UCSB Student on MTV

BY ERIC LINDBERG
DAILY SOUND STAFF WRITER

Jessica Chernicki leaned back and watched as an unknown person from a remote location hacked into her laptop and started combing through her personal files.
But she had nothing to worry about. The MTV cameraman standing near her caught it all on film.
Chernicki, 19, is one of several people who had their computers searched by a stranger as part of MTV’s second season of “Meet or Delete.”

“It was like my laptop was possessed,” Chernicki said. “There were a couple of things I forgot were on there, but nothing I was worried about.”
The premise of the show is fairly straightforward. One person rifles through the personal hard drives of three strangers, picks one, and swaps lives with them for a short time.
Chernicki, who lives in Goleta and attended UC Santa Barbara for the last two years, said she saw a online advertisement asking for participants and signed up because she was bored.
“Then they kept asking me for more information,” Chernicki said, despite the pictures she sent in of herself “making weird faces” and “hanging out with friends and being stupid.”
Since the episode airs on MTV tonight, Chernicki couldn’t say whether or not she was chosen to swap lives. She hasn’t even seen the episode yet, and said she’ll be watching it tonight as well.
“I have no idea what they are going to show,” she said.
Most of the preproduction took place in June, Chernicki said, and filming took place in July at her apartment in Isla Vista. Although she expected a much larger production, only the cameraman and producer showed up for her segment.
“My friends thought it was pretty cool,” Chernicki said. “...It’s funny, when I told my family, they didn’t actually believe me at first. They kept saying, make sure it’s legitimate.”
While Chernicki attended UCSB for the past two years as a dramatic arts major, she said she will be transferring to UC Davis this year, a little closer to her hometown of Yuba City, Calif.
Chernicki’s episode of “Meet or Delete” will air tonight on MTV at midnight and tomorrow on mtvU at 11 a.m.
“It was a really interesting experience,” Chernicki said, adding, “I’m really glad I did it.”