Have you ever had that moment. After being off-line for a while, you finally get a chance to read the SDMB and damn near fall off your chair? My two top moments:
New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevy coming out. I live in New Jersey. I read the thread title and made such a loud sound of shock that someone two rooms away asked me what was going on. My first thought was “What type of Twilight Zone did I fall into?”
Anna Nicole Smith’s death. First read about it in Cafe Society. Again, total shock.
Did she die today, really?
Pretty much all news except 9-11.
Too much to count. I used to surf major news web sites every day but then I figured out they string things out and distort the stories as well and that is no good. I have faith that all important news stories will be granted a thread here. Hell, we have members that serve as unpaid, cutting edge, correspondents to all important news stories with commentary from other correspondents from all over the world. That is what I call service.
I would have to echo the answer of ‘to many to count’, but the story that shocked me the most that I read here was Steve Irwin’s death. Not only was I a bit of a fan but I saw the tread within a few minutes of it being posted, which was at least an hour before I saw it hit any of the major new sources I check online.
September 11th. I remember doing my morning check of the boards and thinking, “Huh, why are there so many threads about planes hitting the World Trade Center?” It took me fifteen minutes or so to think, “Hey, maybe I should read one of these threads” … and then, holy crap :eek:
Yep…too many to count. What I notice more is seeing a bullet on a news site about something I read about 48 hours previously here.
Probably too many to count, certainly too many to remember!
I do remember seeing a thread about the Columbia disaster; since it happened within a week of the anniversary of the Challenger one, it took me a couple of thread titles before my brain clued in and noticed the name difference! I thought at first that there was just new information/interest in the causes of the Challenger’s demise!
Steve Irwin’s death, also. I think I caught the thread before it was really all over the news, so that was something I learned here.
Though I was aware of how Canada was handling gay marriage, pretty much everything I know about the US’s approach/decisions I get from here.
9/11 I watched “live”, but there were some details that I didn’t get until I came here (there was a lot of misinformation going around that day!)
I may think of more, but for now, that’s all I remember!
Ditto.
The National Guard forgeries in 2004. I don’t watch TV very much, so I missed the 60 Minutes story.
Regards,
Shodan
I heard about Steve Irwin’s death here first, although there was a TV on behind me with coverage that I just wasn’t paying attention to. I also first heard about Britney’s January 4th meltdown here, although I don’t know if that would be considered a “huge news story”.
The Columbia disaster was the major one for me. I get a lot of US news from this board, on a variety of stories, but the Columbia is the one that I clearly remember as first heard about from this board.
The Columbia. There was a thread that I read about fifteen minutes after the news hit the air. So I immediately turned on the TV.
Just last week, Edmund Hillary’s death, and otherwise pretty much all major US news - I followed the build-up/fall-out of Hurricane Katrina through these boards.
9-11.
I was at work, & had no radio on that day.
My work area is physically isolated, & nobody thought to tell me of it.
(I worry that if the building caught fire, nobody would tell me. In the darkroom, I’d never know.)