ABELE QUAD—Cameras were flashing and cell phones were buzzing last Friday afternoon after campus celebrity Carson Hamby (Pratt ‘24) was seen traversing the quad. While notan influencer nor artist, Hamby is famous for constantly sending messages in the Duke 2024 GroupMe.
Katie Chen (Trinity ‘24), the first to tweet about the sighting, explained how Hamby became a niche micro-celebrity. “He’s just constantly on GroupMe. I’ve never seen anything like it. Not once have I ever felt the need to send a message to that chat, yet Carson responds to just about everything” Just yesterday, Eric Alberton (Pratt ‘24) asked if there was a separate GroupMe for ECE 230. Nobody answered his question, but Hamby personally replied, stating “My sister took a similar class at Princeton last year. She said that the class was pretty tough, but I took 230 last semester and it was honestly easy.” Chen elaborated, “It’s remarkable, really. He asked himself if all 1,300 members of the GroupMe needed to hear that, and he sent it anyway.”
Hamby is also notorious for the Duke-themed memes he makes and sends in the 2024 GroupMe. Dan Colton (Pratt ‘24), a long-time fan of Hamby, explained some of his most popular jokes. “Every time he sees a piece of trash on campus, he takes a picture of it and sends it in the GroupMe and asks who it belongs to like it’s a lost item. It was never funny in the first place, but he continues to do it, and that’s just classic Carson.” Chat logs show that on three separate occasions last week, Hamby sent a photo of a discarded banana peel with the caption, “Who lost their banana peel? 😂”
So what’s all the hype behind GroupMe talkers like Hamby? Chen shed some light on the situation. “Have I ever talked to him in real life? No. But I know everything I need to know about him through his GroupMe messages. In my head, he’s like a sitcom character. Every day after class I check the chat to see what new shenanigans have taken place. That’s why it was so shocking to see him in person, because I forgot that he’s a real person that actually exists.”
DUU is looking to capitalize on these niche internet micro-celebrities, so don’t forget to sign up for the meet and greet with GroupMe talkers, overactive Instagram posters, and walk-on athletes who will never see a minute of game time, scheduled for next Saturday in Penn Pavilion.
