Phoenix Energy: Where Is He Now?

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My article What's After A Trillion presents a long, tedious and boring strategy to eventually bank 999 Trillion Dollars.  I referenced a robbing glitch that occurred in March of this year and a lot of players were able to get all of the NY money achievement badges by robbing a Mafia Wars profile named Phoenix Energy.

Mafia Wars Maniac covered this glitch in her article titled Robbing Glitch.  Here are some screen shots of what happened to all the lucky illicit badge holders (sorry, I'm a little bitter about missing this glitch!).  Images from the Mafia Wars Maniac Blog, click on them to enlarge.

 

Who is this guy?  I did a little research and was able to track him down.  He is a really cool guy and has agreed to share his links and experiences with us.  He doesn't like excessive abuse of his account so please don't go crazy trying to rob and attack him.  You won't get extra money.  His links:  Facebook Profile and Mafia Wars Profile. 

Phoenix Energy has had quite the ride.  He became a Mafia Wars sensation overnight and was soon hob-knobbing with other Mafia Wars celebrities like Arun.  The good times soon came to an end when a scandalous rumor was started.  Many people believed Kevin Mitnick put his black hat back on and started terrorizing the Mafia Wars account holders who exploited the glitch.  I'm sure most of you remember the warning posts flying all over our news feeds as well as a the fake letter to the Zynga Developers from Phoenix Energy. 

*URGENT BULLETIN* JUST CAME IN TO ME ! URGENT, FOR ALL THOSE GETTING THE TRILLIONS FROM THE ROBBING GLITCH THAT IS POSTED ALL OVER FB, BLOCK THE PERSON YOU HAVE ROBBED FROM AND CHANGE YOUR PASSWORD. NOT SURE ON THE WHOLE OF THE UPDATE AS YET, BUT WILL POST IT LATER, THIS HAS JUST COME TO ME AS AN URGENT WARNING !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! PASS IT ALONG

Attention Zynga Cooperative Developers.
Due to recent leaks of information vital to the security of the Mafia Wars infra-structure a character using profile ID: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000805372673 is scheduled to be released in an effort to track and correct the internal leakage of information. The above referenced profile is in fact a Zynga test account equipped with an unlimited supply of NY Dollars. The account has banking features disabled and is designed to maintain a constantly re-generative 500 quadrillion cash amount and infinite health. The constant monitoring of this account will enable us to determine the source of our internal leaks, and to follow the web of sharing for a period of 21 days. All accounts accessing this profile will come under scrutiny for for TOS violations.
Developers please help us to find our source of leakage.
Please advise myself or Mike Andrews of any accounts posting the above mentioned profile link and/or instructions on illegally gaining Achievements within the Mafia Wars gaming network.

Phoenix Energy

I asked Phoenix Energy what his experiences with fame and misfortune were like and here is his reply: 

"Where to start?  First off, like most people who play this game, I am addicted.  My main Mafia Wars account which I started playing a couple of years back, goes by the name Phoenix, hence the name Phoenix Energy which I started in January/February 2010 as a looting account.  I first noticed something was a bit strange when I collected off my NY properties and got the That's with a "T", Nest Egg and What's after Trillion? Achievement Badges on March 9, 2010...go figure...a glitch and nothing else!

On March 28, 2010, shortly after robbing came back, I started getting robbed, hitlisted and attacked continuously.  I shared my link and the rest as they say is history.

What was quiet humorous at first were all the e-mails I got and the stories.  I was a genius programmer and I was a master hacker and it was a trap that I set to get people's bank account details.  Then of course the abusive mail and threats came.  After a couple of days I got in touch with Zynga as the game had just become totally unplayable for me.  They knew about it and were in the process of fixing the glitch.

The positive spin off of  this is I went from about 200 friends to over 2000 in a very short space of time on this account as well as the "revenge" and support from my clan in bashing the "abusers".  Most people have been great but like with anything, there are always the idiots.  I still get messages from people asking me when I am going to "program another glitch", from genuine hackers wanting to know how I "did it", and please can I "fix" the Bangkok money glitch etc, etc, etc.  I also got invitations from a multitude of clans.  I haven't accepted any for the reason I am tagged on my main account and don't think it is right to know the workings of a clan I am never going to help in a clan war.  I also don't want to be viewed as a spy.  I just collect loot from Phoenix Energy, that's all."

If you rob my warehouse and get more than "normal", go ahead, all I ask is a FR in exchange.  Please don't ice me continuously.  As long as there is an understanding that my account is not to be abused in any way, I don't mind.  If there is abuse, I will respond from my fighting account along with the clan I am in./Phoenix Energy  

I decided to check out Phoenix Energy's Mafia Wars Profile and everything appeared normal.  There was a rumor going around that the robbing glitch was back on and Phoenix was passing out the cash again.  I really want the What's After Trillion? Achievement and would do almost anything to get it.  While I was there, I couldn't help myself and robbed and attacked him.  Sorry Phoenix, I hope you will forgive me and keep your fighting account and clan at bay.  I'll try not to do it again.

Today, Phoenix Energy resides in Durban, South Africa and is still addicted to Mafia Wars.  During the height of his notoriety, a fan page called The Rise of The Pheonix was created in his honor (the creator forgot to run a spell check!).  Phoenix Energy is now an administrator and posts updates and information on the status of his account.  You never know, maybe one day the glitch really will return.

In other "Where Are They Now" non-Mafia Wars related news...Remember The Star Wars Kid? I came across an interesting article on Mashable titled The "Star Wars Kid": Where Is He Now?  He grew up, shed a few pounds and is now a law student in Canada.  This has nothing to do with Mafia Wars but I thought it was interesting. (video from youtube.com and image from mashable.com)