My yahoogänger story, what’s yours?

A few years ago, I found that some of my emails were going to another Anasuya, one who had a similar email address, but on hotmail, while mine was on yahoo. We ended up corresponding over the mistaken emails, and interestingly enough, found enough in common to be in touch through all these years… We narrowly missed meeting each other in person at a conference in Bangkok, but that didn’t stop us. In fact, we’re even connected on Facebook, which, as you all know, is now the only competent measure for any kind of social relationship whatsoever. I mean, I’m seriously thinking of disowning my parents because neither of them has an FB account; what legitimacy can someone have who isn’t updating their online status every two hours?

However, that familial crisis aside, an interesting article in today’s New York Times on Googlegängers was what brought on this post. And if you tell me you’ve never done any vanity googling for your name and checked out whose extraordinary life (or lives) you’re competing against for page views, you’re integrity-challenged. I, for one, can tell you that the Facebook public listing of Anasuya Sengupta ain’t me; I’m the paranoid about privacy kind (yeah yeah, I can’t do anything about this blog now, can I? It has a peculiar life of its own and it terrifies me). Go ahead, my vain friends, tell me your googlegänger stories; I’m waiting with baited (sic) breath.