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What’s your image?

I came across this interesting meme: google for the image that comes up first for your name. I was a little surprised by what “pz” returns, but I think it is entirely appropriate.

i-2fd580520350268b4fe384e33c8f4755-pz3ft_figure3.jpg

Really…you don’t want to cross me.

Doing an image search for “PZ Myers” returns a photo of me and Richard Dawkins first (which is OK!), and a picture of Cheri Yecke second, which I find terribly, horribly insulting.

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Comments

  3. Sunbeam says

    Did you check out the site that’s from? “PZ Myers, whose poop is probably smarter than me, explains.” Made me chuckle.

    /I’m lucky enough to share my name with a B-list actor, so no surprises there.
    //Except for the porn that comes up under just my first name. *sigh*

  4. Nevyn says

    Weird. The first picture is a frightening photo of a wacko radio host preaching a mix of Christianity infused woo. Then there’s a few D&D type avatars, then the sixth one is . . . me! Full name gets me me from an article I published earlier this year, then citizen Kane and, inexplicably, a bunch of different fish heads (WTF?).

  5. Randall says

    The first one for my full name is a picture I drew a few years back; it’s my full name, written such that it reads the same after a 180 degree turn. Fitting, I guess.

  6. knutson says

    PZ, your images stand to reason — “Pz.” is the German abbreviation for “Panzer” or “armored.” “Pz. Kw. 3” stands for Panzer Kampfwagen 3, or Armored Fighting Vehicle 3.

  7. says

    Success! Typing in my name actually returns a photo of me taken the day I started working in my biology lab. Even greater success is that the 7th image is my favorite artwork that I’ve done. *gets weepy* I feel special to have an accurate google search so young! Of course, I guess it helps to have an uncommon surname.

  8. Ichthyic says

    strange, mine turns up a rather artistic ceramic vase

    http://www.garymolitor.com/cups/ichthyic-01-th.jpg

    from:

    http://www.garymolitor.com/cups.htm

    “Ichthyic 1,” 1974, 7″ x 4″.
    Cone 6 cast porcelain with underglaze colors and clear over glaze.
    This series was completed while I was living in Mill Valley. I had the boat and I was under a doctors care. I felt better about my self so I started doing some clay work.

    um… ok.

    many of the other images that turned up on search were actually ones i linked to from other places on this very blog, or on PT.

    this one was the first one that actually intrigued me though:

    http://www.tuscany-charming.it/IMAG/isole/pianosa/pianosamare.jpg

    which had the subtext of “nursery of the ichthyic fauna” and came from the Isle of Pianosa in Tuscany.

    ah, places I’d rather be…

  9. autumn says

    I get a bunch of pictures saying “photograph of [my name]”, none of whom are me.
    I believe that I’m better looking than the rest of me. Guess I should get a picture out on the webs.

  10. Ichthyic says

    strange, mine turns up a rather artistic ceramic vase

    http://www.garymolitor.com/cups/ichthyic-01-th.jpg

    “Ichthyic 1,” 1974, 7″ x 4″.
    Cone 6 cast porcelain with underglaze colors and clear over glaze.
    This series was completed while I was living in Mill Valley. I had the boat and I was under a doctors care. I felt better about my self so I started doing some clay work.

    um… ok.

    many of the other images that turned up on search were actually ones i linked to from other places on this very blog, or on PT.

    this one was the first one that actually intrigued me though:

    http://www.tuscany-charming.it/IMAG/isole/pianosa/pianosamare.jpg

    which had the subtext of “nursery of the ichthyic fauna” and came from the Isle of Pianosa in Tuscany.

    ah, places I’d rather be…

  11. Heather says

    Mine gets a picture of me back in my wild and crazy jugband days (about 2 years ago). Of course, now I’m a suburban housewife and should probably be finding a way to have a more staid and matronly vision of myself out there…

  12. idlemind says

    I get a band.

    Funny thing is, my real name is also the name of a band (but now brings up some minor British TV host).

  14. says

    The results can be more interesting if you remember to turn off SafeSearch (unless you’re at the office, of course).

  17. says

    My first+last name gets me a picture of my lab’s microscope. Just try to exceed my geekitude.

    Unfortunately, subsequent hits are confounded by a movie called “The blue butterfly” where the main character has my first and last name. I should get that movie sometime, it would be freaky.

  18. says

    Surprise, surprise: a whole bunch of images of sex toys and porn that I’ve reviewed. You do get to my actual bad self fairly soon, but not until the seventh from the top.

  22. Dustin says

    I get a picture of an malnourished dog with a bloody face.

    And a picture of Dustin Hoffman with boobs.

  23. Mobius says

    I Googled my initials…RGD, and the number one position was the Rat Genome Database. What a hoot.

  24. Ichthyic says


    And a picture of Dustin Hoffman with boobs.

    interesting. I actually dated a girl in high school named Dustin Hoffman.

    I kid you not.

  25. Mr. Upright says

    Mine leads to a picture of me at my former institution (FAU). Second and third are pictures of the cake my wife made for my Ph.D. graduation.

    The most interesting is #7, which takes you to one of the many “anti-islamofascist” pages that took us to task for actually hiring a Fulbright Islamic scholar to teach at FAU. Several of us had written a letter to the local newspaper. David Horowitz and his buddies are watching me ;-)

    Another takes you to a libertarian critique page that included an early (1997) blog entry I wrote.

    Few of the rest of the images have anything to do with me.

  28. Ichthyic says

    @Chris

    LOL

    yeah, ‘ol SteveSteve tends to grab the limelight wherever he goes.

    Chris used to be a palaeontologist[sic], but I won’t hold it against him

    curse that panda.

    :P

  29. Tyler says

    I get a picture of a gay porn actor, which links to a page with his biography. He is, apparently, a very versatile actor in the realm of gay pornography.

  30. says

    I get a picture of me as the first image hit, then an icon from my homepage, then a picture that I drew. Then some silly mug from a blog where I left a comment. The web search is all about me. All.

    I suppose it helps that there are only about fifteen Häggholms in the world and that I am both the only one named Petter and, among us Häggholms, the most computer savvy and the most active on the internet…

  31. says

    I get a picture of me as the first image hit, then an icon from my homepage, then a picture that I drew. Then some silly mug from a blog where I left a comment. The web search is all about me. All.

    I suppose it helps that there are only about fifteen Häggholms in the world and that I am both the only one named Petter and, among us Häggholms, the most computer savvy and the most active on the internet…

  33. DLC says

    Hm.. no surprise here… DLC returns “DLC” a photo of the logo of the Democratic Leadership Council. My full name, oddly enough, returns a picture of a man with the same name as mine, standing in a hole… On the whole, I’d rather have PZ’s initials.

  35. says

    My initials are also an acronym for the Billboard Liberation Front, so the first thing that shows up is an, uh, “liberated” billboard, BLF Ron English Piece 1. Vaguely appropriate in the sense I’m not keen on billboards in some circumstances/locations, and generally dislike the company/product who is the victim of that particular piece. However, I do find that particular BLF artwork a bit crude.

  38. Who Cares says

    I feel unique. There are no, I kid you not, there are no pictures for me when I fill in my first + last name (in brackets)

  44. Torbjörn Larsson, OM says

    Googling my forename isn’t terribly exciting – all mugs, all bland. The full name is more appropriate…

    – 5th photo is The Swedish Chef muppet, subtitled “Torbjörn Larsson said”.
    – 7th photo is a fox with his catch. (Well, probably a tame fox waiting for its feed considering it is actually posing, but the name of this game is image-ination. :-P)
    – 9th photo is a post card heckling creationists, linked to Pharyngula.
    – 11th photo is Trophy Wife™ #1. (The swedish queen.)
    – 20th photo is subtitled “The Torbjörn Larsson effect begins …”. (In swedish.)

    … but of course I’m not in there.

  45. Torbjörn Larsson, OM says

    Googling my forename isn’t terribly exciting – all mugs, all bland. The full name is more appropriate…

    – 5th photo is The Swedish Chef muppet, subtitled “Torbjörn Larsson said”.
    – 7th photo is a fox with his catch. (Well, probably a tame fox waiting for its feed considering it is actually posing, but the name of this game is image-ination. :-P)
    – 9th photo is a post card heckling creationists, linked to Pharyngula.
    – 11th photo is Trophy Wife™ #1. (The swedish queen.)
    – 20th photo is subtitled “The Torbjörn Larsson effect begins …”. (In swedish.)

    … but of course I’m not in there.

  47. says

    When I turn off safe search, and enclose my name in quotes, “Ken Cope” returns, out of the first page’s 18 images, 8 that are directly associated with me. There are only a few other images over the course of 12 pages that have as much to do with me.

    The first image is of my attempt at making a lower case red “a” out of a cg klein bottle, for a symbol for atheism for this site. The next two images feature my boy and girl in some pirate gear. I appear in two of the images, two are images I created, and the last is a 3D character that I did some work on.

  49. says

    I justed stumbled across Googlism:

    Googlism.com will find out what Google.com thinks of you, your friends or anything!

    Some of the results for “pz”:
    • pz is restricted airspace and will include an upper altitude limit
    • pz is pretty well beat up and in need of rest
    • pz is proportional to rz = 1 = 1/2
    • pz is the only product that can restore and save them from drying out and becoming brittle
    • pz is the comedian of the group
    • pz is decreased by 0
    • pz is nog niet goed genoeg
    • pz is a 0

    And me? Uh… Sorry, Google doesn’t know enough about blf yet. It’s the “yet” that has me hiding under the blankets.

  50. Katrina says

    When I searched with just my first name, I got an entire page of links to hurricane photos – naturally. (sigh)

    When I did my full name, I first got a photo of a pair of associate pastors from the Free In Jesus Christian Fellowship in California. urgh

    The second photo wasn’t any better. It was a photo of a house that a 24-year-old single mom just purchased with the help of some christian outreach program.

    Things didn’t improve until the 21st thumbnail, which was taken from my genealogy website and is a photo of me at age 4, sitting on my grandfather’s lap.

  51. TheBrummell says

    First for my name: the South Park style characterization of myself I put together using a website back around March. Then a picture of a globe, from a website associated with my current lab. Third is a mysterious picture – it’s a wedding photo of the son of a man in Virginia who stole my name several decades before I was born. Time-travelling banditry!

    Then the usual randomness. On the second page there’s a sweet picture of a really big tooth (Megalodon) from Cephalopodcast.

  52. NJ says

    Hmmmm. How about a variation on this meme? Instead of looking for what first pops up on Google images when you use part of your name, why not see how much you have to specify to have an image of you be the first image in the search?

    Yeah, yeah, for PZ Meyers and the like it won’t take much. But for the more obscure of us, it’s interesting to see how we’re tagged on the net.

  53. William says

    Imagegoogling my name always gets some lovely art, but none of it’s mine — I share a name with an American landscape painter, William Keith.

  56. Nan says

    No high school or college yearbook photos. Sigh of relief.

    As for the Westboro church court case, I heard Fred Phelps on the news exulting in the decision. He’s looking forward to the appeals process and eventually the Supreme Court.

  57. Darby says

    I get an obscure singer with my screenname/nickname (a LOT of obscure singers, different ones, come up in the first pages). It’s a fairly eclectic collection, overall.

    My actual, highly generic first name just gets a bunch on Michaels.

    My full name gets a footballer and a bunch of images I link to on my webpages, including a Galapagos iguana and a phospholipid molecule.

    But how could there have been a Hurricane Darby last year and I didn’t know it???

  58. Alice Shortcake says

    My first four images are: two links to my reviews on the British Theatre Guide site, the main page of an investement fund that switches mysteriously from English into Russian, and a deacon of the Linary Church of Christ in Tennessee.

  59. says

    My full name is very common, in fact I’ve met 3 people with the exact same name. One of them lived in the same block of flats, which was very confusing for the postman.

    Luckily, the shortened version of my name that I use most of the time is less common, and brings up the photo of me with a Mountie that I put on my old lab’s home page. The caption is “the real reason [VWXYNot] came to Canada”.

    Result.

  60. Diego says

    Well, if I google both my first name and surname then one of the top hits is a scantily clad picture of Madonna. Apparently I have the same name as one of her ex-boyfriends who she sued because he was selling photos of her in the all-together. I have to say that this was by far the most interesting result I garnered.

  61. ctenotrish, FCD says

    Huh – for “trish” and “tricia”, I get scantily clad women, whom I in no way resemble. But with my full name, I get a photo of my Mom! Well, we have the same name . . . and apparently no pics of me are floating about the ‘net. Fine by me. :)

    Funnily, when I search for “ctenotrish”, I get almost all scienceblog links, from various comments I have made. And then, this: http://skippyslist.com/2007/07/09/cephalopod-surprise/ which is funny every time I re-read it!

  62. Dave says

    Turn off “safesearch” and if your first name is a woman’s name, the fist image is likely to be porn. . .

  66. carolyn says

    My full name gets me a screenshot of Eclipse as the first image.

    Followed, of course, by pictures of people who share my name, and who are not me. Some beauty queen in Australia.

    Damn having such a common name!

  68. Lisa says

    The first picture the name “Lisa” brings up on Google is a photo of a dead body on the autopsy table. Eeew.

    My full name brings up the picture of some lady who was the first woman to sail around the world non-stop by herself. That is pretty cool.

  70. Carlie says

    Fucking hell, that’s creepy. There are lots of decent photos of me on the internet, and the only two that show up are the bad ones. The results then spin off into weirdness, but I’m happy to see that one result high up is a billboard that says “Botany. Got any?” No, I don’t know why. My first and last names are uncommon enough that when I do a normal google for my name in quotes every single damn result is something about me, which provokes a strangely isolated feeling.

  72. Kseniya says

    Dave:

    Turn off “safesearch” and if your first name is a woman’s name, the fist [sic] image is likely to be porn. . .

    Yeah, I suppose that may be true, but although I got a lot of cheesecake, some of it R-rated, I didn’t see anything I’d call pron.

    When I searched for “Kseniya” the first image (and several subsequent images) was a cheesecake photo of a talented young chess player named Kseniya Rybenko sitting on a rock wearing a bikini. (She, not the rock, was wearing the bikini.) Chess! I love it.

    When I searched for “Ксения” the results were similar. (It’s a common name, and therefore shared by several Russian models, actresses and singers, professions that are predictably over-represented in Image searches.) Kseniya Sobchak is popular these days, though not known for her prowess at chess.

    When I added my last name, the skin factor decreased significantly. (Whew!)

    Searches for Russian and Eastern European female names (and mine is no exception) are also bound to turn up more than a few mail-order bride (and scammer-bride) pages. So if I start asking for “just a little more money for air fare, darling,” just ignore me.

  73. Dustin says

    Milne’s was better than Bronze Dog’s. That comic was just asking for the hentai treatment.

  74. Dahan says

    The first half a dozen are just photos of people with my same name (it’s very common). Then a chair a designed and built. Nothing to out of the ordinary.

  75. Dahan says

    A chair I designed and built, that is. Sigh, not doing well with words this morning, and I’ve got a critique to run in an hour. Not good.

  81. David vun Kannon says

    Got it in one! Helps to have an odd name, and be a member of a group photo. It is interesting that the blog responses here and on PT are starting to drown out references to my professional work in Google searches.

  82. Sven DiMilo says

    Using my real name (not uncommon), with middle initial, in quotes, I get:
    1. A guy from Washington State whose name (my name!) is on the Vietnam Memorial wall
    2. A guy who’s on Death Row in Florida.

    My nom de Web brings up a bunch of totally random pix from blogs where I’ve commented (#3 is a headshot of Chad Orzel). By far the most disturbing: this one!

  83. nescientist says

    I got a guy on the texas sex offender register. With a terrifying neckbeard. I just hope my future dates don’t think to google me.

  85. Lurchgs says

    I’m not sure how to take this. Not at all..

    The first image I get with just my first name returns an imag of Lon Chaney Sr as the protagonist in The Phantom of the Opera.

    The first image I get with my full name is – appropriately enough – a picture of my father’s co-workers when he worked at CEBAF. Or is that just strange?

    Using my shortened name (no middles) actually turns up an image of… me! (well, me with my partner and our employees)

    And, finally, using my online nickname, my avatar from Dr Plait’s Bad Astronomy forum

    Only one is really surprising… and it’s almost disturbing.

  87. sinned34 says

    Sigh. My real name brings up a gentleman who shares my name and apparently writes books about training your memory. He used to be a magician? Oh well, it could be worse. At least he wasn’t a backup dancer for Madonna or employed at the Discovery Institute…
    Of course, “sinned34” brings up a bad drawing of a wooden cross. Ick!

  88. says

    Turn off “safesearch” and if your first name is a woman’s name, the fist image is likely to be porn. . .

    Posted by: Dave

    Thanks Dave. But, my initials are DP, and I think we can pretty much imagine what that search would turn up.

    On the other hand, if I search for my first name Dan, I get a picture of a happy, yet gnomish, little fellow in MA who happens to be a square-dancing instructor.

    I bet I could drink that little man under the table. Anyone want to get in on that action?

  91. DnorrisM says

    No suprises for me.

    I get hundreds of pics of a namesake who teaches the science ;) of astral projection, although he refers to it as technical remote viewing.

    That’s why I stress my middle name (No hits on my full name)

  94. Blitzgal says

    Well, the first image was some chick in a bikini, but the second was some awesome graffiti artwork of my first name that is currently my new desktop image. Fun exercise.

  97. David Harmon says

    This has reminded me why I don’t google myself.

    First I misunderstood the instructions, and was looking for images from the regular Google search: David Harmon’s murder in a quiet Kansas town went unsolved for two decades. That’s worse than the first time I ever tried that, when I just got a jealousy-inducing alternate — working at the Smithsonian, with a family, and two books out on ecological diversity!

    Nevertheless, I tried Google Images. The first two are apparently for a Tour De France contender, the third is a snarky poster I saw in the NYC subway and sent to GrrlScientist. (Not even any of my plant/fungi photos that she also posted, <sniff> ;-) )

    Adding my middle initial gets more jealousy — Somebody doing green architecture.

    All three names gets only a CAPTCHA image for some random forum; without the quotes, the search dissolves into Mark Harmon (with David McCallum) and several Michael Harmons, the first of them represented by a pair of tombstone shots. (No relation, it’s a Baptist cemetery.)

  100. Kseniya says

    Rey,

    Kseniya, is that rock climbing gal you? And uh, are you free Friday night?

    LoL, and No, she’s not me and I am not her, though I do resemble her from that angle (in that I, too, exhibit bilateral symmetry and often tie my hair back). And unlike her, I do not have a Russian surname.

    The photo suggests she has more upper-body strength (inevitable, given her chosen sport) but less height, so I doubt she could block my baseline jumper without, you know, climbing all over me or looping a rope around my neck and driving a rawl bolt into my eye socket. In either case, I get two from the charity stripe, baby! :-D

    My brother is the real rock-climber in the family.

  105. says

    Mine comes up as Ryan Sheckler, some skater boy I have never heard of. Bizarre…

    Next up was Ryan Merriman, who was that annoying kid in Halloween: Resurrection (odd), which makes me none the happier.

    At least Ryan Phillippe is in the top ten.

  106. says

    Lessee, with safe search on, the first hit on my first name is some cheerleader’s photo album. The inevitable pictures of flowers follow. The first celebrity with my first name: Heather Locklear. With safe search off, yeah, porn.

    Full name brings up a needlepoint design that I’ve used as an avatar at various sites. Then it finds other people with my name. No pictures of me that I saw.

    Last name gets several pictures of my cousin, Tom Kuhn. Yes, that Tom Kuhn, of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions fame.

  109. says

    Well, that was surprising. My initials are a stock ticker abbreviation and turn up pictures relating to that. 90% of the images for my full name yield my publications, but one links to Good Math, Bad Math, where someone quoted a news story about some of my research. I’ve been mentioned on a scienceblog! I’m famous!

  110. Sonja says

    That’s interesting Scott (#26).

    But don’t do a Google images search on my name if at work.

  111. Charles Soto says

    I think it would be more interesting to search the Urban Dictionary. But that’s just me…

    Charles

  112. ANF says

    First name yields tons of nerdy high-school and official company type photos. Yawn.

    Did my whole name in quotes and all 26 hits were actually me. Most were not actually pictures of me, but most were related to a web site I made back in November, 1995 that’s still up and living at the Univ. of Michigan. The site actually got pretty famous in a narrow circle of art historians, but its fame lives on. :)

    Googlism doesn’t know me, but when I typed in a common blog and forum name I use, it said that I was 166 Mhz. ??

    ANF

  116. says

    My name turns up a photo of what I take to be the famous British poet who shares my name.

    #47: “keith douglas is the greatest thing since spice racks” — woohoo!

  117. Hank Alme says

    First one for “Hank Alme” is a graph plotting cites vs. publication year for papers that cite a paper from Supercomputing 2001 that I contributed to. Boring.

    The second is more interesting, maybe, as it loops pack into Pharyngula. It’s the photo PZ posted (January 2006) of the DVD of “Root of All Evil?” he got from Dawkins. I joined in the chorus of envious USonians in the comments.