David Grimes
I'm a Google; you're a Google
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Are you famous?
Today, you don't ask the Magic 8 Ball to answer that question, you ask Google, that indispensable Internet search device that in 0.40 seconds can provide you with 314,000 references for the word "booger." (As Dave Barry used to say, I am not making this up.)
I do not by any stretch consider myself famous, mostly thanks to my mother, who very accurately pointed out recently, "You're no Will Rogers," but I thought it would be fun ("fun," in this context, meaning "degrading") to enter my name into Google and see how many "hits" I got. (In computer circles, this is called "Googling yourself," but my mother said that sounded dirty and that I should just take a cold shower instead.)
To my surprise (and to my suddenly inflated ego), I got 493,000 hits when I entered "David Grimes." What could they be? Paeans to my wit and wisdom? "A little something" from the Pulitzer Committee? A remedy for my erectile dysfunction?
Believe it or not, there is more than one David Grimes on Planet Earth. In fact, it appears that every fifth person shares my name. (In Tibet, my name translates to, "He who drives with finger up nose.")
For example, there is a David Grimes in New Jersey who buys and sells old tobacco cards, a David Grimes in Alabama who is a member of the state legislature, and a David Grimes who plays wide receiver for the University of Iowa Hawkeyes. (I knew this was not me when I saw that David had run the 40-yard dash in 4.5 seconds, whereas my high school phys. ed. teacher used to measure my dash times with a sundial.)
Clearly, if you would like to re-invent yourself (and who wouldn't?), Google is the search-engine for you. If, for example (and this is purely hypothetical), the description of your current employment situation is, "He who works without pants and stares out the window while a rope of drool pools on his robe," you could, with the help of Google, convince people that you are a "fifth-year graduate student at the University of Washington, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, whose main interests are using and developing techniques in the areas of machine learning and statistics with the goal of solving open computer vision and robotics problems."
(It is clear to me that the David Grimeses of the world, or at least those Grimeses who know how to create a self-congratulatory Web page, are very smart and make — or will make — a lot of money. To these David Grimeses I would just like to say: I hate you.)
I realize that much of my self-centered agitation might be due to the fact that "David Grimes" is a relatively common name. So I decided to enter the name of my childhood friend, Keith Kirschnick, to see what Google would spit out.
Turns out, after a grueling 0.40 seconds of labor, Google could find only 162 references to Keith Kirschnick, and they were wobbly ones at that. There was a Mel Kirschnick who had something to do with the Ohio Housing Authority and a Michael Kirschnick who is very big in plastics in Philadelphia.
So the moral of this story is … ummm … Google can enhance your reputation except in those cases when it can't.
(To Keith, if you are out there: I am currently studying classical guitar, while working on my mathematics major, at Cal Tech.)
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JWR contributor David Grimes is a columnist for The Sarasota Herald Tribune. Comment by clicking here.
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