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Wife of Rambus CEO outed as message board troll

Can we sue anyone for this?

The wife of Rambus CEO Harold Hughes has emerged as the latest message board star. According to a report, Nancy Hughes dished out 170 messages under the alias clarissamehitable on the InvestorVillage site, defending her husband's good name while knocking other members of Rambus's management.

Legal rag The Recorder reports that posters became suspicious of clarissamehitable's ties to the memory maker in June. They noted that she appeared to have inside information and seemed awfully defensive about Hughes. Clarissamehitable's postings were, in fact, so surprising that Rambus kicked off its own internal investigation to scrutinize the postings - only to discover that Nancy was the mysterious scribbler.

"I'm constantly amazed at how many posters on this board know how Rambus management should run the company, all without ever having stepped inside the doors of he Rambus office building," Clarissamehitable wrote in one posting. "With 'loyal' shareholders like this, who needs - well - bashers?

"Yes, it is the American way to be able to bitch and moan and vent. And this forum is probably the best way to do that. Certainly better than taking a loaded gun into a crowded building. But remember, when you make your bed......"

You, um, don't wet it? We don't know.

In another posting, Nancy wrote, "I'm glad that HH changed the management options grants to more rational levels. He does a great job in getting this company through rough times."

And there's plenty more where that came from.

Rambus maintains that the postings were all legit, despite Nancy's intimate knowledge of company affairs.

"The board has determined that Harold had no involvement or knowledge of posting to any message board," a Rambus spokeswoman told, The Recorder adding, "no trades took place in connection with these postings and that the appropriate thing to do was to ask that she not post anymore, which she already had done."

A lawyer for Harold and Nancy Hughes told the paper that the postings were built on "publicly available information. "(Nancy) did not profit or help anyone profit," the lawyer said, adding that Nancy simply "acted out of loyalty to her husband."

There's more here.

Just last month, Whole Foods CEO John Mackey found infamy after he was caught trying to undermine rival Wild Oats on a message board. Mackey also liked to talk about how attractive he is. ®

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