Emergency contact information

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Lucifer
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Emergency contact information

Post by Lucifer »

So, I've got a question. Now, I realize that everything points to the "Durka is dead" thread as being a prank, so that's not my question.

My question is, if someone here were to die suddenly or get seriously injured, or suddenly disappear from the community completely, and someone came along and told us, how would we be able to verify that information quickly enough to have a response?

I'm thinking that, hypothetically speaking, if someone like Durka were to suddenly die, we'd at least want to send flowers to his funeral, right? But by the time we'd be able to verify it wasn't a prank (which, as you can see, we actually have to do), he'd be buried.

This has actually happened before, where someone around here was injured seriously in a car accident and there wasn't a damn thing we could do about it until he came back a year later. Well, where were we when he was in the ER being told he may never walk again? We were oblivious to what was happening.

So, any ideas? I've got several.

* Each individual here that actually wants the arma community notified if they get hurt/killed/whatever gives contact information to their existing emergency contact network so that people here can be notified. This has the fatal flaw in that it depends on such a network existing, and most people don't set one up, they just let their family take care of it.

* For those of us that actually are organized enough to do it (I'm not, but I'll try to remember), we could make little business card-sized things to put in our wallets that say who to contact in case of emergency, and make sure it includes people here in the arma community.

* For the purpose of verifying when someone has been hurt, we could have some private place (maybe on these forums) where people can put emergency contacts that can be used to verify. So, like, when a certain individual went missing and all we could do was google local news, we'd actually be able to call up some folks ourselves and verify it directly. This at least gives us a way to call someone, like Your_mom, and say "Is he really dead? Where should we send flowers? We want to be there too....".

Any other ideas?
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MrsKsr
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by MrsKsr »

Nice idea... I only worry that said information would get into the hands of the wrong people... :/
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Lucifer
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by Lucifer »

dubStep wrote:Nice idea... I only worry that said information would get into the hands of the wrong people... :/
That is both the issue and the problem. Because we're all mostly anonymous, at least anonymous enough to make it difficult to verify such information, we've also protected our real life family's privacy. Since this community is inclusive and welcomes all newcomers, and, well, quite frankly some newcomers may not be people we want to know......

So how to proceed? I could personally go and hit up 10 people or so and give them my parents' phone number, mom's email address, and probably my sister's phone number and email, and trust them with that information. I could give both my mom and my sister those same 10 people's email addresses and phone numbers.

So then, 5-6 years later, how many of these people have managed to keep the contact info? :) Is it something we'd need to refresh every now and then? Because that's not happening. My domain registration still shows my old Seattle address as far as I know, but I haven't lived there in 5 years.
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nsh22
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by nsh22 »

i like this idea, and ironically i was thinking about it lately. i would trust about 3 ppl off the top of my head (4 if you include 2 ppl who r married) that i would trust with this info.
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by Cloaket »

You guise can trust me I am friend :D :D :D
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pie goes moo
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by pie goes moo »

I can't trust Cloaket...
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by Hoax »

Lucifer wrote: if someone like Durka were to suddenly die, we'd at least want to send flowers to his funeral, right?
Wrong :?
:P
Wasn't there that site where it would send out emails if it were to happen. I beleive it was flawed somehow though; like if you didn't log in for a while it would presume the worst resulting in untrue notifications.
Each individual, if they cared about this sort of thing, really only needs one person who thy trust who would tell 'everyone else' (whatever communities) in such a case
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by compguygene »

In many ways this whole topic just reminds me of the need that EVERYONE has to maintain an updated will. When I file an update to mine this year, I am going to be sure to include instructions on how the executor of my will, will need to contact the Armagetron Community. However, I can see that verification identity is a HUGE problem. Perhaps we, as a community could come up with a trusted authority, say a special website maintained by the developers, that would contain real, updated real life contact information for people in the community. This, of course, would depend upon the individuals volunteering said information, and updating that information, as it changes.
Perhaps, someday, this could be part of the next version of Armathentication. Perhaps a future version of Armathentication could be created to use SSL as a more secure manner in which to Armathenticate, perhaps using Open_ID?
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by Word »

i thought about a similar thing some months ago when i was really ill and didn't know how many days i had left on this planet (well tbh i still don't know it but i'm healed, it turned out to be harmless :P). a system like Lucifer proposed would not only be useful in case of someones death, but also when you are unable to use a computer for any other reason. but i'd like to admit that it's important for me who is involved (for example do you like someone to tell your grandparents that their grandchild has spent a good quarter of his life on playing a lightcycle game?).

speaking for myself: our server hoster and i are schoolfriends, he would inform you if i was dead...not that you care ;)
Last edited by Word on Sat Aug 22, 2009 2:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by compguygene »

What got me thinking was this. My wife is the only other person in my Real Life that knows about me even owning "servers". But if I died tommorow...nobody in my life would be able to manage the servers, let alone know how to contact the arma community etc. So, I think I have a vested interest in trying to address this issue. Especially as I am doing things to drive more traffic to my game servers and run tournaments.
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Z-Man
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by Z-Man »

My wife has my master password on both the PC and laptop; she'd be able to post in my name. Simple as that :)
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by Word »

oh that's why subzero thought you were a girl ;)
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compguygene
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by compguygene »

My wife has the master passwords as well, but, she has no clue how to post on a forum, etc. In fact, on the 2 forums that she uses, she sometimes has me post for her for this reason. And, she refuses to learn how! I have been teaching my 13 y/o daughter how to post, and given the concerns raised, I plan to teach her how to login and make a post, using my account, here. I know that I could depend on her to take care of people on the Internet knowing that I have died. I really appreciate Lucifer bringing up this issue. I hadn't really thought about it much in the past.
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pie goes moo
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by pie goes moo »

compguygene wrote: Perhaps we, as a community could come up with a trusted authority, say a special website maintained by the developers,
The only problem with that is if you have to enter info there, or anywhere, there is still on HUGE problem.
Hackers. I mean, what if there is a keylogger attached to our computer? Hackers can get that contact info and do whatever their twisted minds can think of to do with it.
My point is, this is either a big help, or a big blunder. Make your choices wisely. :wink:
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Re: Emergency contact information

Post by DDMJ »

If I got seriously hurt, I would probably tell one of my friend to IM Goodygumdrops. If I got killed then...arrow would win the Ladle again :\/
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