Thursday 30 June 2011

Googling the Haters

Yes, I have had the odd death threat, the odd bit of abuse and the odd road tax argument thrown at me on Youtube. The death threats tend to come from internet hard men (or woman) who hide behind a cloak of anonymity......or do they?

From time to time, I pick a hater and I do a bit of googling. That is I do a quick search using their user name to see if it brings up any leads to who they may be. It is often surprising that someone who has just threatened to knock me off my bike next time they see me, is quite easily traceable.

Take for instance my latest google. It's not his real (or his user name), but for the purposes of this blog, we'll call him supermuppet.

I get a post on one of my my videos suggesting that (and I am paraphrasing so you can't google search it!), 'if that was me I would have ran right over you with my car'.

Mmmm.

So I do a google search on suppermuppet. It doesn't lead straight to him, but it provides information on some other forums he uses, and importantly a different user name he uses on them, hypermuppet. From here it is simple to find some photos that he has posted.

Shock horror, he is a bit of a petrol head and loves nothing better than modding his Saxo. Oh, and one of the pictures of his Saxo has a lovely close up picture of..... his registration! :-)

So I post a reply to his message, asking (again in paraphrase), 'so you will run me over. Will it be with the car bearing registration plate.....'

Late last night I received a direct message on Youtube. It is exactly as follows:

Hi


I would appreciate it if you would remove my Number plate from your post.

I was just being a silly e-warrior, i shouldnt comment ive been knocked off off my bike before...



So take away their anonymity and the macho bravado just slips away. As he has, sort of apologised I'll remove his and my post, and won't inform the police.

Interestingly, whilst I've been writing this I received a new piece of abuse. I can't be bothered chasing this one up, but of your bored Patryk1632 is in dire need of being googled!

:-)

9 comments:

  1. Nice one! I recently watched a rather interesting TED video concerning anonymity on the internet. About how people can adopt a new identity if they want or they can choose to be accountable (to an extent).
    The comments section on here is a great example as it lets me use my Google ID, which I also use on numerous other blogs and sites and I'm seeing more and more sites let you use your Facebook/Twitter/Wordpress/OpenID etc. account, again adding a level of accountability.

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  2. Patiently waiting for my first YouTube death threat. I will have considered myself to have "made it" once I get one :-) The worst I've had so far is people complaining about bikes ruining the city by slowing cars, lol.

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  3. @Alexwarrior - I think the correct response to "bikes slow down cars" would be to point them to my Embankment Traffic video on Youtube....it's the cars holding up the bikes!

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  4. pretty sure this is him:
    http://www.facebook.com/people/Patryk-Karczmarczyk/502869125

    http://www.myspace.com/12856033

    http://live.xbox.com/en-US/MyXbox/Profile?gamertag=Patryk1632

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  5. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPvHIR0J9ZA

    My 2002 Cavalier 2.2L Auto with 191 000km does it in 12.5sec

    Patryk1632 3 weeks ago

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  6. Classic :) Thanks for sharing

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