RIP Ben Lowe aka Rob Cypher, appeared on A&E "Intervention" (fwd)

[danny burstein]

Newsgroups: alt.obituaries
Subject: Ben Lowe aka Rob Cypher, appeared on A&E "Intervention"

No news clips I could find.

Apparently had quite a following in FB, Twitter,
and other freebie media

Came from Grand Rapids

FB post by family:

"Hello everyone. This is Ben's brother Aaron. I think he would want me to let
you know that he passed away. The exact time and cause of death are unknown but
likely natural causes."

https://www.facebook.com/robcypher
https://robcypher.blogspot.com/
====
Wiki:
"Ben is a genius with an IQ of 170 and a debilitating addiction to DXM. Both
addicts suffered at the hands of abusive fathers and father figures throughout
their childhoods and both have serious issues with low self-esteem. Ben's blog
can be found here [1]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intervention_episodes

_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dan...@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]

[anim8rfsk]

In article <Pine.NEB.4.64.16...@panix5.panix.com>,

The notification by his brother:

https://scontent.fphx1-2.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/15672816_1609352305747076
_6187246329046435569_n.jpg?oh=636ce057d3565983b29ef938ee4bcc3c&oe=58FA2B1
B

comments include

Lisa Alexander with Ben Lowe.
4 hrs ?

Today is a very sad day. Ben Lowe, aka Rob Cypher, has walked on to
another world and left us behind. All of us old trolls from back in the
Usenet days remember the mad, flawless group flooding done by him
-through an AOL account. His skills were legendary and he was much
respected.
Ben fought many demons in his life. He dealt with more heart break and
loss than anyone his age should have. I still have the letter he sent me
from rehab back in 2007 when the show Intervention sent him to Florida.
I'll keep that letter till I walk on, myself.
Ben.. wherever you are now, know that you were loved by many. You were
one of my best friends for almost 18 years. I will miss you with all my
heart.
Rest in Power, Ben Lowe. Walk on till you meet up with Sue.
Much love to eternity and back
blujuju

--
Join your old RAT friends at
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1688985234647266/

[Robin Miller]

His Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/robcypher


--Robin

[Ubiquitous]

robin....@invalid.invalid wrote:
>anim8rfsk wrote:

>> danny burstein <dan...@panix.com> wrote:

>>> No news clips I could find.
>>>
>>> Apparently had quite a following in FB, Twitter,
>>> and other freebie media
>>>
>>> Came from Grand Rapids
>>>
>>> FB post by family:
>>>
>>> "Hello everyone. This is Ben's brother Aaron. I think he would
>>> want me to let you know that he passed away. The exact time and
>>> cause of death are unknown but likely natural causes."
>>>
>>> https://www.facebook.com/robcypher
>>> https://robcypher.blogspot.com/
>>> ====
>>> Wiki:
>>> "Ben is a genius with an IQ of 170 and a debilitating addiction to
>>> DXM. Both addicts suffered at the hands of abusive fathers and
>>> father figures throughout their childhoods and both have serious
>>> issues with low self-esteem. Ben's blog
>>> can be found here [1]"
>>>
>>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intervention_episodes
>>

>> The notification by his brother:

>> [...]

>
>His Facebook page:
>https://www.facebook.com/robcypher

Who the hell is he, and why should I care?

--
"Man kicked off JetBlue flight for questioning why Ivanka Trump was on it."
#FakeNews

[Michael Black]

The name sounds vaguely familiar, I gather he was some "internet
celebrity".

The problem is, they never issued "internet celebrity trading cards", so
it's hard to keep track of who's who.

Michael

[YHVH]

Michael Black <et...@ncf.ca> wrote in
news:alpine.LNX.2.02.1...@darkstar.example.org:

He posted on rec.sport.pro-wrestling a lot many years back, that's where
I knew him from. As a matter of fact, he once had a yearly thing in RSPW
where he would play the game Nethack using characters named after RSPW
posters, play as them until the characters died, and post the results
(what items and treasure they found, what monsters they were killed by,
etc.) to RSPW.

I didn't know him that well, as I had just started posting/lurking at
RSPW during his last years there, but he was almost always entertaining.
I've personally lost too many loved ones both this year alone in
particular and in the last few years in general to say I'll miss some guy
I knew on the internet, but Rob Cypher was an entertaining, funny guy,
and those seem to be in short supply on internet forums and message
boards these days. But that's life, I guess. R.I.P. Rob Cypher.

[anim8rfsk]

He was also a friend of our expatriot Peach, so he must have had some TV
group presence.

[Jim G.]

danny burstein sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:01 PM:

> Ben is a genius with an IQ of 170

Is it just me, or do all of the geniuses out there really like that 170
number?

--
Jim G. | A fan of the good and the bad, but not the mediocre
"I killed Hitler. I think I deserve some pie." -- Dean Winchester,
SUPERNATURAL

[Jim G.]

anim8rfsk sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:31 PM:

> All of us old trolls from back in the
> Usenet days remember the mad, flawless group flooding done by him
> -through an AOL account.

Ah. So he was one of those Eternal September problem children...

> His skills were legendary and he was much
> respected.

That would have made him unique among AOL users, then.

[shawn]

On Fri, 23 Dec 2016 19:37:23 -0600, "Jim G."
<jimg...@geemail.com.invalid> wrote:

>anim8rfsk sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:31 PM:
>> All of us old trolls from back in the
>> Usenet days remember the mad, flawless group flooding done by him
>> -through an AOL account.
>
>Ah. So he was one of those Eternal September problem children...
>
>> His skills were legendary and he was much
>> respected.
>
>That would have made him unique among AOL users, then.

Note what Fred said.. All of the trolls respected another troll.
He just happened to be trolling through AOL. Which actually fits given
the way AOL seemed to troll us all with constant CD mailings.

[Michael Black]

On Fri, 23 Dec 2016, Jim G. wrote:

> danny burstein sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:01 PM:
>> Ben is a genius with an IQ of 170
>
> Is it just me, or do all of the geniuses out there really like that 170
> number?
>

I've never disclosed what my IQ is, but then I've never seen the results
of the test. Just some assumption when younger that I probably skewed
high.

Michael

[anim8rfsk]

In article <o3kj7c$n1j$5...@dont-email.me>,

"Jim G." <jimg...@geemail.com.invalid> wrote:

> danny burstein sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:01 PM:
> > Ben is a genius with an IQ of 170
>
> Is it just me, or do all of the geniuses out there really like that 170
> number?

There's an upper number. It varies, but it's about there. Any time
somebody claims 200+ he's lying.

My BFF got 180 when he was in CalTech, but they've lowered the ceiling
since then.

It also depends which test you take.

The Google is saying upper limits range from 150 to 195, depending on
who you believe.

[Jim G.]

shawn sent the following on 12/23/2016 at 07:49 PM:

> On Fri, 23 Dec 2016 19:37:23 -0600, "Jim G."
> <jimg...@geemail.com.invalid> wrote:
>
>> anim8rfsk sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:31 PM:
>>> All of us old trolls from back in the
>>> Usenet days remember the mad, flawless group flooding done by him
>>> -through an AOL account.
>>
>> Ah. So he was one of those Eternal September problem children...
>>
>>> His skills were legendary and he was much
>>> respected.
>>
>> That would have made him unique among AOL users, then.
>
> Note what Fred said.. All of the trolls respected another troll.
> He just happened to be trolling through AOL.

Which in itself is worth mocking. Google Groups has sort of taken on
that role in these post-AOL days...

> Which actually fits given
> the way AOL seemed to troll us all with constant CD mailings.

Heh. I think I threw out a couple of dozen at one point, and that was
just the ones that I could see. I'm pretty sure that there were at least
that many more thrown in drawers and whatnot.

[Jim G.]

Michael Black sent the following on 12/23/2016 at 08:56 PM:

On shows, it seems like a nice, round 170 is almost always trotted out.
Not 171. Not 177. Not 160-ish. But 170. Exactly 170. I notice it in
passing because I know just how rare a number this high actually is.

[BTR1701]

Jim G. <jimg...@geemail.com.invalid> wrote:

> shawn sent the following on 12/23/2016 at 07:49 PM:

>> On Fri, 23 Dec 2016 19:37:23 -0600, "Jim G."
>> <jimg...@geemail.com.invalid> wrote:
>>
>>> anim8rfsk sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:31 PM:
>>>> All of us old trolls from back in the
>>>> Usenet days remember the mad, flawless group flooding done by him
>>>> -through an AOL account.
>>>
>>> Ah. So he was one of those Eternal September problem children...
>>>
>>>> His skills were legendary and he was much
>>>> respected.
>>>
>>> That would have made him unique among AOL users, then.
>>
>> Note what Fred said.. All of the trolls respected another troll.
>> He just happened to be trolling through AOL.
>
> Which in itself is worth mocking. Google Groups has sort of taken on
> that role in these post-AOL days...
>
>> Which actually fits given
>> the way AOL seemed to troll us all with constant CD mailings.
>
> Heh. I think I threw out a couple of dozen at one point, and that was
> just the ones that I could see. I'm pretty sure that there were at least
> that many more thrown in drawers and whatnot.

I remember reading somewhere that if you stacked up all the CDs that AOL
mailed out over the years, the column would reach halfway to the moon.

[Obveeus]

On 12/24/2016 2:07 PM, Jim G. wrote:
> Michael Black sent the following on 12/23/2016 at 08:56 PM:
>> On Fri, 23 Dec 2016, Jim G. wrote:
>>
>>> danny burstein sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:01 PM:
>>>> Ben is a genius with an IQ of 170
>>>
>>> Is it just me, or do all of the geniuses out there really like that 170
>>> number?
>>>
>> I've never disclosed what my IQ is, but then I've never seen the results
>> of the test. Just some assumption when younger that I probably skewed
>> high.
>
> On shows, it seems like a nice, round 170 is almost always trotted out.
> Not 171. Not 177. Not 160-ish. But 170. Exactly 170. I notice it in
> passing because I know just how rare a number this high actually is.

This is probably similar to people scoring an 800 on an SAT subject...or
780 or 760...but not any odd number in the middle since the test score
resolution moves in increments of 5 or 10 or 20.

[Michael Black]

On Sat, 24 Dec 2016, Jim G. wrote:

> shawn sent the following on 12/23/2016 at 07:49 PM:
>> On Fri, 23 Dec 2016 19:37:23 -0600, "Jim G."
>> <jimg...@geemail.com.invalid> wrote:
>>
>>> anim8rfsk sent the following on 12/22/2016 at 11:31 PM:
>>>> All of us old trolls from back in the
>>>> Usenet days remember the mad, flawless group flooding done by him
>>>> -through an AOL account.
>>>
>>> Ah. So he was one of those Eternal September problem children...
>>>
>>>> His skills were legendary and he was much
>>>> respected.
>>>
>>> That would have made him unique among AOL users, then.
>>
>> Note what Fred said.. All of the trolls respected another troll.
>> He just happened to be trolling through AOL.
>
> Which in itself is worth mocking. Google Groups has sort of taken on that
> role in these post-AOL days...
>
>> Which actually fits given
>> the way AOL seemed to troll us all with constant CD mailings.
>
> Heh. I think I threw out a couple of dozen at one point, and that was just
> the ones that I could see. I'm pretty sure that there were at least that many
> more thrown in drawers and whatnot.
>

It was better when they sent out the software on floppy disk, though I
think that early it was never that extensive. You could reuse the floppy
discs, though I don't recall getting many.

But yes, once they went to cdrom they saturated everywhere, at one point I
did collect some, I had some reason but I can't remember why, and I think
I still have the box of them in the basement.

Michael

[Michael Black]

So IQ is like collecting point somewhere? They give you ten points because
it sounds more generous than getting 1 point, but it really means the same
thing?

"I have an IQ of 17" does not sound as impressive as "I have an IQ of
170", though pity the poor person who has an IQ of 1.7.

Michael

[shawn]

800 on a section of the SAT makes sense as a number to use as it's the
most you can score on the verbal or math portion (at least the last
time I checked.) Is 170 the most that you can score on some IQ tests
or is it just a number that writers have tended to settle on as high
enough to impress the viewers but not so high as to be unrelatable
("He's got an IQ of 9000.")

[A Friend]

In article <qhdv5chro2497sd7a...@4ax.com>, shawn

IIRC you get 250 on the SAT (verbal or math) just for showing up. Even
after almost fifty years, I still remember what I got. Cripes, how
useless.

[Obveeus]

I think the IQ max is 200, but maybe there is a vertical asymptote at
that value. My point was that the resolution of the tests which attempt
to measure IQ might move in set increments so a person misses one
question and they drop from 190 to 180 on the test. The SAT English has
(or had) a resolution of 10 point increments while the math section
resolution was 20 point increments. So, maybe you cannot get a measured
IQ of 177 simply because the test resolution will say 170 or 180, but
nothing in between.