First Publicly Traded Person

Patrick Campbell shares the story of KMikeyM, the first publicly traded person, and his attempt to do a hostile takeover.

"Mike Merrill, about 13 years ago in 2008, became the first publicly traded person. He sold shares in himself through an interface. He gets to choose to put votes up, and people who bought shares vote their shares. He doesn't just do little stuff like what color glasses to get, but also big decisions like 'should I move in with my girlfriend.'

The debate is fascinating because some voters are his friends and family, and then there's just random people in Connecticut saying 'I've known Mike for a long time through the project, I don't think this makes sense.'

I got some money and thought 'I don't know what it's like to do a takeover of a company.' When he put an auction up for additional shares, I sneakily started buying shares and researching people who haven't been active. I got 1,930 shares, about 10-11% of the entire thing.

I went to speak at his shareholder meeting and announced 'I'm doing a hostile takeover of Mike. Here's why - I think the project's undervalued. You guys voted to make him not go on social media, that doesn't make sense.' All the questions were like 'Is this good for Mike?' because a lot of his actual friends were there. I said 'What's good for the share price is good for Mike and vice versa.'

In 13 years, he has never gone against what a vote has said. He's been covered by Wired, Atlantic, all kinds of stuff. The project was in a lull, and I'm injecting some excitement into it again."