Lorenzo Von Matterhorn: Social Media Success Story

: Image by watchwithkristin via Flickr

You can tell a TV show is doing something right when a fictional character hits the mainstream and becomes an instant icon. CBS has pulled off just such a feat, with one of its characters going viral on Google, Twitter and the like.

On Monday, the show How I Met Your Mother introduced a fictional character by the name of “Lorenzo Von Matterhorn,” played by Neil Patrick Harris. They created the character as an alias to Barney in an attempt to pick up women.

Lorenzo Von Matterhorn even his own page on Wikipedia page before it was deleted. Before it was deleted, it read as follows:

“Lorenzo Von Matterhorn was born somewhere in Switzerland in the spring of 1974. The exact date and circumstances of his birth are unknown since he was immediately placed in a basket and tossed in a river. Young Lorenzo rode the pristine Alpine glacial melt waters for hundreds of miles until a young Milanese woman discovered the basket along the banks of the river Po. Some say it was this first early journey to Milan that fueled both his love of exploration and fashion. The woman would raise Lorenzo Von Matterhorn as her own, naming him Lorenzo after her father and giving him the surname Von Matterhorn to reflect his Swiss heritage as well as his uncommonly large penis.

“Shortly after his family moved to New York City in the late 70’s, Lorenzo began rescuing stray puppies and other cute animals. As someone who had been abandoned himself, Lorenzo Von Matterhorn recognized both the pain of loneliness as well as the power of hope. One evening, while nursing a particularly cute Cocker Spaniel back to health, Lorenzo noticed the rest of his brood howling in unison. Curious as to their abilities, he spent the next several months developing their voices and then entered them as a musical act in a local festival under the name DOG STEVENS. They took first place, and went on to become one of the most successful animal musical acts since The Beatles.”

To keep the hype going, Neil Patrick Harris joined Twitter as well, and managed to grab 33,000 followers in seven hours.

You can follow Neil yourself on Twitter @ActuallyNPH. You can also catch How I Met Your Mother on Mondays 8 p.m. EST to see what all the buzz is about.