The Other Scott Adams
May 11, 2009 General Nonsense |
I have a common name. There are at least three guys named Scott Adams in my local community. Most big corporations have a Scott Adams on the payroll. We're all over the place.
When your name is that common, it's only a matter of time before one of us gets arrested for serial murder, running a Ponzi scheme, or having a dungeon below the house. So far we have been lucky. Most people named Scott Adams end up pursuing hyper-nerdish lines of business. The most famous Scott Adams who isn't me is a pioneer computer game developer. Not too shabby. And recently a junior member of our club won a science award for genetically modifying wheat. Nice.
When your name is that common, it's only a matter of time before one of us gets arrested for serial murder, running a Ponzi scheme, or having a dungeon below the house. So far we have been lucky. Most people named Scott Adams end up pursuing hyper-nerdish lines of business. The most famous Scott Adams who isn't me is a pioneer computer game developer. Not too shabby. And recently a junior member of our club won a science award for genetically modifying wheat. Nice.
I wonder if other people throughout history have worried about this sort of thing. For example, one of the most colorful bad guys of all time was called Vlad the Impaler. You could Google him, but his name pretty much says it all. I wonder if after he got famous for being all fierce he worried that some other Vlad the Impaler would come along and ruin his reputation. He wouldn't want to be walking the dog and overhear neighbors talking...
Neighbor one: Who gutted that peasant over by the other dead peasant?
Neighbor two: I heard it was Vlad the Impaler.
Neighbor one: Do you mean the chicken fornicator or the other one?
Right now there's a 16-year old Scott Adams in Canada saying, "Why did that idiot have to write a blog about Vlad the Impaler and ruin my good name???"
Sorry.
Votes: +8
Comments
User Name: rjpaquin
May 13, 2009
0
If you google my name, Ronald Paquin, you get a priest from Boston who is currently incarcerated for the extraordinarily bad habit of molesting boys. Happily. anyone who knows me is well aware that there is no chance whatsoever that I could be mistaken for a priest. (I think that calls for a double rimshot! One for the obvious, and one for the "rimshot".)
/For the record, I cannot be mistaken for someone who molests boys, girls, women, men, farm animals (or farm implements), soft fruits, hard vegetables or baked goods. Cause that's nasty. Just wanted to be clear.
/For the record, I cannot be mistaken for someone who molests boys, girls, women, men, farm animals (or farm implements), soft fruits, hard vegetables or baked goods. Cause that's nasty. Just wanted to be clear.
User Name: normalityrelief
May 13, 2009
0
My name is David (Dave) Cameron. So far all I've had to contend with (of which I'm aware) is the leader of the UK's conservative party, which is not too bad. Plus my father, who's a retired Episcopal priest. The only trouble I ever had was that I sounded similar to him at a fairly early age, so I ended up answering business calls & he got invited to movies.
Just kidding. No one ever called to invite me to movies. I was pretty dorky. Still am, but now proud of it.
Just kidding. No one ever called to invite me to movies. I was pretty dorky. Still am, but now proud of it.
User Name: tartanmarine
May 13, 2009
0
My brother Tom in Massachusetts has a doppelganger (different MI) in SC, who has had a lot of legal troubles. It causes Tom endless trouble at the registry of Motor Vehicles.
As to your knock on Vlad III, he only used impaling because Waterboarding hadn't been invented. And he fully briefed Nancy Pelosi first, though she now denies it. It was a cruel age, and he is remembered as a hero by the locals for defending Romania against one of the earlier attempts by Muslims to conquer Europe. As they now are succeeding in creating Eurarabia, Vlad's image is likely to get worse.
As to your knock on Vlad III, he only used impaling because Waterboarding hadn't been invented. And he fully briefed Nancy Pelosi first, though she now denies it. It was a cruel age, and he is remembered as a hero by the locals for defending Romania against one of the earlier attempts by Muslims to conquer Europe. As they now are succeeding in creating Eurarabia, Vlad's image is likely to get worse.
User Name: mohitgidwani
May 13, 2009
0
Hi... My name is Mohit Gidwani, and I am from India... I did my majors in Metallurgy and Materials Science, and I am a huge astronomy fan and an Astronomy Olympiad Finalist.
Turns out, one Mohit Gidwani is studying Materials Science in the US, and one more is a huge astronomy fan, studying in south India.
What's in a name, I ask :P
Turns out, one Mohit Gidwani is studying Materials Science in the US, and one more is a huge astronomy fan, studying in south India.
What's in a name, I ask :P
User Name: sanderw
May 12, 2009
0
http://www.sanderis.com/Name.html
My namesake is surprisingly similar to me. Very strange.
My namesake is surprisingly similar to me. Very strange.
User Name: janeerdekens
May 12, 2009
0
This looks a lot like a question Dave Gorman asked himself once, which turned out to be great television: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Are_You_Dave_Gorman?
User Name: MScottAdams
May 12, 2009
0
"Do you think there are any other Scott Adams out there taking credit for your work? Posting clipped cartoons in their cubicles, telling coworkers that he used them in strips and e-mailing the offending panels? Telling management that he really doesn't need the job because of the great cartoonist pay, but he'll stick around to help them out and get more ideas for his comic? flag this comment "
YES I do it all the time!!!!
:)
Say Yoho - Everything spins around and suddenly I'm elsewhere...
M. Scott Adams (Not Dilbert, Adventure!)
http://www.msadams.com
YES I do it all the time!!!!
:)
Say Yoho - Everything spins around and suddenly I'm elsewhere...
M. Scott Adams (Not Dilbert, Adventure!)
http://www.msadams.com
User Name: cyclistjim
May 12, 2009
0
Just wait a minute try having Jim Brown as a name. No need for an unlisted number. There are so many of me that it is great. People can't find you among the clutter of others. But of course if you work for a large corporation it becomes a problem. I never seem to get their email but people are always sending the email for me to them. So needless to say I don't always know what people want me to do and they seem to think I should know about it since they sent an email to the other Jim Brown not me. They will argue with me too. But I sent the email. Then I say show me. They do and I say that is the other Jim Brown you sent it too! The typical response is there are two Jim Brown's in this company? My response yes it is a common name.
User Name: Haliverpool
May 12, 2009
0
That's why I like to go by the name HALiverpool. I googled it and most of the hits are comments on the Scott Adams blog. My real name is way too common.
It occurred to me that this might be a test to see how many people will give up their real name; what with all the news about all the stupid personal things people put the web via social networking sites after claiming they value their privacy.
-HAL (not my real name:)
It occurred to me that this might be a test to see how many people will give up their real name; what with all the news about all the stupid personal things people put the web via social networking sites after claiming they value their privacy.
-HAL (not my real name:)
User Name: tom_steiner
May 12, 2009
0
My surname is Swineflu. Luckily it's pronounced "Swinn-EFF-loo"
User Name: gargamel9
May 12, 2009
0
As always..Thx for the laughs scott!
IMHO the thing about vlad the impaler that I like most is that it inspired the even more famous (except in romania where he is a national hero, which is funny in itself..well short of..) dracula fictional character, funny thing being that an aristocrat that spends the nights seducing virgins in nearby towns to drink their blood in the fiction is like count chocula compared with the actual historical character. In my opinion Stoker had to downplay the psicotic nature of the guy in orther to make it an acceptable fictional character, that being an inmortal demoniacal undead from hell that seduces little virgins and then kill them. I wont comment what the historical guy did. Lets just say that he terrorised the otoman empire that was famous for its ruthlessnes in a time when Europe was a short of continous flaming spiral of carnage, pillage and destruction. Those guys were a kind of the borg in history, and they were appaled by the things Vlad used to do.
IMHO the thing about vlad the impaler that I like most is that it inspired the even more famous (except in romania where he is a national hero, which is funny in itself..well short of..) dracula fictional character, funny thing being that an aristocrat that spends the nights seducing virgins in nearby towns to drink their blood in the fiction is like count chocula compared with the actual historical character. In my opinion Stoker had to downplay the psicotic nature of the guy in orther to make it an acceptable fictional character, that being an inmortal demoniacal undead from hell that seduces little virgins and then kill them. I wont comment what the historical guy did. Lets just say that he terrorised the otoman empire that was famous for its ruthlessnes in a time when Europe was a short of continous flaming spiral of carnage, pillage and destruction. Those guys were a kind of the borg in history, and they were appaled by the things Vlad used to do.
User Name: goosemonster
May 12, 2009
0
User Name: goosemonster
May 12, 2009
0
Could be worse, friends of yours names their son Andrew. Unfortunatly his surname is !$%*!$%* Hopefully he never shortens his name of else he'll be Drew !$%*!$% (Dropy C o c k)
User Name: notscottadams
May 11, 2009
0
I loved playing the Scott Adams adventure games on my TRS-80 in the late 70s.
At one point I wondered if you were the same person, and somehow found something on the internet saying you weren't.
Thanks to both for the things you've done.
At one point I wondered if you were the same person, and somehow found something on the internet saying you weren't.
Thanks to both for the things you've done.
User Name: williehorton
May 11, 2009
+1
My name (not actually Willie Horton) is very common.
It's so damned common that I almost didn't get a driver's license when I moved to this state: their computer check brought up a guy with the same first & last names and middle initial, born ten years to the day before me, whose license was revoked in New York. If I hadn't looked over the counter at her printout and noticed that he was born in 1951, I would still be riding the darned bus.
Maybe he's the reason I'm on Do-Not-Fly list... and maybe he's the reason that my gun purchases get 'held' about half the time. When my gun dealer calls my transactions in to the ATF, he gets transferred to a supervisor; if there are none available, I get 'held' until one shows up (and observes, I imagine, that I was in fact born in SIXTY-one). This is really inconvenient when I NEED to have a gun RIGHT NOW... oh, wait, that never happens.
If we ever have a child, I want to name it "Ignatz" to spare him (or her) the trouble...
It's so damned common that I almost didn't get a driver's license when I moved to this state: their computer check brought up a guy with the same first & last names and middle initial, born ten years to the day before me, whose license was revoked in New York. If I hadn't looked over the counter at her printout and noticed that he was born in 1951, I would still be riding the darned bus.
Maybe he's the reason I'm on Do-Not-Fly list... and maybe he's the reason that my gun purchases get 'held' about half the time. When my gun dealer calls my transactions in to the ATF, he gets transferred to a supervisor; if there are none available, I get 'held' until one shows up (and observes, I imagine, that I was in fact born in SIXTY-one). This is really inconvenient when I NEED to have a gun RIGHT NOW... oh, wait, that never happens.
If we ever have a child, I want to name it "Ignatz" to spare him (or her) the trouble...
User Name: a_knobbie
May 11, 2009
0
Speaking of your-name-related news, I listen to the Adam Carolla show, and was semi-convinced that you were gonna be on it, when I saw the guest listed as Adams Scott. Apparently he's some sort of actor character. I was like, this sounds like the name of the Dilbert dude....hopefully they just screwed up the name.
Anyway, my point is that you should do a podcast with Adam Carolla. I think you two would have a suspicious amount of things to talk about.
Anyway, my point is that you should do a podcast with Adam Carolla. I think you two would have a suspicious amount of things to talk about.
User Name: steventhethorn
May 11, 2009
0
The people with my name seem to either write inspirational books or engage in fraud and murder people.
And apparently there's an idiot with my dad's name who's on the run from the law and owes people a lot of money. Not a good deal.
And apparently there's an idiot with my dad's name who's on the run from the law and owes people a lot of money. Not a good deal.
User Name: Fred Zeppelin
May 11, 2009
0
Well, my real name name is a Major League Baseball player, and a leading character on a CBS daytime drama.
I still make the first page of the Google search tho'.
I still make the first page of the Google search tho'.
User Name: Webster
May 11, 2009
0
User Name: wishnevsky
May 11, 2009
0
Names are powerful, and a lot of fun to think about. I remember when there was a rash of people picking new names, most of which turned out to be Frodo or Sunshine.
Although my name is not all that common in America, it is fairly normal in Slavic countries, many variants. Now on the internets, there are three that get a lot of hits, a journalist in Russia, my daughter, and me. My daughter is the famous one.
At least your name is not Mohammad. Then you might have an identity crisis.
Although my name is not all that common in America, it is fairly normal in Slavic countries, many variants. Now on the internets, there are three that get a lot of hits, a journalist in Russia, my daughter, and me. My daughter is the famous one.
At least your name is not Mohammad. Then you might have an identity crisis.
