If you’re a geek, you’ve probably seen her face. Blond hair, great smile, eyeglasses that look just right on somebody who spends a lot of time at a computer.

Microsoft used her to symbolize the idealized software developer. Wired Magazine called her “the closest thing to a supermodel you’ll see in connection with Linux’s biggest trade show,” and noted that “nobody knows her name.”

Now we do. She’s Marla Clarke and she lives in . . . Calgary.

Marla was as surprised as anyone to hear about her new-found fame. About a month ago, somebody told her that her face was on the home page of the huge Linux World Conference, held recently in New York City.

Photo courtesy of Marla Clarke
Marla Clarke was surprised to find her image attached to the Linux World Expo home page, as well as a Microsoft website. But she’s not letting it go to her head –“This is my 15 minutes of pathetic fame,” she says. “I’m savouring every moment!

Sure enough, there she is, for all to see. And her perky smile has graced Microsoft’s Visual Studio.Net web page for months.

“It’s become kind of a ‘Where’s Waldo’ type of thing,” she says, “with friends e-mailing me to tell me about places where they’ve seen my image.”

How this happened says a lot about a world where a digital image can travel the world in seconds, and advertising folks can pick the perfect model to represent their product, without messy details like photo shoots or even knowing the model’s name.

Marla worked for a Calgary company called EyeWire, which was later bought out by Getty Images of Seattle. It bills itself as the “world’s leading source of imagery and motion.”



In other words, it is a stock photo company, but oh, what a library it has. As just one example, it is the exclusive distributor of still images collected from CNN footage. So, if a politician picks his nose on camera today, you might have that image, all properly licensed and paid for, on your computer by tomorrow.

Back to Marla’s tale. As a good EyeWire employee, she dutifully posed for pictures (no, not that kind!) which were included on the company’s royalty-free image CD.

Having moved on to another high-tech firm, and with EyeWire sold to Getty Images, she kind of forgot about the whole thing until the “haven’t we seen you somewhere?” e-mails started coming in.

It reached a new level of bizarreness on Jan. 21, when Wired Magazine, which is read online by real fans, ran an article about a “mysterious geek girl next door” whose face is being used to promote Linux, Microsoft and various other products.



“The entire article is about me, “ Clarke says “and how nobody knows who I am, yet my face was coincidentally chosen by two competing companies as their poster geek chick.”

The Wired article’s author apparently had a lot of fun asking people who they thought the mystery “geek girl” was. Linus Torvalds, the creator of the Linux operating system, opined that “those shifty eyes – notice how she’s clearly avoiding looking at the camera – seem to certainly imply an MS chick.”

A marketing consultant, also interviewed by Wired, said that she was perfect because she’s attractive but doesn’t look unattainable. “She’s good looking, but not so good looking that people think that she’s a joke.”

Marla is flattered by all the attention, but she’s also got her feet firmly on the ground. “I love life when it throws bizarre incidents like this my way,” she says. “I fully recognize that this is my 15 minutes of pathetic fame – so I’m savouring every moment!”

We can learn some important lessons from this whole saga. One is to be a little careful with that digital camera, scanner, or for that matter any photographs. When I give presentations on the power of technology, I often show a photo of a naked man emerging from a shower (I cover up the most sensitive areas, usually with a U of C logo). He is allegedly named James Hodges and his disgruntled lover posted the photo all over the Internet with the caption: “Digital Camera $499, 4 AA batteries $4, key to ex-boyfriend’s apartment $0. Posting this picture on the Internet: Priceless.”

I do hope that James Hodges is never in the audience at any of my presentations because I would probably be lucky to escape with a broken nose. By the way, just in case any geeks out there have been gazing too fondly at Marla’s photo on the Microsoft site – she’s recently married.

A second observation is that both Microsoft and the promoters of the big Linux show in New York are either cheapskates or a little shortsighted. After all, two competitors in the same industry each chose the same virtual spokesperson, Marla Clarke, to promote their wares.

They each licensed the photos from Getty Images, apparently using the cheaper, “royalty free” license agreement. This gives them rights to use the images as much as they want, but doesn’t grant exclusivity. To do that would have required a more complex, and more expensive, “rights managed” licensing agreement. You can bet that Microsoft will think about that in the future after seeing its “geek chick” digitally flirting with the enemy.

Marla says she doesn’t receive any royalties when her image is used, and she understood that when the pictures were taken. But she’s currently saving up for the down payment on a house. And with all the free publicity she’s given Getty Images lately, she has a simple suggestion for them – “maybe you’re willing to share?”

Web watch:
www.linuxworldexpo.com
msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/productinfo/default.asp
www.gettyimages.com
www.wired.com/news/linux/0,1411,57307,00.html