Google Chuck Norris—On 2nd Thought, Don’t

Sometime in the early 2000s, Conan O’ Brien began making Chuck Norris jokes on his show, ‘Late Night with Conan O’Brien.’

The jokes were about the exaggerated “facts” regarding the “superhuman” qualities of Chuck Norris, which were most often absurdly hyperbolic claims about Chuck Norris’ supposed toughness, manly attitude, virility, and sophistication.

The formula was simple: think about any incredible claim—the more absurd it is, the better—and somehow find a way to establish a link with Chuck Norris, and that’s it!

Some examples:

• Chuck Norris can charge a cell phone by rubbing it against his beard.
• Chuck Norris has already been to Mars; that’s why there are no signs of life.
• Chuck Norris has a grizzly bear carpet in his room. The bear isn’t dead, it’s just afraid to move.
• Chuck Norris doesn’t flush the toilet; he scares the sh*t out of it.
• Chuck Norris makes onions cry.
• If Chuck Norris were to ever run out of ammo, his weapon would continue to fire out of fear of disappointing Chuck Norris.

Inspired by that brand of humor, many people began “experimenting” and making up their own Chuck Norris jokes. Eventually, the whole thing became a popular internet meme that continues to this day—so popular and pervasive that the said “facts” have locally translated versions that are allusions to any specific country’s local advertisements or cultural elements. Most often, the specific things made fun about Chuck Norris are his roundhouse kicks, his profusion of body hair and his beard, and his “awesome” role in the TV series ‘Walker, Texas Ranger.’

So beginning in 2005, when you Google Chuck Norris, you get a lot of these jokes. The thousands of Chuck Norris “facts” floating on the internet culminated in Ian Spector’s (initially controversial) book, ‘The Truth About Chuck Norris: 400 Facts About The World’s Greatest Human’ (published by Penguin Books). Chuck Norris was initially “appalled” that such a book could get published by actual people, so he sued Spector and Penguin for “trademark infringement, unjust enrichment and privacy rights.” Some months later, however, Chuck Norris dropped the suit without any explanation. Then a few years later, in 2009, Chuck Norris also co-authored and published his own ‘The Official Chuck Norris Facts Book.

Google Chuck Norris: The “Non-website”

To further “stoke the fire,” someone named Arran Schlosberg (that’s the name that appears in the Whois data, but we’re not sure if he’s the real McCoy) made his own contribution to the whole Chuck Norris internet phenomenon by creating a website that integrates a Chuck Norris “fact” in the context of search engine usage. Users who Google Chuck Norris and click the “I’m Feeling Lucky” button are directed to a page that purports to be a Google results page but is actually Schlosberg’s site. Users are met with an empty “fake” Google result page that says:

Google won’t search for Chuck Norris because it knows you don’t find Chuck Norris, he finds you.
Your search – Chuck Norris – did not match any documents.

Suggestions:

Run, before he finds you.
Try a different person.
Try someone less dangerous.

Maybe it is important to point out that Google itself has nothing to do with the Google Chuck Norris “Easter egg” (the site’s URL is  HYPERLINK “http://www.nochhucknorris.com” www.nochhucknorris.com) so technically, it is not a real “Google Easter egg.” Nevertheless, it is a delightfully funny and well-played Chuck Norris “fact” that has fooled many an unwitting search engine user who must have been living under a huge rock to not know anything about Chuck Norris.

In a way, from the perspective of search engine optimization techniques, the so-called Google Chuck Norris bomb is similar to what Steve Lerner achieved in 2003, when he created what has since become a famous (or “infamous,” depending on which side of the French fence you are on) Google bomb: when you entered the phrase “French military victories” and hit the “I’m Feeling Lucky” button, you are directed to a mocked up Google page that says, “Your search – French military victories – did not match any documents. Did you mean: French military defeats?”

Yeah, that was funny, in a wry sort of way. Especially if you’re not French. But what Steve Lerner did was a unique way of driving traffic to a site—something like a reverse SEO—as in the end, Lerner’s page received a lot of traffic—thousands of hits in less than a day.

Chuck Norris himself seems to take it all in stride. This strange way of finding some resurgence in his popularity seems largely harmless—if people could laugh with these “facts,” then that’s all right. After all, some of these so-called facts are actually facts—Chuck Norris is indeed a “dangerous man,” as he was a warrior first before he became an actor (unlike so many others). Aside from his various martial arts belts (he’s not the 1969 Fighter of the Year by Black Belt Magazine and recipient of Karate’s Triple Crown Award for nothing. Not only that, he also holds the Golden Karate Lifetime Achievement Award), he’s actually the creator of a distinct martial art style called Chun Kuk Do. Never missing out on a good business opportunity—as long as it has something to do with kicking your enemy in the face—Chuck Norris was a heavy promoter of Action jeans—you know, the jeans that “won’t bind so you can get a full range of motion for face-kicking.” And when people say “Chuck Norris has not lost a fight since 1968,” that’s true, too. On top of all such awesome badassness, he is actually a syndicated columnist—yes, the tough, macho man who wields two Uzis in his most famous movie and roundhouse-kicks his enemies into a mangled heap loves to write and share his opinion.

As of last count, Chuck Norris is currently in his seventies. But it takes only a little Google Chuck Norris to remind us—and the whole world—that Chuck Norris does not age; he simply levels up.