Anniversary: Battle of the Giants

Today’s the day, back in 2002, when the internet’s two largest like/follow spammers tangled.

It happened by accident and at its peak, the Web ground to a halt.

BeEnlightenedNowSir and GetRichLikeMe are now little remembered, but back in 2002, 80% of all blog posts were liked by one or both of them, and more than 90% of all blog sites were followed by one or both of them.

How the two got into an automated like/follow loop may never be known, but all like/follow stats were blown away before they were done that day.

BeEnlightenedNowSir was living at the time in a cold-water walkup on the south side of Brommist-on-Earm. GetRichLikeMe resided in a yurt on the hill with that water tank, overlooking Possum, Montana.

Banned from the Web, the two met in St. Moritz and blew through their wealth in epic fashion (they both made a billion online, from bloggers paying them to get lost). The couple died in each other’s arms from what the post mortems described as “extreme insults to the body.”