Dan Kelly

For something he considered an experiment in the mundane, Matt McClintock's Web site at mc.clintock.com has generated a surprising amount of global attention. McClintock, a Web site administrator by profession, wanted to experiment with PHP and Apache computer programming by compiling an online representation of his home's contents. Not satisfied with merely listing all his worldly goods, McClintock photographed and posted them to the Web as well. From the books on his shelves to the boxer shorts in his dresser, at mc.clintock.com, visitors can click through a virtual tour of McClintock's domicile.

A mention on link clearinghouses memepool and metafilter in June led to a server-melting barrage of 400,000 hits per day. Soon after, story-fodder-seeking journalists blitzed McClintock. Predictably, Wired was the first at his doorstep. Interviews with the New York Times, BBC, and NPR followed. Soon after, Los Angeles TV, Japanese radio, and Norwegian magazines were all knocking at McClintock's virtual door. More surprising to him is the number of ordinary Web surfers interested in his living conditions, which are likely not so different from their own.

"It was interesting to see how many British and Irish people visited my sock drawer," offers McClintock.

McClintock is delighted and amused at the attention his home life has received. He's also received lessons in international etiquette. A Muslim woman from Singapore, for example, informed him that she has only entered the site as far as the living room, the idea of entering a person's bedroom being entirely too invasive. Conversely, according to his Web stats, for myriad anonymous others, a search for "the good stuff" (i.e., porn), is pro forma. McClintock remains faithful to his vision of revealing all, holding back only on showing tax documents and similar materials that could be used to defraud him. Above all, his home's true location remains a secret. While located somewhere in the Chicago area, McClintock's home could be anywhere, while, through the Web, it is everywhere.

Despite its clean design and stockpiled images, McClintock's site retains the warmth of the traditional open house, without sacrificing his privacy. Unlike the multitudinous exhibitionists showing their private parts across the Net, mc.clintock.com is refreshingly free of its occupant's ego. From one point of view, you travel through McClintock's home as McClintock, seeing his items as he sees them. Simultaneously, he is the site's deus ex machina. He's everywhere, yet evasive. Like The Turn of the Screw, no matter how furiously you click, you may never catch sight of the home's resident.

"I'm not there," says McClintock, "There's no egotistical connection, and nothing you find really ties itself to me... It's totally revealing, but it doesn't reveal a damn thing about me."

While delighted with the attention, McClintock, a long-time technophile, realizes the fleeting nature of Web celebrity.

"After all, it's not the sort of site where people come back to see if I've moved the couch."

(2002-10-02)

Also by Dan Kelly

CHEESED OFF
Uneasy lies the head that wears King VelVeeda's crown. That head belongs to Chicago cartoonist Stuart Helm, the King's alter ego, who, in late March, was sued by Kraft Foods, which alleges trademark infringement of the company's Velveeta cheese product.
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TEXT WARS
Soon, books will become obsolete, rendered amusing anachronisms by the advance of electronica. E-books will seize the territory currently occupied by fusty old paper books, and free text from its tightened—academic and literary—constraints.
(2001-08-30)

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