what was your 15 minutes of fame?

Red Squirrel

No Lifer
May 24, 2003
69,241
13,006
126
www.anyf.ca
When I was a kid I wrote a bunch of small windows applications for fun that were made to prank people. Like a fake command prompt that no matter what you type, it starts doing "Format C" or another was simply an app that that pops up errors, etc. I just released it as a zip file called "prank pack" on download.com. I totally did not take into account that the next day was april fools, and it blew up with a ridiculous amount of downloads until it exceeded the bandwidth limit of my crappy Tripod account. Got mentioned on big news sites like CNN, MSN, got listed as top 10 downloads on CNET etc. It was pretty crazy seeing my creation being mentioned on all these big sites.

I was also on the front page of our local news paper as a kid once for making a fluorescent tube light up using a motor to generating static electricity. It was kind of random, I was just messing around in my room and the editor for the paper happened to be visiting my parents and decided to just make a story of it. Something about wanting to join the science fair but being too young at the time.
 

pete6032

Diamond Member
Dec 3, 2010
7,860
3,352
136
Getting quoted in the newspaper. Happens a couple of times per year due to my job in public policy.
 

brianmanahan

Lifer
Sep 2, 2006
24,497
5,904
136
When I was a kid I wrote a bunch of small windows applications for fun that were made to prank people. Like a fake command prompt that no matter what you type, it starts doing "Format C" or another was simply an app that that pops up errors, etc.

lol nice! i made something like that too, just a little QBasic program, but i never uploaded it anywhere
 

Ichinisan

Lifer
Oct 9, 2002
28,298
1,235
136
I once found Gamecubes at Walmart with a special bundle: Zelda Collector's Edition (which hadn't been officially released yet) and a game disc carrying pouch. The bundle was meant to be a Walmart exclusive Black Friday promotion, but this was more than a week before Black Friday. The Internet hadn't got wind of the promo or the special price yet. Apparently, the employees didn't realize that they were not supposed to sell it to me or even have them visible in the locked glass case.

So I got a killer price on the Gamecube bundle and owned Zelda Collector's Edition before it launched.

@CZroe scanned the receipt and box and posted it to CheapAssGamer forums. Then it went viral on all the deal sites, each one showing the scan of my receipt as proof of the upcoming Black Friday price.

Gamecube hacking had only begun just recently. Almost nobody was aware of the scene - not even Nintendo. At the time you needed a Gamecube broadband LAN adapter and a bit of PC software to act as a streaming server for the dumped game disc data. No one had publicly released any tools for dumping Gamecube games. The release groups on the scene all wanted to keep the tools to themselves. I went on IRC and none of them would share the dumping tool with me. I think they didn't believe at the time that I really had Zelda CE before launch.
 

brianmanahan

Lifer
Sep 2, 2006
24,497
5,904
136
I once found Gamecubes at Walmart with a special bundle: Zelda Collector's Edition (which hadn't been officially released yet) and a game disc carrying pouch. The bundle was meant to be a Walmart exclusive Black Friday promotion, but this was more than a week before Black Friday.

whoa that was really early! i had a heck of a time finding just a regular copy of OoT, and finally managed to snag the last one available at ames right before christmas.
 

WelshBloke

Lifer
Jan 12, 2005
32,139
10,157
136
I saved a lady by clamping her femoral artery with my fingers once. I was pretty swanky on the ward for awhile there, got some free beer from her husband as well!
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
53,344
6,169
126
There was an article written about me in the Washington Post when I got hit by a car on my 4th birthday back in 1985. The article was written around Xmas of that year when Nancy Reagan came to Children's Hospital to visit all of the kids. They took the kids out to this big room where she would visit them. Well I was being a stubborn SOB and refused to be rolled out there. Nancy Reagan heard about this and decided to come visit me personally in my room. So they wrote the little article about all of that. I don't remember it at all but my mom still has the cut out in my baby book.

I also went to Zero Hour (Xbox 360 launch party) and my friend posted a bunch of pics I took of the prize package and trip I got out there on his website, which got picked up by major websites.
 

renz20003

Platinum Member
Mar 14, 2011
2,714
634
136
I made a website about a study hall monitor being a Nazi (edge wont let me lower case n, it shouldn't be capitalized IMO). It went viral at my school overnight and I almost got expelled. Ended up getting 2 weeks suspension. They would have kicked me out but the whole idea came from a student play portraying her as one. So they tried to save face when my parents threatened lawsuits.

 
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Perknose

Forum Director & Omnipotent Overlord
Forum Director
Oct 9, 1999
46,674
10,114
146
I've got a few. Here's one: Not a "boarding house." Her car was still registered at my house. I had to testify at her trial, but I turned down all news interviews, including an offer to be on 60 Minutes.
 

brianmanahan

Lifer
Sep 2, 2006
24,497
5,904
136
I've got a few. Here's one: Not a "boarding house." Her car was still registered at my house. I had to testify at her trial, but I turned down all news interviews, including an offer to be on 60 Minutes.

upi.com said:
He said he once saw Seegrist burning a stuffed 'bunny rabbit' on the front porch. When he asked her what she was doing, she extinguished the fire and said, 'You wouldn't understand.'

whoa
F1PvrRb.png


now anytime someone tells me "you wouldn't understand" i'm going to expect the worst
 

Mai72

Lifer
Sep 12, 2012
11,562
1,741
126
Posting on ATOT?

Hey, I got the achievement for a ton of likes I got for posting an article over on politics. That's fame worthy right? Right dudes. :(
 

CZroe

Lifer
Jun 24, 2001
24,195
857
126
Some moron admin banned me from a Facebook group when I tried to troubleshoot an relevant issue. I may have been the first to report it, but every user in the world was suddenly unable to install the necessary software for a popular product with a large user base (millions?). Just a completely misleading error message that prevents installation.

I was determined. When I found a simple work-around later that night, I was forced to share on YouTube to reach the group members (banned, remember?): just change the system date.

15,000 views in 5 months and getting thanks every day. Due to the nature of every user encountering this the next time they reinstall the application of connect to a new PC, I don’t see an end in sight. I even found out that the administrator who banned me was sending people to my video even though it wouldn’t exist if he had his way.

If you have an older Cricut machine and can’t get the Cricut Craft Room software installed, try this:
https://youtu.be/TiQWhHwRAHE

The irony: I didn’t intend to continue using that software at all and only needed to verify that the used Cricut Expression machine worked before buying unofficial software that’s no longer legally available due to Cricut lawsuits. All the later machines can’t even be used with that alternative application, so they were SOL. The manufacturer wanted to force everyone to a newer machine that uses their cloud-connected apps, so they aren’t sharing the fix or updating the software for the old machines.