gridlore: Doug looking off camera with a grin (Default)
Douglas Berry ([personal profile] gridlore) wrote2002-08-25 10:02 am

I had an idea last night.

As everyone knows, we are fast approaching the first anniversary of the September 11th attacks. Everyone is discussing how the best memorialize the event, and the people lost. Here's my two cents.

A day of silence on the Internet. For one calendar day, starting at 0001 11 SEP 02, your local time, stop posting, emailing, surfing whatever. A global day of silence moving around the world. I realize that this would be impossible for those in business who rely on the net, but I think it would be a powerful statement. I remember on that day the messages on the Traveller Mailing List to our NYC members asking "are you ok?" And I know the terrible silence when one person never replies to those calls.

So for one day, stay off the net. It will survive. talk on the phone, go for a walk, or just remember how much we all lost on the terrible day, one year ago.

thinking I will be on the NO side of this one.

[personal profile] chiefted 2002-08-25 08:32 pm (UTC)(link)
From the sorta cheap seats here. I will be using the net that day in much the same way I did a year ok. Working. Last year it was boxing radios to go on a moment notice. Watching and updating the two O6s (Capts) I work for on what is going on, what are we doing. This is not the day to remain silent. This is a day to connect with one another.

One of my loves could have lost someone that day, her love in NYC. The only way to talk to him on that day was on the computer, via the internet. She opened a line to her mum too. As the calls came in from others in the area they were on the phone checking, praying that the phone would be answered.

So in much the same way of defiance as when her and I were standing on her balcony on the 13th of Sept and she and I looked up and saw a plane about to land at the airport, she yelled through tears streaming down her face...you bastards haven't won. I will use the net in the same way....they haven't won, I will remember the other life savers who gave thier lives so others may live.