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[Demos182]

Synopsis and Link Here
People decide to play an intricate, 3 year long prank on a stranger

[Holy the Goalie]

Wow, I wish I was smart enough to waste massive amounts of my free time in order to harass and confuse a complete stranger.  The only losers in that story are the apparently unemployed idiots that wasted tons of their own time and money to pull a prank on someone that seemed to enjoy the "prank."

[Liquorish]

I saw this a few days ago read through the whole thing (takes a while). I'm going with the assumption that it's so complex, it has to be real.

It's an amazing story and I have to disagree about the perpetrators being losers. If they were indeed unemployed at the time, I'd imagine they've been recruited by the CIA by now.
That's the one uneasy element for me, in this case a benign and even wondrous (series of) event(s) was created, but as they stated themselves, they were manipulating his trust and he had to take many leaps of faith.
The last part was kind of cheesy, but simultaneously so convoluted in it's creation that I have to give it props.
I'd have little hesitation in saying that at some point (may already have happened) that techniques like this or similar will be used to lure someone into something much less innocent though. You just need the right motivation on the perpetrators part, and the right lack of judgment on the subject's.

Having said all that, I'm actually slightly jealous that I've not had a three year, friendly, mind-fuck happen to me. That's the kind of stuff that would re-wire your brain (in this case, for the better/weirder). I'm betting you could dine out on that story for a loooong time.

[Allister]

I would agree with Goalie if it were the pranker's intention to hurt the victim but in this case it seems like it was innocent fun from the offing; it is a profound waste of time on a scale rarely matched but is that not the titular aim of this website? If not the entire internet? I laud them for the little bit of wonder they brought in to another, rather gullible, person's life.

[Rockin Joe 12]

And, if you can really convince someone that they are being

lead around the city in search of robots, buried treasure and information needed to save the future

then you deserve some credit for damn good creativity.

[Sa9jev]

But if you

monitored and recorded Kolin’s AOL instant messages and gathered information about his friends and family from other sources on the net

in regards to a complete stranger, then you are a fucking creep.

[Darkside_of_AH]

rather gullible

Did you even read the full story?  There's a huge difference between gullibility and curiosity. 

I love how well the "pranksters" are able to judge Kolin's willingness to play along, to the point that they plant clues in an art exhibit months ahead of time, expecting that Kolin would discover it and investigate.

[curiouswonderer]

Is it just me, or did the whole "Robots-from-the-future-comes-to-the-past-to-kill-the-future-Resistance-leader" feel very Terminator-ish?

[Nimby]

No, it reminded me more of Bedtime for Bonzo.

[Hungarian]

Demos182, I'm your future self. Check your inbox for instructions.