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Unique, Vain, Too Bland for the Internet or All of the Above?

M

mpw

Guest
Original poster
Jun 18, 2004
6,363
1
Bored at work today (again) so I thought I’d Google my own name for the first time since 1995.

I’ve not got a single mention. Even my surname doesn’t get a single hit, relevant or not.

I’m sure I got at least an unconnected hit in 1995 (not through Google though – probably Yahoo!)

Anyone else Google their own name with surprising results?
 
I googled my name in quotes, I got 448 hits, down from 800 the last time I posted. My name is fairly unique. The search results grow each time my name is mentioned in an online article or magazine article (2004 and 2005 were my 'reclusive' years). :p If I intentionally misspell my name, as usually the case with people, I can add another 84 hits on top.

This thread is similar to this thread.
 
801 hits on my name in quotes right now... most of them are me. A few are my Dad (we have different middle names, so I am NOT a Junior), one or two are other folks, and there are a couple of misspellings (there's a White House official named "Clay Johnson" whose name was misspelled as "Johanson" in a couple of news articles).
 
Recently my personal site has jumped from somewhere around page 10 on Google for "Robbie Duncan" to the first result! It used to be all about Robert Duncan McNeill who was in Star Trek Voyager (who goes by Robbie not Robert). I think must have changed their algorithm or something.

Anyway it's always nice to be No.1 :D
 
Just tried it again "in quotes" this time, both first and first & last but still not a single hit.

Turns out there must be just four people in the world with my last name and I wake up normally with at least two them in bed with me!

Best have a boy next or it's curtains for the family name.:(
 
mpw said:
Just tried it again "in quotes" this time, both first and first & last but still not a single hit.

Turns out there must be just four people in the world with my last name and I wake up normally with at least two them in bed with me!

Best have a boy next or it's curtains for the family name.:(
Click to expand...

I don't even need the quotes. I just used them to show the search term!

I must be famous (or just post a lot to sites like this with links back to my site)... :D
 
iGary said:
Remember this? - http://news.com.com/Apple+takes+a+step+away+from+FireWire/2100-1041_3-5587951.html
Click to expand...
CNET said:
Gary Reich, an Annapolis, Md.-based boating publication editor and owner of three Macs, said he launched the petition because he "felt a little betrayed."

"We, as dedicated users and supporter of your hardware and software are completely dismayed at your recent decision to discontinue standard FireWire support for the iPod music player line," the petition states, going on to note that "It is very unfortunate that you have left your faithful out in the dark on this one."
Click to expand...

Uh oh. Not this again. :rolleyes: The nightmare! :eek:

Still feeling betrayed, Mr. iGary?

Here's to the Crazy Ones ​
 
clayj said:
Did you see this? Got my name in 27 or so newspapers around the country a few weeks ago... :p
Click to expand...

Even scarier is that Google are tracking you. This: "New! Get the latest news on clay-johanson with Google Alerts." is at the bottom of the page!
 
This is slightly off-topic, but there was an interesting segment yesterday on The Newshour with Jim Lehrer about Google's phenomenal growth and vast influence. I was surprised to hear one of the guests state that every search entry ever made in Google has been permanently saved on their servers and is available to investigators under provisions of the Patriot Act.
 
I have a pretty unusual last name, but even so I googled my first and last names together and got several hits, most of them for a university professor in the Northeast with the same name. Through all the mentions of him, I couldn't really find any references to me.

These days I just assume that any woman I start dating will google me to see if I'm a psycho or something. Good thing I covered my tracks well!
 
In quotes: 41,000
Without quotes: 31.7 million

:eek:

That's what I get for having a common name... :eek:

Oh, and my wife's name, in quotes, returns over 7 million hits - of course, since my wife is Pamela Anderson and all... :D :cool:
 
I Googled my name in quotes, and discovered that I have the same (unique) name as a German language professor at a Canadian university. The remainder were pages about me as president of an organization at my university.

A paper that I wrote is one of the top hits under "Tanzanian Culture". Huh.

:rolleyes:
 
Basically what you get with mine is all the results from the marathons I have run, posts here, the "Pack Rat" article on CNET, the Firewrie thingy, my Web site, and when I was editor at Waterway Guide...

Pretty dull. :eek:
 
Googling my name (Richard James) gets 127,000,000 hits. Now lets try some others... how about porn? Only 35,100,000. Yes, I am more popular than porn :D

Well, at least I am more common than porn...
 
robbieduncan said:
Recently my personal site has jumped from somewhere around page 10 on Google for "Robbie Duncan" to the first result! It used to be all about Robert Duncan McNeill who was in Star Trek Voyager (who goes by Robbie not Robert). I think must have changed their algorithm or something.

Anyway it's always nice to be No.1 :D
Click to expand...

You also share your name with one of the most important poets of the 20th C (a Robert, though).

I, unfortunately, share a name with a very famous surfer (of water, not webs). Thus, all my accomplishments are buried beneath a ... ahem ... wave of information about some "dude."
 
Just quoted my name and got all of three pages in Google. Only one hit is from a website that I know. The rest are in German. My last name was shortened when my fathers family moved from Germany to the U.S. in the late 40's/early 50's.
 
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