Thursday 19 August 2010

Stig in the Dumps

Sorry, but how often will I be able to use that pun?

Stig, in this case, is the 'anonymous' racing driver employed by popular silly car programme Top Gear to drive fast cars around a track. Apparently, this is enough to justify an autobiography, but the BBC has used lawyers to ban him from making his identity known.

This is more interesting than it might sound: 'The Stig' is being treated not as a name, but as piece of intellectual property which can't be attached to the individual using it. So the man whose major claim to fame is playing 'Stig', can't tell anyone, even though it's true and probably the most prominent thing he's ever done (do you remember Ben Collins' career in Formula 3 and NASCAR?). He must be undergoing a strange existential crisis…

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