In the final days of the 20th century, in that strange twilight period of a world searching for answers, an unknown Turkish journalist, Mahir Cagri, got his 15 minutes of fame, becoming the most famous person on the Internet.

His pastiche lonely hearts web page portrayed a character who wouldn't have looked out of place in 1970s sit-com 'Mind Your Language'. He invited the world's women to live with him, listing his interests as 'sex and photographing naked ladies'. Alongside photographs of Mahir playing table tennis or sunbathing, is the welcome to browsers – 'I Kiss You'.

Mahir claimed that the site was a practical joke played on him, but due to the mix of 70s sexual innuendo and pre-millennium irony of the web community, this post-retro-pre-modern-now-cool-kitsch-zeitgeist became an Internet sensation. Mahir-mania was unstoppable.

Half a million people had visited Mahir's site in two days, and he received thousands of e-mails and hundreds of offers of marriage. Mahir wasn't just omnipresent, he spawned a plethora of tribute sites, Mahir Pac Man, Mahir MP3 music, Mahir Screensavers, and online debate as to whether Mahir should be offered a job at the United Nations.

Mahir decided to use this new found fame for good. 'God gave me a duty and now I have to do it. I don't want children to be hungry. I want to help people. I will talk about the world's problems.'

Wherever you are today Mahir – we kiss you.