The Internet Digs Up Our Darkest Secrets
January 2007 In and Around Town - Delta

You've done it to other people. And then one day, you were sitting alone at your computer, and decided to do it to yourself. Just admit it – you've Googled yourself.

It's nothing to be ashamed of. Most of us have done it at some point in our lives, and if not, will probably try it after they read this article. (For those in the technical dark, “Googling” someone simply means looking up their name on Google, or any of the 16 bazillion search engines.)

As I've mentioned in past articles, the Internet can take in everything that has ever been published on the web, or other surprising places, as you will see.

Case en point: One night, I was watching an old movie and forgot the name of some actor and didn't want to wait for the credits. And besides, when movies are on commercial TV, the credits scroll by too fast and are in squished into teeny-tiny type so the network can promote another show or movie. So I started poking around on the Internet Movie Database for that actor's name. (What did we do before the Internet?!)

Then I noticed that IMDB.com managed to catch EVERYTHING anyone has ever done in the movies and TV shows. And I started wondering….

So I did a search on myself, on my original maiden name. I was an extra in Revenge of the Nerds when I was a freshman at the University of Arizona . If you look closely at the scene where the Lambas do that showstopper at the Spring Fling (which was filmed in early January in 40-degree weather), you might see the top of my overly-moussed head. Hey, it was 1984, what did you expect?

I even got to meet Ted McGinley. I believe he was at the catering table cutting cheese, and by that I mean actual cheese, like cheddar, not euphemistically cutting the cheese. Anyway, I digress….

But my name didn't show up. Just for fun, I searched for “Karen Moss”. The only Karen Moss in the database is an actress that was in 1985's Krush Groove and that wasn't me, although then I might have had the honor of seeing Blair Underwood eating cheese.

So I did a search on my previous married name, Karen Fagen, and there it was.

Some history: Back in the mid-‘90s, I was working at Maxis (now a part of Electronic Arts) as web developer for the sites that promoted the “Sim” games that the company produced. One day, the producers needed someone to do a quick voice-over as a news reporter for a new game they were developing – SimCopter. I thought, “What the heck?” I went to the sound booth, read a few quick lines, and went back to my cubicle. But lo and behold, over 10 years later, I've been immortalized in the Internet Movie Database.

So be careful what you do – it will probably end up somewhere on the Internet.