about what some other knucklehead did using her likeness on Geocities 10 years ago? For that matter, in all seriosness, what made you feel compelled to try to interview her?

I mean, don't get me wrong, thrilling crime-esque caper, it was a big deal(tm) on the site and I remember being hooked by it -- but once the villain is outed, once it's explained, what greater reflection is there?

I'm just mystified how tracking Julie down ever got on your radar and would like to hear more about it.
posted by cavalier at 12:24 PM on September 24, 2012

I mean, don't get me wrong, thrilling crime-esque caper, it was a big deal(tm) on the site and I remember being hooked by it -- but once the villain is outed, once it's explained, what greater reflection is there?

For starters the question of whether the villain was outed and whether it all was explained.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 12:28 PM on September 24, 2012

cavalier: "what greater reflection is there?"

I can't speak for Matt, but it marked a couple of historic firsts in the history of the site. See the timeline. It was one of, if not the first time the Metafilter community received national attention outside the 'net. It was also the first major investigation launched by MeFites.

If you're looking at the history of the site as a whole, it's significant for those reasons, and that it showed the community was capable of working as a collaborative whole.
posted by zarq at 12:29 PM on September 24, 2012

I would have loved to hear from Julie what it was like to have had her images stolen by someone she thought of as a trusted friend and used as the figurehead of an elaborate hoax. I think lots of people would be interested to hear her perspective.

Of course, it is certainly her right to choose not to share it. But I would have looked for her, too.
posted by Sidhedevil at 12:30 PM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

I think it is a fantastic idea. this girl was inadvertently in the middle of a massive internet hoax, so to catch up with her and find out how this had impacted on her life, her work, career, socially, etc, would have been interesting to a lot of people. Imagine when she applied for a job five years later and the interviewer says "You look familier for some reason..." would she say who she was?

I mean this wasn't just some knuckkehead pissing around on geocities (get to know your new neighbours!) but was an long, ongoing hoax, perpertrated on thousaands, if not millions of people.

On Preview, also what zarq said.
posted by marienbad at 12:30 PM on September 24, 2012 [3 favorites]

TMNL, what are you suggesting hasn't been explained?
posted by Sidhedevil at 12:31 PM on September 24, 2012

Thanks y'all. I guess what I don't grok is the Julie angle -- the Debbie angle, sure, but as an unwitting/willing victim/accomplice, I just don't see a big get there. That said, it certainly has a larger place in the site history then I previously recalled. Could have sworn there was a big community thingy before Kaycee -- my bad.
posted by cavalier at 12:36 PM on September 24, 2012

TMNL, what are you suggesting hasn't been explained?

I don't know. What I do know is that most of the 'facts' we know about the resolution came from a woman who was less than credible, and one that had every reason to choose the fastest and most plausible story that would make the problem go away.

That the account was her daughter's and she took it over?
That the total price of received gifts was negligible?
That she convinced her daughter and a friend to lie on the telephone?
That the entire thing wasn't a simple case of Munchhausen's By Proxy with a fake proxy?
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 12:52 PM on September 24, 2012

Ah. My own opinion is that all the stuff about the daughter's involvement was a lie, except for the part where the daughter was told that her mum might get some calls for "Kaycee" and to turn the phone over to mum whenever anyone called for Kaycee.

My guess was also that she downplayed the value of the gifts she received.

I doubt she'd be truthful about any of those things even if interviewed today. It certainly might be interesting to hear from the daughter about her perspective, if she chose to share it, but.
posted by Sidhedevil at 1:27 PM on September 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

That the account was her daughter's and she took it over?

That seems plausible-- it began with her daughter and a friend creating the account on CollegeClub.com, and Debbie discovered it and became intrigue and took it over after her daughter got bored with it. By far the most plausible explanation I heard was that she used it to get the attention of halcyon.

That the total price of received gifts was negligible?

Total bullshit.

That she convinced her daughter and a friend to lie on the telephone?

Hard to say. Perhaps this became a participatory game with Debbie and her daughter or friend. On the other hand, in other cases of this the faker changes his or her voice on the vote to imitate the fictional persona.

That the entire thing wasn't a simple case of Munchhausen's By Proxy with a fake proxy?

Ultimately, these questions don't get answered, I don't think. There's the case of Tania Head, the September 11th faker.... we are just never going to know what is going on inside someone's head regarding why they do stuff like that. And they're such convincing and practiced liars that no explanation they can come up with would be trustworthy.
posted by deanc at 1:57 PM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

It was also the first major investigation launched by MeFites.

I like this framing; like it was a training exercise for community skills that would later be put to use to help two wayward Russian dancers.
posted by ceribus peribus at 2:12 PM on September 24, 2012 [5 favorites]

Matt's missing a golden opportunity to put "MetaFilter: Private Dicks" in the logo.
posted by zarq at 2:14 PM on September 24, 2012

I was here (different name) and during a very troubling time in my own personal life, started following Tracy Nicole. I did NOT need the grief.

I still have fond memories of BWG though. He was a good guy. Is he even still around here?
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 3:24 PM on September 24, 2012

Matt's missing a golden opportunity to put "MetaFilter: Private Dicks" in the logo.

Wouldn't "MetaFilter: Private Dicks - $5" be more appropriate?
posted by Cat Pie Hurts at 4:05 PM on September 24, 2012

It feels strange and even somewhat spooky, that long, long (for the day) thread where all the links just go to 404 pages now and the users making the heated comments mostly aren't around any more. Don't wander far from the bustling front page, kids, you'll find yourselves getting into halls where all the rooms are dusty and empty and the light switches don't work.
posted by jfuller at 4:22 PM on September 24, 2012 [11 favorites]

asnider: "Is anyone else getting a blocked Trojan alert from Firefox when they try to follow the second FPP link?"

Avast flagged it as such for me.
posted by radwolf76 at 4:36 PM on September 24, 2012

I cannot recommend Catfish highly enough.
posted by unliteral at 4:52 PM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

asnider: "Is anyone else getting a blocked Trojan alert from Firefox when they try to follow the second FPP link?"

No, but when I clicked on it my monitor immediately became a bunch of bright green vertical lines and I had to reboot. Hope I didn't introduce a virus to the network.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 5:00 PM on September 24, 2012

Don't wander far from the bustling front page, kids, you'll find yourselves getting into halls where all the rooms are dusty and empty and the light switches don't work.

"All is silent in the halls of the dead. All is forgotten in the stone halls of the dead. Behold the stairways which stand in darkness; behold the rooms of ruin. These are the halls of the dead where spiders spin and the great circuits fall quiet, one by one."
posted by winna at 5:06 PM on September 24, 2012

Nthing unilateral......SPOILERS




I thought for sure someone was going to get hurt during the course of the movie
The paintings showed talent for an eight year old;for a grown-up they were mediocre.
posted by brujita at 5:27 PM on September 24, 2012

How odd to see this thread on the heels of this.
posted by mwhybark at 5:41 PM on September 24, 2012 [6 favorites]

I heard that Kaycee was actually u.n. owen.
posted by Falconetti at 5:52 PM on September 24, 2012

> That the account was her daughter's and she took it over?
> That the total price of received gifts was negligible?
> That she convinced her daughter and a friend to lie on the telephone?
> That the entire thing wasn't a simple case of Munchhausen's By Proxy with a fake proxy?

Romance at short notice was her specialty.
posted by jfuller at 6:08 PM on September 24, 2012 [3 favorites]

Didn't u.n. owen make a comeback on this site under a sockpuppet and then flame out again? My memory is hazy.
posted by Rumple at 6:17 PM on September 24, 2012

Catfish is certainly a movie that depicts a deception, but IMO not the deception its trailers suggest.
posted by Sidhedevil at 6:20 PM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

Didn't u.n. owen make a comeback on this site under a sockpuppet and then flame out again?

She was posting under her husband's account. It's in the sansgras thread.
posted by oneirodynia at 6:32 PM on September 24, 2012

Wouldn't "MetaFilter: Private Dicks - $5" be more appropriate?

Shouldn't it be " Metafilter: Private Dicks-$20 same as in town"?
posted by miss-lapin at 6:43 PM on September 24, 2012 [2 favorites]

Thanks oneirodynia
posted by Rumple at 6:49 PM on September 24, 2012

Didn't they make a Law & Order about this?

Starring Melissa Leo
posted by dumbland at 6:56 PM on September 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

Who's the blue private dick who's a sex machine to all the chicks?
posted by box at 8:48 PM on September 24, 2012 [5 favorites]

A lot of 1, 2, 3 and 4 digit user numbers in that thread. Our odometer is at over 150,000 and the engine is running better than ever.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 9:39 PM on September 24, 2012

mwhybark: whoa. that was an intense, troubling, but ultimately hopeful read. I hope Diane gets those zeroth cupcakes and Stephanie gets help.
posted by batmonkey at 9:49 PM on September 24, 2012

Somehow, reading through that thread, I like how Metafilter's turned out. If you ask me, it seems less, eh, snarky and angry nowadays, not to mention that good punctuation and thoughtful comments seem to be the order of things now, more than they were then. And yeah, I agree that the holdkris99 thing would've played out very differently in the Metafilter of 2001.
posted by undue influence at 2:37 AM on September 25, 2012

it seems less, eh, snarky and angry nowadays

I don't think you have to wonder long about what element of the site we can mostly attribute that to.
posted by mediareport at 6:35 AM on September 25, 2012 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I've been posting a lot less lately, haven't I?
posted by ook at 7:00 AM on September 25, 2012

Ouch. The snark, it bites. Hard.

Otherwise, I'm only confused, and wishing hard for a 'disappear my post!' pony button. Any clues, mediareport?
posted by undue influence at 7:15 AM on September 25, 2012

Hey, no snark intended. I originally had a joke about "the new mods" there, but didn't think it would be funny. So I guess...I went more obscure? Hmm.

*drinks coffee*
posted by mediareport at 7:38 AM on September 25, 2012

My snark is pretty obscure, you probably haven't heard of it.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:46 AM on September 25, 2012 [11 favorites]

If Metafilter is going to be known for community investigations, I'd rather us be known for saving the two Russian women from human trafficking than for exposing a deeply disturbed woman's online persona, but that's just me.
posted by Navelgazer at 8:00 AM on September 25, 2012

One can't pick and choose the notoriety of their community. Er, as a rule. I think. Maybe.
posted by cavalier at 8:16 AM on September 25, 2012

cortex: "My snark is pretty obscure, you probably haven't heard of it."

We know more about your snark than you can possibly imagine!
posted by zarq at 9:00 AM on September 25, 2012 [3 favorites]

cortex: "My snark is pretty obscure, you probably haven't heard of it."

Your snark is so obscure it's really a boojum.
posted by radwolf76 at 9:29 AM on September 25, 2012 [11 favorites]

I'VE BEEN SNARKING ALL MY LIFE
posted by ook at 9:38 AM on September 25, 2012

No one reads the snarks down here anyway...
posted by Mister_A at 10:50 AM on September 25, 2012

No one may not, but notyou does.
posted by notyou at 11:02 AM on September 25, 2012 [6 favorites]

It feels strange and even somewhat spooky, that long, long (for the day) thread where all the links just go to 404 pages now and the users making the heated comments mostly aren't around any more. Don't wander far from the bustling front page, kids, you'll find yourselves getting into halls where all the rooms are dusty and empty and the light switches don't work.

The worst I've ever had that kind of feeling was when I was heavily browsing the C2 wiki, when it was already past its prime. Due to the way it was formatted (especially the lack of timestamps), it was very disorienting to navigate and felt a lot like combing through the ancient ruins of an Internet community.
posted by burnmp3s at 11:15 AM on September 25, 2012

How odd to see this thread on the heels of this.
posted by mwhybark at 8:41 PM on September 24 [6 favorites +] [!]

Jesus. Reading that at a time when a member of my RL community is dealing with AML and BMT was wrenching. It really brought home how hard the Kaycee Nicole thing must have been to people who believed in her.
posted by endless_forms at 12:58 PM on September 25, 2012

No one reads the snarks down here anyway...

It just confuses the people who are here to buy used cars.
posted by amyms at 1:07 PM on September 25, 2012

Reading the original thread, I wonder if anyone ever apologised to FAB4GIRL for the shrieky hysterical pile-on that landed on her when she expressed a mild cynicism.
posted by Catch at 7:38 PM on September 25, 2012

Ah, mediareport, it's only now time for coffee in these parts of the world. Apologies. What can I say, Metafilter-2001 got my Snark Antennae™ activated.
posted by undue influence at 7:54 PM on September 25, 2012

FAB4GIRL wasn't cynical about Kaycee's existence, she was cynical about the idea that a cancer patient should receive special treatment because she had a blog. She wasn't picking out Kaycee so much as grandstanding.

However there is one fantastically ironic comment aimed at her. This one goes in the "couldn't make that up" file:

a WHILE back in this pathetic thread, FAB4GIRL, you mentioned you only live 30 miles from kaycee. so go pay your respects, sarah. go visit.

put down the mouse. go meet the human being.

you might find you're not so damned caustic when you're done.

Then again, you might find yourself caustic and more...
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:54 PM on September 25, 2012

Mm-hmm, but that thread really points up just how fervid and fanatical Kaycee's admirer's were. I'd kind of forgotten why it was such a Big Deal, but looking back, there was some kind of St John's Dance happening on the internet in '00-'01.
posted by Catch at 8:38 PM on September 25, 2012

My snark is pretty obscure, you probably haven't heard of it.

Your favorite snark sucks.
posted by Forktine at 10:16 PM on September 25, 2012

One of my mailing lists had a pseuicide around the same time. [It was a Sentinel fanfiction list (don't judge me) so it had to have been circa 1999.] The person in question claimed to have lung damage from having dropped a bottle of ether, which somehow became veeerrryyy slooowly fatal. Over the course of the drama, her sockpuppet "sister", "mother", a handful of "friends", and... seriously, her "ICU Doctor" came by to offer paens to her courage, kindness, and overall inner beauty as she was in hospital "dying," all of them with the exact same verbal tics. Anyone questioning the increasingly implausible story got hit with walls of "why are you so meeeeaaan???!!?" I remember a few people trying to point out things like, "hey, the hospital she mentioned doesn't even exist, and neither is there any listed doctor by that name anywhere in the country," and eventually giving up. There are probably still tribute pages to her out in the archived internet.

I think at some point people get deeply invested in defending the lie, because otherwise they have to admit to having been gulled.
posted by Karmakaze at 7:55 AM on September 26, 2012

the fall-out includes mefites in need hesitating to post for help/advice.
posted by Wilder at 8:36 AM on September 26, 2012 [1 favorite]

I'd rather us be known for saving the two Russian women from human trafficking

Not to dirtycreature/bingo this thread, but was there any concrete evidence (other than the circumstantial sketchniess/ickiness of the situation) that supported the charge that K&S were actually being trafficked? Was there any subsequent involvement by authorities that led to some kind of conclusion as to what was really going on?
posted by to sir with millipedes at 8:48 AM on September 26, 2012

Yes, there was.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 8:53 AM on September 26, 2012 [2 favorites]

Judging by your laconic response, I'm guessing it's not something you can talk about. But thanks for the response.
posted by to sir with millipedes at 9:19 AM on September 26, 2012

The person in question claimed to have lung damage from having dropped a bottle of ether, which somehow became veeerrryyy slooowly fatal.

Heh, presumably she rejected consumption as too implausible, but still wanted a death that was as Victorian as possible.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 9:40 AM on September 26, 2012

"She's totally dying, it's super tragic. I think she said it was acute Burtonitis."
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:43 AM on September 26, 2012

Judging by your laconic response, I'm guessing it's not something you can talk about. But thanks for the response.

Yeah sorry didn't mean to be cryptic, but this is one of those situations where explaining more would involve outing the real-life identities and jobs of MeFites and other people who were involved in this who really didn't not want that information made public and I try to err on the side of discretion. fake did a good update here which gives a little more information than just "trust me"
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:59 AM on September 26, 2012 [1 favorite]

I had missed that update. That's so cool.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 11:13 AM on September 26, 2012