Countdown to Millions

What other face so appropriately says, "I've lied?"

Well, I was hoping to keep this site going for a little more than 10 days (As the countdown on the right indicates), but recent events have forced my hand in this situation, and I must tell you that I am not who I say I am.

Those who read this blog, undoubtedly know me as “Nick Fox,” but truth be told he is simply some guy I found on Facebook, I just ripped off his profile image and plugged him in as a character in this whole “Countdown to Millions” thing.  The concept itself was hatched, as most great ideas are, a few weeks ago at a bar.  I was talking with a friend who said that what people really need right now is an “everyman” someone they can follow and relate too when everything else in the world seems to be going wrong.  So, I just randomly searched Facebook, until I found a suitably ambitious-looking young man; that was Nick.

Nick probably has no clue that I did any of this, and if he does, he seems to be a good sport about the whole thing, because I haven’t heard from him yet.

So, why, if Nick doesn’t know about this do I have to unmask myself?  The truth is I happen to be quite a successful entrepreneur, and by some accounts a multi-millionaire already.  Those who spend any amount of time on the web will know my name: Kevin Rose.

You might know me from some of my ventures such as Digg, Revision 3, Pownce, or the beer-laden podcast known as Diggnation.  If it isn’t obvious by now, my hand was forced for legal reasons.  When Jay, the CEO of Digg, found out about my little site here, I got hell for it…not just from him, but from our legal team as well.  Clearly this little blog of mine could not survive.  It was stupid of me to think that my deception wouldn’t be uncovered and there wouldn’t be any repercussions from it, but given the potentially libelous nature of the material here, the legal team told me I only had one option: Shut down the blog.

I have to say, it was fun being anonymous for a while, to have to work for every set of eyes that came across this site.  It really made me appreciate how far I’ve really come in my own life.  And although Nick doesn’t realize it, that is a gift that he gave to me.

To anyone, including Nick, that I’ve hurt in any way, I’m sincerely sorry.  I can only say that I only had the best of intentions, I only wanted to give people hope, something to aspire to, and with the economy the way it is, hope is something that we will always need…even us millionaires.

-Kevin

Update (April 1, 2009 - 7:12PM):  What’s that?  It’s April Fools day, you say?  Well, I guess I’m not Kevin Rose then…damn looks like I’m going to have to keep working if I ever want to get millions and a BusinessWeek cover like K. Rose.  Hope you all enjoyed my little diversion, but now I must get back to work.

-Nick “I’m a Real Boy” Fox