Fake Steve Jobs Hunt Takes Creepy Turn

It has elements of mystery, the tenets of paparazzi defense, and the feeling of a prank gone too far. In a blogosphere-wide attempt to unmask blogebrity – well, it may not be an exaggeration to call him/her a cyber cult leader – Fake Steve Jobs, digital espionage has turned a fun cat-and-mouse game into something Fake Steve calls "creepy."

In the past year, even Bill Gates and Apple CEO Steve Jobs himself have tuned into The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, authored by FSJ, for the witty, insightful, and oftentimes biting commentary.

Meanwhile, in other places on the Net, the mystery of who this author might be has been a titillating one, with theory after theory proposed and then discredited or stamped with a "maybe."

Well known writer about "all things Mac," Andy Ihnatko, with a sense of humor and writing style similar to FSJ's, has been a crowd favorite. In an IM interview

Which of course makes him sound guilty, thus proving his point in an MC Escher kind of way.

Whether or not he is or isn't, directly asking him if he is, or speculating aloud, doesn't violate any moral or civil codes. The online manhunt, though, took a nasty turn. At Sitening.com, Tyler Hall admits to a little trickery at the FSJ's expense.

They created a joke website dedicated to iPhone haikus, and sent FSJ a
From Fake Steve Jobs's post, he's been in discussions with attorneys to determine the legality of what Sitening.com did, and how much, if any, protection is afforded to his privacy.

And that won't be a question easy to answer. IP addresses, and things on the Web in general, might be considered akin to public space and/or public information. Paparazzi can do what they do because of First Amendment protections of the press – you can take a picture of anything in public.

Phone numbers that are listed in phone books have been sore spots for Internet privacy advocates too, for even though numbers are public information, most don't want their phone numbers available to people outside of their local areas. A