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A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

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Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#151

Post by ricardo81 »

0x1F8B wrote: post #67

> IN APRIL 2017, a man started hiking in a state park just north of New York City. He wanted to get away, maybe from something and maybe from everything. > Everyone who goes into the woods is trying to get away from something. > Everyone, at some point, has wanted to put their phone in a garbage can and head off with a fake name and a wad of cash. Since you are here I want to mention how off-putting this rhetoric is…

Agreed, I've been working online for 20+ years in the Scottish Borders in a town of 15K people, with the forest and fields a minute walk away.

> Everyone who goes into the woods is trying to get away from something.

Getting into something is maybe more apt. Walking the dog in the middle of the countryside is very peaceful and regenerative, it grounds you. "Getting away from something" makes it sound like the something is the modus operandi when it never was. It's almost like it adds more nuance to a man's story, you know, the fast living 21st century tech man who has an epiphany. Perhaps the 80-hour a week tech worker's walk into nature means something more than other people's... or not really.

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#152

Post by sebmellen »

newguysofly wrote: post #147

Pretty sure I found him in like ten seconds. I just searched NAMUS for people matching his characteristics, and I found a Joseph Wayne McCartan from Louisiana. MH claimed to be from there. They also look strikingly similar. Further, JWC was suspected to have been a cancer survivor. This could explain the large abdominal scar—and, if the cancer recurred, the wasting. Check this reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Mo…

I took a look at the picture of JWC, and I can't quite see the resemblance, but maybe I'm missing something. Is there any mention of JWC working in tech?

Edit: From the missing persons website:

> Last seen on shrimping boat in the Texas area in the Gulf of Mexico.

Seems somewhat unlikely that's him.

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#153

Post by notsuoh »

newguysofly wrote: post #147

Pretty sure I found him in like ten seconds. I just searched NAMUS for people matching his characteristics, and I found a Joseph Wayne McCartan from Louisiana. MH claimed to be from there. They also look strikingly similar. Further, JWC was suspected to have been a cancer survivor. This could explain the large abdominal scar—and, if the cancer recurred, the wasting. Check this reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Mo…

Reoccurring cancer could also be an explanation for taking the step of getting rid of your digital lifelines and walking down the Appalachian Trail.

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#154

Post by jakehop »

newguysofly wrote: post #147

Pretty sure I found him in like ten seconds. I just searched NAMUS for people matching his characteristics, and I found a Joseph Wayne McCartan from Louisiana. MH claimed to be from there. They also look strikingly similar. Further, JWC was suspected to have been a cancer survivor. This could explain the large abdominal scar—and, if the cancer recurred, the wasting. Check this reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Mo…

I know you're only trying to help, but they look nothing alike. And going missing on a shrimp boat leaving Texas, to then hike from up north seems too odd for Occam's Razor.

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#155

Post by dang »

0x1F8B wrote: post #67

> IN APRIL 2017, a man started hiking in a state park just north of New York City. He wanted to get away, maybe from something and maybe from everything. > Everyone who goes into the woods is trying to get away from something. > Everyone, at some point, has wanted to put their phone in a garbage can and head off with a fake name and a wad of cash. Since you are here I want to mention how off-putting this rhetoric is…

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24982298.

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#156

Post by newguysofly »

jakehop wrote: post #154
newguysofly wrote: post #147

Pretty sure I found him in like ten seconds. I just searched NAMUS for people matching his characteristics, and I found a Joseph Wayne McCartan from Louisiana. MH claimed to be from there. They also look strikingly similar. Further, JWC was suspected to have been a cancer survivor. This could explain the large abdominal scar—and, if the cancer recurred, the wasting. Check this reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Mo…

I know you're only trying to help, but they look nothing alike. And going missing on a shrimp boat leaving Texas, to then hike from up north seems too odd for Occam's Razor.

Two points: One, I don't know who you're looking at! They look very, very similar to me. Keep in mind, you have to age your mental image of JWM about ten years. Second, it's absolutely clear that MH wanted to "go missing" / be untraceable. If I were to accomplish that, the best way to do so would be to fake some sort of accident... like a mishap at sea (so that people believe you to be dead). Hence, shrimping boat.

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#157

Post by 0x1F8B »

dang wrote: post #155
0x1F8B wrote: post #67

> IN APRIL 2017, a man started hiking in a state park just north of New York City. He wanted to get away, maybe from something and maybe from everything. > Everyone who goes into the woods is trying to get away from something. > Everyone, at some point, has wanted to put their phone in a garbage can and head off with a fake name and a wad of cash. Since you are here I want to mention how off-putting this rhetoric is…

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24982298 .

Why?

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#158

Post by newguysofly »

sebmellen wrote: post #152
newguysofly wrote: post #147

Pretty sure I found him in like ten seconds. I just searched NAMUS for people matching his characteristics, and I found a Joseph Wayne McCartan from Louisiana. MH claimed to be from there. They also look strikingly similar. Further, JWC was suspected to have been a cancer survivor. This could explain the large abdominal scar—and, if the cancer recurred, the wasting. Check this reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Mo…

I took a look at the picture of JWC, and I can't quite see the resemblance, but maybe I'm missing something. Is there any mention of JWC working in tech? Edit: From the missing persons website: > Last seen on shrimping boat in the Texas area in the Gulf of Mexico. Seems somewhat unlikely that's him.

Maybe someone more savvy than me with this could age him ten years to get to get a better comparison... As for working in tech, yeah you'd think there'd be some record. But then again, tech is a great place to work if you want to be anonymous. E.g. could have been a contractor.

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#159

Post by MereInterest »

thomasqbrady wrote: post #5

The Screeps detail seems like something that could be fairly easily pursued... there can't have been that many players of that game to begin with, let alone those that would care so much about it that they would journal their thoughts about it. A quick check of the GitHub repo doesn't show he contributed code, but might he have opened an issue, contributed to docs? Might there be someone who was active in the communi…

A post on this topic is the top post on the screeps subreddit, but with no clear answers. Some posters found players who stopped playing unexpectedly during the appropriate timeframe, along with the group that player collaborated with. However, I don't know if there was any follow-up there, or if it was a dead end.

https://www.reddit.com/r/screeps/comments/fnwhvr/who_is_this...

Re: A nameless hiker and the case the internet can’t crack

#160

Post by sebmellen »

newguysofly wrote: post #158
sebmellen wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I took a look at the picture of JWC, and I can't quite see the resemblance, but maybe I'm missing something. Is there any mention of JWC working in tech? Edit: From the missing persons website: > Last seen on shrimping boat in the Texas area in the Gulf of Mexico. Seems somewhat unlikely that's him.

Maybe someone more savvy than me with this could age him ten years to get to get a better comparison... As for working in tech, yeah you'd think there'd be some record. But then again, tech is a great place to work if you want to be anonymous. E.g. could have been a contractor.

Fair enough. Quite hard to age him plus the beard.
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