Is Matt Drudge Stalking an Israeli DJ on Twitter?
Is conservative web-linker and race hustler Matt Drudge stalking an Israeli house DJ on Twitter? This is probably not a question you thought you would be asking yourself on a Tuesday morning. And yet: the internet has a funny way of asking questions for you.
The great modern journalistic experiment of Buzzfeed has finally paid off, thanks to this wonderful, wonderful piece by John Herrman, who ran Drudge's personal (AOL) email address through both Twitter's "import followers" tool, and a similar Gmail extension, and discovered it had been used to register the Twitter handle @nathanmia. (Drudge's middle name is Nathan; he lives in Miami.)
No big deal for a prominent media figure to have an anonymous personal Twitter account, obviously! But, say, John, what is @nathanmia up to?
The account appears to have been created for one purpose: to talk to [Israeli DJ] Offer Nissim. Nissim is its only follow, and all five tweets are directed at the musician
The tweets:
— nateman (@nathanmia) June 25, 2010
@djoffernissim MAYA CD! MASTERPIECE.MY REVIEW, LOVEhttp://www.offernissimfans.com/offernissimfans/Forums/Message.aspx?ForumMessage=4561
— nateman (@nathanmia) July 10, 2010
@djoffernissim come to miami my darling!
— nateman (@nathanmia) July 19, 2010
@djoffernissim what is your favorite song this summer?
— nateman (@nathanmia) August 26, 2010
@djoffernissim you keep getting better and better and better... GIVE US EVERYTHING!
— nateman (@nathanmia) October 11, 2010
@djoffernissim WHAT ARE YOU WORKING ON?TELL US! WHAT DO YOU DREAM?
As Herrman points out, the account has been inactive since 2010 — but the message board account linked to in the tweets has been used within the last four months. Herrman has both of "Nathan"'s message-board reviews up on Buzzfeed. They are... not very well-written. But certainly enthusiastic. And weirdly concerned with Iran? Here's his take on "My Pride": "A sad, sweeping song, that sounds like it is being sung as Iranian missiles have been launched." And on "Tel Aviv": "With war drums in the air and bomb fears from Iran looming, this is Offer's anthem for the era."
So is @nathanmia our favorite fedora enthusiast? (Drudge is, of course, a devoted fan of dance music, and has linked to an article featuring Nissim in the past.) He denied it to Herrman, pointing out that "he's been the target of other online attempts to compromise his identity." But from everything we can tell, in order for Drudge's personal email address to be associated with the Twitter handle @nathanmia, he needs to have verified the address — i.e., whoever is using @nathanmia needs to have access to Drudge's personal email account.