Speaking on this week's episode of Andrew Denton's Interview programme, 2004 Australian Idol winner Donovan revealed the truth of her long-term relationship with a "man" she had never met.
An older colleague expressed some surprise that an online deception of this magnitude could continue for six years.
I couldn't stop myself from responding. I am only a year younger than Donovan and I was an early adopter of the internet. I said; "It wasn't easy to figure out that someone was lying to you on the internet back then. The same thing happened to me."
Donovan was just 16 years old when she won Idol — "a little bit emo, a little bit depressed" — I was 15 that year and in a similar state of mind. While Donovan was being launched into the spotlight, I found community in the nascent internet, specifically on DeviantArt (a social networking website for artists and art enthusiasts) and on Neopets (a game platform where you raise cute pets). I met my American friend, Claire*, on Neopets. We were both regulars on the forums, and we switched to MSN to chat about our distant, different lives.
The early 2000s was a scary time: for parents and for fashion. Photo / Angelika Smuga
Claire was great to talk to alongside my school friends and real world crushes, and I remember that we often spoke about boys. Claire would constantly talk about her friend Dallas, or Dally. I can't remember when "Dally" started talking to me, or why, but Claire must have introduced "us". Dally was blonde, handsome, and wanted to talk to me a lot. He was also "my age"! I immediately developed a crush on him.
*Claire's name is changed not because I want to protect her, but because I honestly don't remember her name. I was lucky that the Dally deception didn't last long. I liked him, so I remembered when his stories didn't line up. He was never online at the same time as Claire.
Since I preferred "Dally" to Claire, when I got suspicious, I removed them both from my online world. By this stage Claire and Dally were taking turns to manufacture a grand drama over whether or not Dally liked "her or me" better, and it was all getting very fishy. This is America; I cut my losses. There were other weird boys and girls to meet in the real world.
The point I would like to make is that the farce could have so easily continued. Back then I didn't use Skype and I was far too self-conscious to use video chat anyway. Dallas sent photos but reverse image search didn't exist back then to identify them as fakes. MSN was nightmare-fuel for parents in the "naughties"; there was a terrifying number of people who wanted to speak to young girls like me and could easily do so. My mum would have been utterly horrified.
I remember the day MSN did the responsible thing and shut down their public internet chat rooms. I was disappointed but also relieved; I had real world friends who deserved the attention I was lavishing on illusions.
I was very lucky; the more isolated and vulnerable you are, the harder it can be to escape these dangerous traps. For an insecure teen exploring the wild west of the internet in 2004, the attention was powerful and addictive. I'm sure it still is.
