Origin of Spider Borland

In the past year my moniker known as Spider Borland has sort of taken off. People from all over know me only by this name. People I've even known from High School or before started calling me Spider. It kind of freaked me out at first, but I grew to accept it.
Emails, Bulletin Boards, MySpace, Facebook, and Personal Projects all have gained this tag of ownership.

I wanted to take a moment to talk about this names origin.

Back in 2001 I was in the second year of college. College males play video games. Bushido_Cedar introduced me to a little game called Ultima Online. One of the most ghetto, and widely played MMORPGs in the world... still.
The game is set in a medieval type world. Swords and Armors and Wizards and Dragons. All that. So I needed to create a name for my avatar (player character) that worked in this world. At the time my favorite band was Powerman 5000, and the crazy guitar player with the black contacts from Limp Bizkit was my hero ((Please Note: My favorite band is NOT Limp Bizkit, but I loved their guitarist)).





I remember clearly sitting on my couch in front of my computer ((yeah, that's how I roll bitches!)) and needing a name. I didn't just need a name, I needed a persona. I character. Semi recently to this point I had purchased Big Dumb Faces new album Duke Lion Fights The Terror. That's when it hit me... I'll be Duke Lion-esque.

I paused and gazed around my room looking for inspiration. That's when I caught a glimpse of two posters: Spider One and Wes Borland. ((you've gotta be pretty dense at this point to not figure that one out))
So that's who I became in this world.
Spider Borland.
I even donned black plate armor and sported a short yellow afro, much like Duke Lion does on the cover of the CD. ((Carrying a golden sword was a lot harder in Ultima Online)) While I was based on Duke Lion, I was still very much Spider Borland.

Spider Borland became very respected on the Leavarius Shard. ((This was the name of the Free Server I played on)) He was never very good, but everyone knew who he was because of the stories he'd tell.

2-3 years go by while I continue to play. During this time "Spider Borland" was confined to the UO Universe. I'm really not sure the moment in which Spider began to broaden his horizons and ambitions. I believe it might have been with AOL Instant Messenger... then maybe an email address... finally culminating with the MySpace page. From then on out, whenever I signed up for any sort of community, I was known as Spider Borland. I believe the current, correct way to type it out is [spider.borland]. That kind of gives a with_teeth, Nine Inch Nails spin on it.

It was with the communities that I became members of that the moniker took off. My photoshop art has been become semi legendary on Echoing The Sound, and I sort of became a local hero on the Black Light Burns message board ((visit that board at your own risk, as it has become over run with Spammers)). Sadly, the board has fallen on hard times, but before that had happened, the moderation of the board was offered to me: Spider Borland. I've even met the band a few times, and they all know me as Spider Borland. ((I'm even mentioned in the commentary on the DVD Anvil Pants Odyssey

So there you have it... I think.
Hope that was informative.