Who is Michael Crook?
December 1st, 2006
I don’t know. But I do know he has pissed off a lot of people. He sent Kevin Burton a DMCA Takedown Notice however Michael believes in free speech. I googled him and the first result was www.michaelcrook.ca which seems to have been taken down. However www.michaelcrook.com is online but in 2018 seems a lot different than it was in 2006. I’m not sure it is maintained by the same person.
I went to his about page back in 2006 where I learned he ran an online fan club for 2 Unlimited who had the hits “Get Ready for This” and “No Limit” which you can still hear at hockey games. He also believes the EFF is an abusive group of deviants.
I think he did something with javascript to prevent people from selecting the text on his webpage, which is annoying. If you are curious, there is a lot of information about him and what he has been up to, which apparently isn’t search engine optimization as his site doesn’t come in the top ten for his own name in Google. Maybe he got Google Bombed or something. If you want to read about Michale Crook formerly you could read an epic thread on Tucker Max’s bulletin board, but most people don’t keep their website online for twenty plus year. From the now lost thread, I’ll quote Michael Crook:
I stand firm in my hatred for children, jews, and members of the military.
I’ve written before how you should be careful what you write in digital communication as you never can tell how another person will react. Of course if you post publically how you hate children, jews, and members of the military, is it any surprise it upsets people?
I was going to quote Rodney King who asked “Can’t we all just get along?” but what’s the point.
This story just makes me sad. It’s no fun being a pariah.
Michael Crook may have learned his lesson but others did not
Almost six years later people still search the Internet for information about Michael Crook. I know I continue to use him as an example of how not to behave online. If you want to learn more about Michael Crook and how he tried to use the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to bully people online, remove content critical of him, and generally try to cover up the fact he is a huge douche bag to use the parlance of our time. 10 Zen Monkeys is one of the websites that fought him in court, they were directly involved, I merely commented and observed, but it didn’t stop Michael Crook from writing me after I mentioned him here online.
I’ve had to deal with a lot of difficulties in life and keeping this blog online. My reputation isn’t quite as bad as Michael Crook’s but it was better prior to March 17th 2005 so if you have any advice on finding a job online or improving your online reputation you can leave it below.
This entry was originaly posted on , it was last edited on and is filed under: Rambles and tagged: DMCA, Michael Crook, Online Reputation.
Someone claiming to be “Michael Crook of Syracuse, New York, USA” wrote me informing me that the reason his webpage is not in Google is not due to a lack of SEO but due to modifying his robots.txt file. Nor is he the Michael Crook of Canada, whose webpage is back up and based on a quick look at michaelcrook.ca, that Michael is watching the liberal leadership convention, as am I.
Michael Crook of Syracuse, New York, USA is also “sorry to read that you disagree with my views”. Needless to say I didn’t think it was necessary to state that I don’t hate all children, jews, and members of the military. I just wanted to know who Michael Crook was and why he seemed to have caused such a stir online even on sites that deal more with technology than politics.
Michael must have a Google Alert and/or a Technorati Watchlist on his name, something almost everyone should do if they are interested in their personal brand online.