Straight to the point – I’m on AOL, and had someone local start up IM’ing me out of the blue a couple of months ago. I don’t know the lady, didn’t want to know the lady, and ended up ‘Buddy Listing’ her just so I’d know to avoid her. Not much new there, but as a consequence of having her on my ‘Buddy List’ I gained a fair idea of her on-line habits, relative to my own.
The various comings and goings of this person have suddenly changed – rather than popping on-line and off-line like the rest of us are wont to do, this lady has suddenly been on-line what seems to be continuously for five days now. I’ve asked a few friends with different hours than my own to look out, and all reports are that she hasn’t signed off in nigh on a week.
I even IM’d her a couple of times to see if anyone was watching the store, and got no response.
Help me out – have ye any good cause for this kind of thing, or should I be callin’ the cyber equivalent of 911 here?
Yes, tell someone.
There maybe a technical reason, in which case AOL should be able to help. If there isn’t, checking things out is part of what the police get paid for.
What I wonder is, how is she keeping her connection for that long? Most servers require that you remain active, lest they disconnect you. Maybe DSL is different; does she have that? But then there are power outages and surges, and computers (like mine) that choose their own times to reboot.
Something may be amiss here, but I’m not sure if it necessitates calling 911. The fact that her connection has remained constant (or almost) for five days indicates that she’s at least alive. Does your impression of her allow the possiblity that she’s done, or is doing “something drastic”? Could it be that she’s being held hostage? Maybe she’s going for the world record for the longest online session, and doesn’t want to tell anyone for fear she’ll inspire competition.
Is there a “cyber 911”? They’d be the ones to handle this, certainly.
So, if I’m understanding this correctly, it could be as simple as having changed her service? Something new every day learns I, and if this is the case, then I must wear the epithet ‘Paranoid Idiot’.
And doubly so since I’ve already asked the folks at AOL to have a look just in case something really is wrong. (I have an odd little program installed that keeps AOL from booting you, so if I happened to keel over this damnable machine would keep me connected for eternity.)
Anyway, I suppose being concerned does no harm, and I thank you all for the free lesson in electronic trickery. I honestly had no idea.
Thats about it Crick. I leave my connection on all the time because I am on cable so its an instant connection. I would be concerned tho if no one answered for such an extended period of time.
We are, each of us angels with only one wing,and we can only fly by embracing one another
Well now this is just turning out to be one sweet damned roller coaster of a week . . .
I no sooner post a nice warm fuzzy touchy-feely kind of thread, and the damned phone rings. The local constables would like me to stop by at my convenience to have a little chat concerning a certain local young lady. (What kind of cop calls a fella at 6 a.m.?)
Kudos to somebody for actually following up on a flaky inquiry, but it might have helped my disposition a bit if the cops had mentioned just what they wanted to talk about.
I’m guessing I might have been a bit too eager to wear the ‘Paranoid Idiot’ label.
Anyway, it ought to be interesting. I’ll let you know what happens, assuming they tell me anything.
