Have you seen the commercials for the website mylife.com? Apparently, you can use it to find people and, more importantly, find out if anyone has been looking for you. In the commercial, an attractive woman logs on and her eyes go wide as she says, “Five people are searching for me? I wonder if one is an old boyfriend.” Hmm. They have internet in prison?
How desperate or paranoid do you have to be to log on to a website just to see if anyone has been searching for you through the very same website?
Well, I was bored.
Two hundred and sixty one people? (I’ll ignore that more are women than men.) I didn’t even know that I had ever met that many people. Everyone I owe money to already knows exactly where to find me. Anyone I went to high school with has already found me through Facebook. Who are these people? My maiden name is very common, so I assume most are probably strangers looking for someone else. But, what if some of them are legit? What if I made a lasting impression on some random person I met in passing and now they are trying to find me to thank me for changing their life for the better? I should acknowledge them, shouldn’t I?
I figured that for the sake of any potential long lost admirers (and blog fodder), I could pay $9.95 for one month, search through my stalker list, then cancel the membership. I’ve spent ten bucks on stupider stuff (hello Walk Hard dvd).
Good thing I read the fine print:
You gotta pay for your months in advance. Figures. Sorry, but $44.85 is too steep an investment just to satisfy my mild curiosity even if it could possibly result in the raddest blog post ever known to man.
If any of you cough up the cheddar to do this, please let me know. Before your stalker strangles you in the shower, that is.
Okay, I’m too cheap too, but you know what they say about curiosity… Apparently, my maiden name is not as common. I have 1 person looking for me. One 32 year-old male in Fayetteville, NC. I’m thinking that’s a little creepy.
The whole thing is a little creepy, but yeah. One guy. Weird.
Yeah, I thought this whole thing was called Facebook. And it’s free. And I can semi monitor the crazy there.
And I love the Billy Joel “bosom buddies” reference.
I know! How many different ways are there to stalk someone for free? Why would you want to pay for it!
The song always pops into my head when the commercials come on, so I had to make it the title.
They are probably looking for the movie star of the same name anyway.
Damn! You’re probably right.
“My Life” huh? That’s copyrighted because My Life is the title of President Clinton’s autobiography. I’ve often fantasized about being a TV host and asking him “Well, Bill. What’s the book about?” I tried that who’s looking for you thing a while back. Among the most alarming: Internal Revenue Service, Selective Service Board(think 1970, Vietnam, draft), Social Security Administration, Department of Homeland Security, my mother’s pediatrician(from 1949), ex-wife’s attorney (from 1984), and an extraordinary number of women that care to discuss some esoteric scientific matter having to do with DNA(?). They need to develop a program that helps people find what they are looking for not who or what’s looking for them. My own particular is that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. So far I have not even been able to find just the end of the rainbow. Some foolish old man that lives in a cave told me it’s not the finding, it’s the searching. Give me a break! And the by line for this My Life” service says “Find everyone. All in one place.” Right there you know this is a scam because 99% of the people I know don’t live in one place i.e., Miami.
I think they get away with it cause it’s “mylife” all one word. Sneaky. Why would your mother’s pediatrician be looking for you? IRS and SSI are always looking for us aren’t they?
Also, I thought there was already one place to find everyone: whitepages.com
I asked MyLife.com to stop emailing me. I think they said it would take something like 10 days for them to consider my request. How lovely! I’m still evaluating if they have released their email meathooks from my carcass or not.
What a coincidence! 261 people also searched for me, but I have to say I feel my results are way more significant than yours. Neener, neener. Your name is actually pretty common. My real name is Ignatz Clancy Febrizio Wigglebottom.
I have a “junk” hotmail account that I use for just these types of situations. Yeah, they will be emailing you forever. So, neener, neener right back atcha!
Mother’s pediatrician? Either he’s looking for me to get more money because I didn’t turn out so well or he wants more money because I turned out better than expected. If the latter is the case, maybe it’s an unexpected windfall in the form of a rebate.
Oh my god. I feel like I have to do this. You don’t get any “freebies” at all?? Sons of mothers!
Nope. They give you a number then make you squirm until you pay up sucka.
Thanks for stopping by!
Fine print always = NO FUN.
You said it!
Fine print is all fine and dandy but I never signed up on the MyLife.com web site. EVER! Apparently they have some sort of “partnership” deal with Classmates.com where they trade info on us, kind of like the way I trade Pokemon cards in my spare time, and that is NOT cool!
I think I had more fun reading your comments then I did looking through my email this morning. You all are funny people.
I’ve never gotten any emails from them. I guess that’s a good thing. I think I may go and see how many people are looking for me just for the he’ll of it. It definitely is creepy though.
I guess if I find anybody who was looking for Scott Oglesby then they probably were looking for me. I have to go check it out.
Wow you are like really popular. I see a restraining order in your future.
I have never been really popular in my life, that was a first clue that this site was a sham.
And would that be a restraining order against me or for me?
I’d be afraid to know someone is looking for me. It sounds like a Lifetime movie in the making. I kinda wish my half-sisters would find me though. Idle curiosity about who they are, but I’d prolly be freaked out about that too wondering what they would think of me.
A scary site is intellius, it’s free part gives name, addy, age, and even relatives. Makes me wish we kept our home number unlisted b/c it’s just weird -though on a positive note, they got my mother’s and my ages switched around.
It’s very scary how much you can find out about a person through the internet. It’s just a good thing I don’t have any secrets!
Thanks for stopping by!
My friend Carl told me about you and Im glad he did. You are a wonderful writer with an amazing sense of humor. Im going to keep reading your work but right now Im going to mylife.com Sadly, you’ve put the thought in my head that maybe someone somewhere (not counting law enforcement agencies) is looking for me. WTF, Im on facebook, they can find me if they really want to.
Carl seems to be my biggest fan. If I made money doing this I’d owe him commission!
It’s an intriguing to think that there are people out there dilligently searching for you (who you don’t owe money to), and I think that’s what mylife.com cashes in on. Most people can be “found” with a Google search. For free!
Thank you so much for the complement and thank you for reading!