BY NOW, MOST Internet addicts have heard about the MIT graduation speech hoax, while the rest of us are still trying to sort it out. Some say it is the most widely distributed piece of e-mail in the history of the Internet.
In a nutshell, the story is this: A graduation speech, allegedly given at MIT by the famous novelist Kurt Vonnegut, was launched into cyberspace as a vast e-mail chain letter.The people who read it were so impressed that they sent it to several friends. Among other places, it went to Italy, France, Scotland, Israel and Brazil.
Vonnegut himself does not dabble with the Internet, but his wife, Jill Krementz, received it and liked it so well that she e-mailed it to several of her friends.
Krementz asked her husband why he didn't tell her he spoke at MIT. His response was "Because I didn't."
Another person who received the speech by e-mail was columnist Mary Schmich. Because the first words in the speech were "Wear sunscreen," Schmich quickly recognized it as her own.
Even though her name was nowhere to be seen on the cyberspace edition, she had written it as a satirical column, published in the Chicago Tribune on June 1, 1997.
In the column, she said, "If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, where-as the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering ex-per-i-ence."
Then she offered some other practical suggestions, such as "Sing. Don't be reckless with other people's hearts. Don't put up with people who are reckless with yours. Floss. Don't waste time on jealousy."
She suggested graduates not feel guilty if they didn't yet know what to do with their lives.
"The most interesting people I know didn't know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives. Some of the most interesting 40-year-olds I know still don't."
Schmich also advised readers to "live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard. Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft."
She said, "Don't mess too much with your hair or by the time you're 40 it will look 85."
Her last line was the kicker - "But trust me on the sunscreen."
If irritated that her material had been pirated, Schmich was also complimented that so many people would think her light-heart-ed advice so good that it could be mistaken for Vonnegut's "eternal wisdom."
To be fair, not everyone was convinced of the similarity. One doubting contributor to a Vonnegut chat group said it was not Vonnegut. "It was a little too jokey, a little too cute . . . a little too `Seinfeld.' "
Schmich did some research but couldn't track down the culprit who took her name off the column and sent it off under Vonnegut's name.
When she called Vonnegut, who answers his own phone, he said a women's magazine wanted to reprint it until he informed the editor he didn't write it.
"It was very witty, but it wasn't my wittiness," Vonnegut generously told Schmich.
This story is a little unsettling. It means that the Internet, as fascinating as it is, is far from gospel. In fact, it is filled with unreliable information. I've received my own weird chain letters, after all.
The weirdest e-mail Schmich has received is one that claimed Mary Schmich is actually a character in Kurt Vonnegut's latest novel.
Stranger things have happened, but the unmistakable conclusion is that a columnist from Chicago has achieved worldwide recognition. Whether it is, as Andy Warhol once said, the "15 minutes of fame" to which everyone is entitled remains to be seen.
As for the "real" MIT commencement speech: It was given by Kofi Annan, secretary general of the United Nations. I read it off the Internet, and all I will say is I'm going to keep it by my bed in case of insomnia.