It's worth little coming from some random HN guy, but I can confirm eric_hard_jams was Richard D James. We used to hang around similar circles online, and there were a couple meetups. There were a bunch of other Rephlex and Rephlex-adjacent musicians using pseudonyms, as well.

Richard was sort of annoying at times, in the way someone on the spectrum can be. A bit of a troll with poor timing, and poor social skills, but a good, kind lad who spent his time doing things completely orthogonal to anyone else and that made him quite interesting.

I lost touch with him in around 2000-2001. He kinda went dark in those circles. I don't know what he's up to these days, probably raising a family like me.