“Richard Dawkins” Twitter account is fake

[Ian David]

“Richard Dawkins” Twitter account is fake
Wednesday, April 8th, 2009 | By: Cristian Popa

Have you ever wondered why the tweets of the @Richard_Dawkins account on Twitter are so lackluster on their best days? Or why the design is so unlike any of the other sites (exhibits A and B) which Richard Dawkins uses? Or why even within the confines of 140 characters “Richard Dawkins” still manages to uncharacteristically slip in misspelled words? Or why the profile links to a site other than the official RichardDawkins.net? Or why there are no updates about the significant goings-on in the life of Richard Dawkins? No talks, no conventions, no book signings, no media appearances? Well, if you have wondered, you had good reasons. It turns out Richard Dawkins has nothing to do with @Richard_Dawkins.

From the Professor himself, reposted from the forum of the official Richard Dawkins website:

Yet again, some impostor is pretending to be me. I do not Twitter, I had never even heard of Twittering until this thread alerted me to it, and I most certainly have not signed up for it. I am told there are numerous Facebook pages purporting to be mine. None of them is. I do not have a Facebook page, or anything comparable.

I don’t understand the motivation of these impostors. They do not seem to intend malice. If that were the motive, I could kind of understand it. If it were amusing satire I could understand the motive. But the fictititious persona that they invent for me is not particularly discreditable, nor is it funny. The statements attributed to me are not wildly implausible. But they are not mine. They are pure fiction. If anybody can suggest a possible motive I would be curious to know. What kind of person makes up fiction about a real person, which is neither malicious nor humorous but just sort of DULL?

<snip>

Yes, disappointing in the extreme, especially for those who have been followers since the beginning, which appears to have been some time mid-2008. What makes it worse is that this is not a random fun-loving teenager playing on Twitter–which would have been bad enough–but a cunning exploiter who abuses the good feelings and intentions of Dawkins’ admirers to drive traffic to an affiliate link farm off of which somebody (perhaps him, perhaps someone else) derives an undeserved profit.

More:
http://reasonweekly.com/richard-dawkins/richard-dawkins-twitter-account-is-fake

[TZ]

1. Yeah. I would never expect Dawkins to be a tweeter.

I don't think he's the type to have a myspace page either...:rofl:

[JitterbugPerfume]

2. -----

:rofl: :rofl:


Richard Dawkins TWITTERING!

[semillama]

3. great.

now they'll be telling us this isn't the real person on Twitter either:

http://twitter.com/CobraCommander

[CreekDog]

4. Well, that tweet about bible archeology sort of raised my suspicions

:hide: