Who goes around getting someone's autographs? Obviously a large chunk of humanity. I was at a recent conference where an apparently successful author had just published a book on the hot topic of the day. After the conference there was a mad rush of book buyers to get this person to sign their copy of the book.
Now first question -
In today's day and age of rampant identity theft do these authors actually pen their signature like they were signing a check? Or do they have a fake signature to give out to the millions of dolts that want this scribble on an otherwise pristine copy?
In case of the latter its already a sham since what that person does on someone's copy of the book is equivalent to graffiti as its not the real thing.
If it is a real signature then it actually might prove that the book belongs to the signer and not the signee and further screws up the idea of owning a new copy.
If the person signing is giving out his signatures willy nilly to any homeless that profers a copy of this book he wrote then it would be cool to see if his accounts got breached.
Second question -
Going back to the actual subject of why certain indivduals feel the urge to get signatures on stuff from celebrities is a mystery to my simple mind. I say celebrities because other than my bank no one has ever asked me to sign my name on anything. So it goes to say that certain people feel awed by other humans to the point that they will go for any crap that the so called celebrity doles out.
There are examples of Brittany Spears' hair and other detritus (including Reagan's blood sample and someone's last breath - that stinks) of other personalities being sold on eBay for monstrous sums.
If you really think hard you will realize there is no meaning to the idea of collecting anyone's signatures on anything anyway. What does that prove? To whom? Unless its a personally addressed note with certain significance, collecting stuff at random book signings and sportstar autographs on balls and bats and caps are an example of vanity to the extreme. Not to mention a huge bother to the person being accosted to get him to scribble on your stuff. Although some show offs actually enjoy the idea of signing off on any surface given a chance.
Moral of the story - Signs are pointing to a doomsday not far away!
This time for a tech conference in the realm of what else? AI. But applied to an oft neglected space called Knowledge Management. The latter is a community of practice that focuses on analyzing, organizing and making available reams of data that have been gathered over time by various functions within an organization for anyone in the company to utilize. This function or process is ripe for applying AI agents (or agentic AI framework) and optimize for better outcomes. It was informative. More rewarding was getting acquainted with folks who practice this craft as well as learning of what they see in the corporate or public sectors. Since the venue was Washington DC it also afforded me the chance to take evening strolls albeit the weather was trying. With wind chill in the single digit it still is a glamorous place to perambulate through history absorbing what this country has been through since its founding days. I was able to visit the place Lincoln was killed along with his monument t...
With some recent experience of signing book copies, I can say that at least I wrote a personalised note to the buyer, before doing the real thing..but I have not really wanted anyone to sign anything at all. Maybe it's a Type A and Type B type thing. I must have some other disorder!
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