To Live and Die on the Internet

To Live and Die on the Internet
(written on Oct. 22, 2010)
by Sandra Wade

NOTE: All forum quotes in this article were copied and pasted, with original misspellings left intact.

On October 15th, 2010, just after 11pm, local L.A. model/actress “Clare Hess” died of cancer.

Or did she?

This is either a heartwarming story about the human spirit... about people coming together to comfort a beautiful actress/model who, despite facing death at a tragically early age, chose to share her last moments with others on the forum of Model Mayhem, a popular social networking site, to inspire others to be nice to each other and appreciate the richness of life.

OR...it’s a cynical story about a disturbing hoax perpetrated by a perhaps mentally unbalanced, devious person who, for unknown reasons, pulled the wool over the eyes of hundreds of people.

Model Mayhem can certainly live up to its name at times. I use Model Mayhem (MM) to network with photographers and display my modeling portfolio. If you stick to using the site as just a place to promote your work, you’re probably not aware of the controversy and politics for which MM is known.

Even a cursory dip of the feet into the MM forums, however, can be a rude education about the worst of human behavior often on display in the industry. Like a lot of largely unregulated online squawk boxes, MM's forums can be full of mudslinging, racism, bigotry, and intolerance. A teenage clique mentality often surfaces, and certain "more Zoolander-than-thou” photographers and models gang up on those they perceive as “wannabes”. Sometimes the forum’s moderators, who are mostly unpaid volunteers, either fail to enforce the rules, selectively enforce the rules, and/or join in the high schoolish cyber bullying.

Model Mayhem’s reputation in that regard is well-known by tongue-in-cheek urban slang authorities like Encyclopedia Dramatica. Their entry describing the MM forums claims they are “full of drama...full of models getting butthurt about doing (sic) nudes...GWCs (guys with cameras, a derogatory name for “photographers” who just want to see naked chicks) bawling (sic) about models not wanting to do nudes....women complaining about female problems and why it’s so hard to be a model.”

In mid-September 2010, however, a beacon of light emerged from this murky cesspool of nastiness - a forum thread entitled, “Some News About Me.” It read:

“Hello MM,

I wasn't going to bring this up just now but because the issue may be a little more pressing than I was thinking just last week and I may not get the chance latter.

I was diagnosed with cancer a little more than a year ago, and it has progressed to the point that I am indeed terminal and I am not going to be continuing treatment because the benefit has become by far outweighed by the drawbacks.

What is happening now is my liver is giving out and so my time may be very short.

I wish for everyone to know here that MM has been a bright spot for me many days for as long as I have been here.

Many of you here mean a lot to me and I will carry a bit of all of you where I'm going when I go.

Be kind and loving, "Don't let the sun go down on your troubles".

Love Clare.”

Clare’s simple sentiments, and the public revelation that someone so young and beautiful could die so soon, touched hundreds of MM participants. Responses flooded into the thread. Members posted well wishes, sympathies, mini-motivational posters, statements of gratitude for “reminding us to appreciate and savor the joy in every moment”, and videos of Celine Dion songs on youtube, to give Clare some much-needed inspiration.

Many of the responses were downright poetic:

“Dear Claire

It's a beautiful morning out today - The cool breeze on your skin has that unmistakable feel of autumn. A changing of the tide, from Summer.

I think about you - and hope you will see the same things soon - feel those cool breezes.”

After a week, Clare’s thread stretched out for pages and pages and pages. If it were one of those impromptu, side-of-the-road memorials, it probably would have spread the entirety of Route 66. Clare’s thread rapidly developed into a rare display of MM people forgetting about their petty rivalries for a while to support a dying woman and reflect on the brevity of life.

Even the MM moderators, traditionally a crabby lot on the forums, expressed their amazement and joy at the profound outpouring of communal spirit Clare’s thread had inspired:

“I've got to say is that this has got to be the most unusual thread there has ever been on MM. Ten pages and going strong, of love. Who would have ever thought that was even possible on here.

Clare, you will always be an inspiration on this site and in all of our lives. “

Clare would pop in every day or so to give an update on her condition. She indicated she had to leave her place in Los Angeles to stay with Daniel Colegrove, a photographer in Ventura who was taking care of her.

Clare raved about Daniel in many of her posts.

“No mater how difficult things are or have ever been Daniel has faith, I don't know in what, but he has it. And I should have faith that he knows what he's doing because of that.”

Sometimes, when Clare was ostensibly too ill to post, Daniel would pop in and report:

“It's about midnight thirty here... Been a long day... Well, was a long yesterday.

They moved Clare back in with the machines... Stuff... Just stuff... She's sick.

Read her all the notes from well wishers from here. I did get the messages etc and will sort through it in the morning or something.

One of Clare's friends from LA came up for a brief visit... Never met her before... Seemed nice.

More to say but I'll deal with it later.”

From the beginning to the middle of October, Clare was in and out of the hospital. During one such visit, Daniel posted an update with a rather odd footnote at the end:

“Alright I'm awake now...

I read through the thread and my messages... Answered couple... But here:

At the moment Clare is at Ventura County Medical Center (VCMC)...

Note 2: Clare has been adamant that she doesn't want for anything.

Note 3: Although you could probably guess this but Clare Hesse is a pseudonym...
Even though everyone calls her Clare this isn't her legal name. If she tell me to I'll clue everyone in... A couple of people here know it but PLEASE CLEAR IT WITH HER FIRST if you are going to spill.

The above note is mostly for the Conspiracy Theorist crowd.”

Members continued to chime in on the thread....every day, newbies would find it and post messages of hope and prayers for Clare. Clare, instead of lamenting her lot in life, constantly spoke of how great Daniel was to her. She suggested bestowing if not a sainthood, at least a knighthood, on Daniel for his dedication to his sick friend, and many members chimed in to agree.

On October 16, Daniel reported that the worst case scenario everyone had feared, yet expected--Clare’s death--had taken place the night before.

“Hey...

Clare went to bed Thursday evening and she didn't get up from then... She passed on ahead of us late Friday night.

I'm sorry I didn't get in here to let you all know sooner...

I will get back to everyone as soon as I can get it together.”

In the days following the death notice, people posted more inspirational songs on youtube, more poems, many simple responses of “RIP Clare”...it was clear that people who had been following Clare's ordeal were choked up and very upset by her passing. There was talk of tears shed, even as they were writing their posts.

“
Clare,

I know you are smiling down above us and are in a happy, healthy, painless place right now.

You have touched so many lives in your short time on this earth, and I am extremely grateful for being able to say I know you.

Ive talked about you to my fiance so much that he knows who you are when I mention the name Clare.

RIP Clare.

I will never forget you.“

The thread continued to waft flowers and sympathies, up until the fateful day that someone posted the question Daniel must have reasonably known was coming:

“RIP.

Sorry for your loss Daniel.

May we have her real name and funeral info?”

No response was forthcoming.

That day, a brand new member from Ventura called MrMarx posted:

“I'm not a big MM guy but I knew Claire and worked with her on occasion, I'm actually helping sort out her things.

She spent a lot of time on here just looking and apparently did some moderation here too. She had pretty much quit working as a model, not because she had lost "It" but more because she had moved into the "Film Industry". I guess this was her connection to the industry she enjoyed so much.

My fondest memories of her are of how she would laugh. It was so infectious, once Claire started laughing? You might as well put all the equipment away because everyone would be rolling on the floor.

By all accounts, she went very peacefully on Friday Oct. 15 around 11 pm. She spent her last evening with close friends and the kids she loved like they were her own.

Something I want to mention is that she did not chicken out, she rode it out to the end and I'm sure she did it to demonstrate to the people she loved so much that she wanted to be there for them.

She left a sticky note here on her computer that says "please tell all my friends on Model Mayhem goodbye for me".”

As soon as "MrMarx" informed everyone about the last-minute sticky note, however, he was gone--his profile disappeared. A moderator explained that he had removed it, but this odd blip of an appearance by MrMarx triggered some skepticism on the thread.

Three days after her reported death, questions about her funeral remained unanswered. Finally, Daniel responded that there would be no funeral...Clare didn’t want flowers...but his vague replies just raised more questions.

Moderators soon started deleting posts that raised doubt or confusion. Explanations on the censored postings told inquiring minds with questions, “this is not the thread for questions, please take them elsewhere.”

Take them elsewhere they did...a whole new thread was started called the girl from hawaii-the dude with the eyepatch.” The title was a bit of a “wink wink nudge nudge” reference to two prior hoaxes perpetrated on Model Mayhem.

Although the original poster of this thread had followed the moderator's directive to "take your questions elsewhere", his simple act of even bringing up the topic of these two hoaxes immediately landed him a subtle threat by a high-ranking member of the MM mod posse:

“Check the brig log, the 2 prominent members who are no longer on this site and ask yourself if you want to keep pushing this.”

This didn't quell the questions.

Without explaining how he knew, one of the moderators actually assured everyone that Daniel and Clare were both real. When someone replied with the understandable prompt, "Did you ever speak with Clare on the phone?", she was brigged (being brigged means you are unable to post on the forums for a period of time determined by the moderator.)

The true believers continued to vouch for Daniel and Clare-even though no one could say they had met either Clare or Daniel, it was pointed out that Clare Hess had been a gatekeeper, for chrissake. Gatekeepers are members selected by the moderators to approve profiles. They determine who is allowed on the site. Surely, they argued, the moderators must have put Clare through a vetting process, to determine she was real, before giving her a position of power?

But the skeptics were unswayed. As arguments got nasty, personal, and political, with people splitting off into the "non-believer/believer" factions, there were ongoing briggings of the skeptics, and some of their posts were hidden as "personal attacks" against Daniel. Many members chafed at what they considered to be Soviet Politburo-like tactics.

There was a surprising amount of support for censorship, however, and many expressed disgust that anyone in the MM community would try to drag a dying girl's rescuer through the mud.

“This is not something that is an old wound, this is something some of us (myself included) are dealing with - this just happened. Wether you believe it or not, doesn't matter to the people who do, and why not let them/us/me be.

Very very bad taste.”

Despite such valiant attempts by the true believers at pushing for more decorum, the skeptical posts continued. And it wasn’t just Daniel’s blithe dismissal of funeral details and inquiries into Clare’s real name that caused people to question reports of Clare’s death and, eventually, Clare’s very existence.

A flurry of sleuthing was going on behind the scenes among certain members of the MM community. People started noticing a lot of odd inconsistencies and weirdness surrounding Clare’s knight in shining armor, Daniel Colegrove:

1) Despite his status as a little-known wedding photographer, Daniel Colegrove has a wikipedia page, written by a journalist named Moshe Richart. The page refers to a website containing colorful articles about Daniel’s outrageous adventures in a Chilean prison and covering 3 wars. A footnote mentions that Moshe Richart died in 2008.

Many skeptics who dug up the page said that they conducted searches for information on a “Moshe Richart” and found nothing. Apparently, there is no journalist listed anywhere with that name.

Someone named Myra Edison is given a contribution attribution on the Wikipedia page and listed as the writer of the articles lauding Daniel's bravery and expertise. Currently, the wikipedia article is flagged for removal with the following statement: “It is proposed that this article be deleted because of the following concern:

The article has no references other than the subject's own site. Several of the original content writers appear to be sock puppet accounts.

2) On a photography site, a model named Claire Edison gives a rave review of Daniel Colegrove’s headshot-taking ability. Her photo on the site, however, looks just like the recently deceased Clare Hess. A Google search of “Claire Edison” pulls up no information abut anyone who could have been using those headshots.

Clare Hess, in fact, had no photos from any other photographers on her profile besides Colegrove’s, and she had been an MM member since 2007. Many photographers had expressed the desire to work with her on her profile tag board, but apparently, no one had.

3) When Daniel was asked early on on the “Some News About Me” thread about Clare’s real name, he posted:

“Want Clare's legal name?

Myra Holden... I think... Could be Holden-Eubanks or just Eubanks... She was always Clare to me and everyone I knew that knows her.”

Was Clare, the dying model, and Myra Eubanks, the Wikipedia contributor, the same person (gasp)? If so, Clare would have had to travel through time to write the articles-they were listed as written in the 1980s. In fact, as Model Mayhem refugee Pat Yuen pointed out in a blog he writes about the site, Daniel Colegrove had a “circle jerk” of references, all with similar names and who died mysterious deaths.

It struck a lot of people as odd that Daniel did not seem to know Clare’s real name. After all, he shot this woman and probably paid her for the work...he claimed that she had babysat his children..he took her in and took care of her during her last days... they seemed to be as tight as a steel boned corset on a fat chick.

4) Further research by amateur MM investigators revealed that Colegrove was kicked off a BMW site for using four different profiles in this one thread.

None of this information seemed to matter to the Model Mayhem moderators, however. Many posts revealing the circumstantial evidence Model Mayhem’s amateur Sherlocks were uncovering by the minute, got censored, and their threads were locked as soon as they were posted.

In my opinion, the moderators must have realized they had gone too far with the assurances, and the very fact that they'd approved Clare as a gatekeeper meant they had reputations to uphold.

It is now late October. Censorship on Model Mayhem hasn’t stopped the conversation from continuing elsewhere on Pat Yuen’s blog and Facebook group “Beyond the Mayhem”. Daniel has even made a few appearances on the group’s chat board, leaving odd, cryptic messages about Clare being “more complicated than I ever imagined”, but still refusing to answer any questions about a funeral or death certificate.

As the outrage over the potential hoax grows louder and more Model Mayhem’ers learn about the plethora of circumstantial evidence, somebody is attempting to wipe out all evidence of Clare Hess from Model Mayhem and the rest of the web. Daniel Colegrove’s profile, under the name "Image Is Nothing" has been removed, as well, although...thanks to Google, nothing is ever REALLY permanently deleted on the interwebz.

There are many reasons to be concerned about all the secrecy. For one, if this indeed a hoax, Daniel Colegrove succeeded masterfully in pulling the wool over the eyes of tons of people for over TWO years. When a photographer wishes to work with a model, it’s considered due diligence to check with other models who’ve worked with him to make sure he’s professional. Models could easily the impression that the site is no longer a reliable venue to find work, as references are now questionable. I personally no longer have ANY faith that the profiles on the site are actually run by real people, as a result of this debacle, and I bet I am not the only one with these thoughts.

Safety is also a concern. No one is certain, if Colegrove did indeed perpetrate this hoax, why he did it. If you take the hypothetical to a paranoid extreme, it seems conceivable that a psycho killer pretending to be a photographer could easily create several fake profiles with the goal of luring young women who will trust these phantoms as references.

Model Mayhem’s sweep of this mess under the carpet suggests they either haven’t considered the safety ramifications of this mess, or don’t care.

As one former MM member, who prefers to be nameless, opined:

“The (MM) mods are a star chamber - an ugly, closed, and secretive structure with several members (not all of them, but several members) who don't give a shit about the members & only care about their own power trips.

They act like thugs and bullies and the one thing they CANNOT stand is exposure of their faults, deficiencies, weaknesses, and mistakes. Revealing such things is THE fastest way to get banned from the site.”

Evidence suggests that this opinion holds merit. The moderators were bamboozled just like everyone else, so the cover-up could be meant to avoid embarrassment. I have to ask, though - is this really the way to run a social networking site where people rely on the authenticity of professional contacts to conduct their business?

In my opinion, it would have been very easy for Model Mayhem’s management to make things right. They could still salvage their reputations by simply posting a thread expressing concern about a possible hoax. They could declare an impending investigation into the matter and apologize for their attempts at censorship. As any TV preacher or politician will tell you, it’s always better to at least APPEAR contrite once the cat is out of the bag.

I am sure I’m not alone is suggesting that I would have cut them some slack for being among the hundreds of people who were fooled, had they been more upfront and honest. These days, with the proliferation of free email accounts and the laissez-faire attitudes of most social networking sites, it’s very easy for even the least trusting, most sophisticated people to be deceived online. At a time when most people don’t even know their nextdoor neighbors and spend way too much time online, people are eager to donate their trust to random strangers. In these somewhat alienated times, it’s easy to feel drawn to the plight of a person you’ve never even met without once questioning their existence. Just ask any woman who’s lost her money to one of those Nigerian “love scammers.”

As a model, I understand that modeling and photography is all about image. The problem, however, is when concerns about image trump everything else, including the broken trust of the MM membership. The moderators seemed so concerned about saving face and avoiding embarrassment, that they left many Model Mayhem'ers feeling as if they’d been scammed not only by Daniel Colegrove, but by the site itself.

Perhaps this is Colegrove’s lesson to us-the need to discard this extreme concern with image. Could this be why he titled his profile, “Image Is Nothing”?

I also suspect that the members might not be as angry about the moderators’ role in the incident as the moderators seem to think. This post from the “girl from hawaii’ thread carries a clue:

“I do not believe this has been a hoax, I do not believe I have been fooled; and I claim that if it does turn out to be a hoax, I have nothing to feel embarrassed about, I have no reason to be ashamed of being fooled, rather the feelings I felt reveal my humanity, my compassion, my heart; why should I fear showing that?”

If it was a hoax, the lingering question on everyone’s lips is....why? Perhaps Daniel Cosgrove wanted to look more notable than he was. He created these models who seemed to fall over themselves extolling his virtues. Maybe he had a serious case of low self-esteem. It’s doubtful that any answer will be forthcoming, even though he has teased the Beyond Model Mayhem group with the prospect of one. I can only surmise that certain cryptic clues might be found in Colegrove’s Model Mayhem profile:

“First of all... Let me be the one to tell you that I am a head case, you will find out soon enough but I'd rather you heard it from me first. Here, go listen to some Blur. Second... I'm pretty much here for entertainment purposes only and I hope my portfolio reflects this fact. Here, go listen to some Blue Man Group with Venus Hum. And... If you Google my name... Take it all with a grain of salt. Here, go listen to some Missing Persons. Also and...In the immortal words of my friend Lou Reed:"Life's Like Mayonnaise Soda". Here, go Listen to Some King Crimson. or some David Bowie. "

UPDATE - October 25:

On October 24, a member of Model Mayhem conducted his own independent investigation and discovered proof that Daniel Colegrove had perpetrated a hoax. An exploration of Colegrove’s MySpace page yielded evidence that Colegrove had used a photo he had taken of one of his daughter’s friends to construct his fake “Clare Hess” profile.

The member contacted her, and she responded:

“ I did some of those modeling pictures for Daniel. He is one of my friends Dads whom I hardly speak to anymore. I’m clearly not dead and am not suffering from cancer.”

Many have wondered how a sockpuppet profile could have been approved as a gatekeeper, and have called out for an investigation. One moderator mentioned on a recent thread that research into better verification technologies was going on "behind the scenes." I doubt too many people are holding their breaths. Especially since other moderators have continued, even after proof of the hoax was revealed, to insist the skeptics were wrong and that no one was brigged unjustifiably.

One moderator actually told a prominent member as he was brigging her, in a rare moment of candor, “"Looks like we've been fooled but that doesn't change the fact that you disrupted the thread". Translation: "You were right to question us, but we're punishing you anyway."

The revelation of the hoax on the MM forums caused another huge forum uproar for the last few days. Accusations descended to the ridiculously paranoid level, with some members raising the specter of a grand conspiracy involving Pat Yuen, the model, Daniel Colgrove, and many others. Some questioned whether the girl whose photo was used, even existed. The crew that originally expressed skepticism called out for the true believers to eat crow and apologize. They received one...from a member. No apologies were issued from a single moderator.

It's obvious that many people feel horribly emotionally manipulated, and the wounds are still raw. Whether this incident will result in any site changes remains to be seen-there have been no site-wide announcements by MM as of October 25, 2010, just more forum mudslinging.

People have short attention spans, however, so I suspect this frenzy will soon die out. The drama will dissipate. And we will be once again stuck with "....models getting butthurt about doing nudes..." and similar topics.

NOTE: I have chosen not to reveal the real model’s name, as she has been bombarded with unwanted attention from the MM membership. I would prefer people leave her in peace so she can devote her time to suing the pants off Daniel Colegrove.