I have no idea who this guy is, but based on my own memories I’m pretty sure trans* did come from within the community. I know trans* as a term dates back at least to the early 00s because I remember seeing it around then, and from what I recall it wasn’t a new term, but one that came from 90s trans user groups (with the * being a programming reference to wildcards, because some things about trans spaces never change). Trans* was used to be inclusive of transgender and transsexual, which were common self identification terms at the time that obviously gave way to transgender.

But what we lost in the (pardon the pun) transition is that transgender as a term used to include many people who would consider themselves cisgender today. If you look through flyers and media from the time you’ll sometimes see illustrations of the ‘transgender umbrella,’ and it includes butch women, feminine men, drag performers, basically anyone who could conceivably fall into the ‘gender criminal’ category. What trans* did is give people a way to make it clear they were talking about both groups. And I think the inclusion of people we would now consider cis under the transgender umbrella was an important way to help a lot of people who now consider trans rights to not have much to do with them (because they don’t want to transition and identify with their birth sex) that it actually has a ton to do with them, because anyone who diverges from gender norms is a target of the same patriarchal system.

Again, no clue who this dude is, this is just one of my old trans recites memories at clouds routines. Caveat: I can only speak for my own memories of the time, someone else may be able to speak more accurately than me.