too happy to be real – this is pretty annoying
Well, you might want to call me cynical… but I am not surprised. It turns
out that Kaycee wasn’t real – or wasn’t completely real … or something.
Let’s recap…
- Someone starts circulating on the web calling themselves Kaycee. A 19 year
old girl with cancer. She puts up a web
page. - Over time, they may friends with some good people and get a website and a weblog.
- Over the course of more than a year she draws people in. Over the phone
and in email and online messengers. - Then she dies.
That should be the end of the story right? No way.
It turns out it was a lie. She never existed at least not in any way that was
as presented. People sent money, gifts and love. People believed and cared. It
was a hoax.
The woman who perpetrated this fraud claims
that her intentions were good. To be honest, I don’t have any reason to believe
her ont his, or anything else. I have no reason to think this is any more true
than anything else. In this I am as cynical as some
others.
I do know it was wrong. And people
got hurt.
What amazes me is that many people are taking the line that as long as the
story was a good/moving one, then there is nothing wrong with it being faked.
Amazing. Of course it is wrong. It was a lie.
Here are some related links. Take away from it what you want. [1][2][3][4][5]
Ah well.. this sort of thing has happened before in other places, and it will
happen again. The story of the faked
death of an Everquest guide comes to mind. Denise
Sharpe is much more extreme example of online insanity. A completely
different story of being played is here.
Some other thoughts about online angst are here.
A long and twisted tale of a faked public murder that took more than a year
to play out is here
There is no end of stuff to follow up there, from the announcement thread
of the death to the confession.
And they say I am sick…