Since it’s my 20th anniversary year, I thought I would tart up my bio. And what better way to do that in 2024. than to ask an online AI chatbot to write it for me based only upon publicly available online info. So that’s what I did. I used Google Gemini (nee Bard).
What Gemini wrote is the following:
Based on publicly available information, the northlondonhippy appears to be:
- An author: Their primary online presence seems connected to their book titled “Personal Use,” which explores their experiences with drug use.
- An online personality: They describe themselves as a “fictional hippy and make-believe online drug activist,” suggesting a playful and potentially satirical approach to their online persona.
- A media figure: They have been interviewed on LBC Radio, likely promoting their book and potentially discussing drug-related issues.
- Someone with experience in journalism: Their past employment includes working for major organizations like BBC News, AP, Reuters, primarily as a journalist.
- An advocate (potentially): While their self-description includes “make-believe” drug activism, their writing and media appearance suggest an interest in and potential advocacy around drug-related issues.
Disclaimer: It’s important to note that this information is based solely on publicly available sources and may not be entirely accurate or represent the full picture of who the northlondonhippy is. Their true identity and motivations remain unknown.
For the sake of transparency. here’s a full screenshot of the interaction:
The only thing Gemini doesn’t catch is my latest incarnation, #EpilepsyHippy, but that’s still a bit recent. So I asked a specific follow-up to get this response:
Based on my search, #EpilepsyHippy seems to be primarily associated with [an] online persona:
The northlondonhippy: This individual, also known as @northlondonhippy [or @nthlondonhippy] on social media, uses the hashtag in connection with their experiences living with Right Temporal Lobe Epilepsy.
They describe themselves as a “writer/fake hippy” and have written about their journey with epilepsy on their website, northlondonhippy.com.
Not bad. And here’s a screenshot of that second interaction:
The whole epilepsy thing has kinda taken over my entire life. It sucks in a big way.
That’s hit all the highlights. If you are still craving more details, what follows is a slightly tweaked version of my old bio, to fill in some of the rest of the blanks.
In 2004, Doug – the northlondonhippy, began writing and publishing his work anonymously online. He wrote mainly about drugs, and drug use, specifically his own. For many years, Doug was that “loveable make-believe hippy from the internet.”. Now, he is make-believe no more.
In late 2016, Doug published his first book, “Personal Use”. In it, he chronicled his long, glorious, and unapologetic lifetime of ingesting and enjoying recreational drugs over a period spanning 35 years (it’s over 40 years now). These days he is a medicinal cannabis user, and Doug campaigns to reform the United Kingdom’s archaic and harmful drug laws.
After a very brief period promoting “Personal Use”, Doug withdrew back into his work, as a Senior Broadcast Journalist at BBC News, but he never stopped being a secret internet hippy.
During his 15 years with BBC News, Doug managed the initial BBC newsgathering response to countless breaking news events. A small selection of international stories Doug dealt with includes the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami in Asia, the death of Michael Jackson, the Bataclan terrorist attack in Paris, and the death of Osama Bin Laden.
In 2017, Doug had a run of major breaking news happen while he was working on the BBC Home Desk. They included the Manchester Arena bombing, the London Bridge terror attack, and the fire at Grenfell Tower, and they all had a profound effect on him.
Before the BBC, Doug worked for AP and Reuters. He travelled a lot, and spent time in Bosnia and Croatia during the war in the 90s, covered the Olympics in Atlanta in ’96, including the bomb, And was also deployed to Long Island around the same time, to cover the aftermath of the crash of TWA 800. He also took a handful of trips to Africa. He was even in Somalia when the US Marines first landed on the beach in December 1992, but saw no Blackhawk helicopters shot down.
In 2018, Doug began having weird, difficult to describe, neurological symptoms, combined with a serious depressive episode. It got so bad that he had stop working. Over the next few years, the symptoms grew worse until he had a series of serious cluster seizures in 2021, and nearly died. He was eventually diagnosed with a rare form of epilepsy. He’s still learning to live with it.
Doug recently launched his first campaign, called The Ceasefire Initiative. It’s just a small, simple idea to help bring about an end to the war on drugs.
You can also find Doug – the northlondonhippy on Twitter: @nthlondonhippy and a host of other platforms.
Brilliant on LBC today .Good luck.