Jeff Albertson
Within the series, the character Comic Book Guy is often used to represent a stereotypical inhabitant of the newsgroup alt.tv.simpsons. The first such instance occurred in the seventh-season episode "Radioactive Man", in which Comic Book Guy is logging on to his favorite newsgroup alt.nerd.obsessive. David X. Cohen often read alt.tv.simpsons to gauge audience response to episodes. He decided to lampoon the passion and the fickleness of the fans.