Off George W. Or Office of George W.?

"_bfc_off george bush" or as it is referred to on the Wordtracker site, "__bfc_off george bush" is an intriguing mystery. No one seems to know what it is about. Alerted to the existence of both Wordtracker and this unusual item on its list of top 300 word searches by Associated Content's Timothy Sexton, I was compelled to find the root of this enigma.

My first stop was to do some searches. As many have done this using the more popular engines, I decided to try using old school engines like INFOSEEK and LYCOS and DOGPILE.

One such response was linked with the Boston Fencing Club and someone trying to unravel the same mystery I was. He had no new insights, so I moved on.

I found a possible target when I found a video that supposedly has George W. talking about explosives bringing down building 7 during the 9/11 attacks. The sound is obviously not linked up to the video. But this could be the final location intended for the search words.

I also found a Polish site with lots of words amidst Bush's name and the aforementioned code. Eerily enough the banner starts out with a keffiyeh headed individual with glowing eyes. Creepy.

An image search provided the following link that had an anti-war connotation.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/reedjohnson/362260480/

Someone recommended it was a game you could play. When clicking on the offered link, I got a Google Error 404 Site Not Found.

If you break down the letters, maybe it could mean Battle Force Commander Officer George Bush. (I found this cuortesy of Wiipedia's acronym search.) It could refer to Banque Financière de la Cité, where money is being held for anyone who "offs" George Bush.

I don't see it as meaning Bikers for Christ or Beekeepers for Christ. I also don't see it a reference to skateboarders, as in Boarders for Christ. Can you see ole "W" on a skateboard? I think not.

I found an intriguing possibility with a company named Base One International Corporation. They offer a product called, Base One Foundation Component Library (BFC). It is a ".NET database and distributed computing tools" company. Maybe this could be where the target of the search word was leading to. However, only adding to the mystery, I sent an email that stated:

"Wordtracker has sprouted an interesting item on its top 300 search words list. it is "__bfc_off george bush" and appears somewhat enigmatic. There doesn't appear to be any rhyme or reason for this. In doing research on the possible meanings of this, I came across your company. And it occurred to me that this may be a reference in one of your databases. If so, it would seem an easily explainable thing; mystery solved. If it is not some code used in your database, then I will continue on with my research."

This email got me a Mailer-Daemon failure notice.

I tried calling. I explained I was a freelance writer and wanted to speak to someone concerning questions I had about their database product. The person who answered said "We would not be interested in that, thank you." And hung up.

Curiouser and curiouser, as Alice might say.

I found a few other possible targets.

I found a video that supposedly has George W. talking about explosives bringing down building 7 during the 9/11 attacks. The sound is obviously not linked up to the video. But this could be the final location intended for the search words.

There is a link on a mega-games site that has a member named "poikl" who has been a member since July 15, 2008. On his page, which has no posts by him/her/them, is a link with the header:

__BFC_OFF GEORGE BUSH
WARNING! ADULT CONTENT!!
ENTER

I didn't enter, so if this is the culprit, it will remain a mystery, as I don't click sites that have such a dubious web address of a bunch of + signs followed by .info/in.cgi?

Another possible target could be the George Bush News, Information and All Internet Search Results page. This has everything on it from polls to Battlestar Galactica and (get this) The Office videos. It would be a prime suspect in having a high density of this unusual search word list.

The reason Wordtracker is now moving this up the list is obvious. The buzz on the internet is driving users and people like Tim and myself to hunt out the site responsible.

However, the bottom line in why it was on the search word list to begin with only has two explanations as I see it. Someone is using a spider-bot program in order to build up hits on their own site. Or a multitude of users are looking for the same site. The former being sleazy but easily explainable, and mostly harmless. The latter being a conspiracy theorist dream.

Think about it, if one of the target sites above, such as the creepy one or the video one, were the place a multitude of users were looking for, they would only want to find it for one reason. To further the hatred of many people against America in general and George Bush in particular. Maybe even provide a site (the creepy eye one, for instance) with hidden messages in it.

But now, this search word has been muddled and will not offer anyone the target site they were looking for without a whole lot of effort. Because now articles and websites are being devoted to the mystery of this search word. I expect it will slowly die down and disappear off the list soon enough.

Maybe we will never know. Maybe we're better off not knowing. I for one, intriguing as it all may be, am done with searching for the answer.

Sources:
Wikipedia
The free encyclopedia

Lycos

Dogpile
Web Search Home Page

Infoseek
go.com