Boycott International Shutdown Day!
By Peter Rojas 
posted February 23rd 2007 5:41PM
posted February 23rd 2007 5:41PM
It seems that a pair of men named Dennis Bystrov and Michael Taylor -- bitter victims of the bubble, we suspect -- want to perform a social experiment wherein people all over the world boycott computers for an entire day; willing participants are encouraged to click a pledge of sorts on the International Shutdown Day website promising to forgo any and all PC usage on March 24th.
Hold on there, big guy. You want us to STOP using computers for a day? How about we all decide to hold our breath for 24 hours, too? Yeah, that's right, we're not giving up our gadgets for anyone. We know that some day our computers will kill us (either by rising up against us or by getting us so sucked into a six day-long WoW marathon that we forget to eat), but hey, you gotta die from something right? At least we'll go out knowing we spent every waking moment indoors doing something worthwhile like reading RSS feeds and downloading porn. Those are truly the hallmarks of a life well-spent, wouldn't you agree? Anyway, we're going to show the Blame Computers First crowd what's what and use our computers TWICE as much on March 24th -- even if that means grabbing two machines and then typing with our fingers and toes at the same time.
Uhm.... How 'bout no? My income depends on a near-constant internet connection, thanks.
Okay, I think some people are overreacting here. The campaign is not about shutting down mainframes, pacemakers, life support, nor is it about companies stopping to work and refusing requests. Obviously if you work today and you use a computer at work (and no, that’s not quite as default as some people here seem to think), you won’t decide to participate, it’s that simple.
The point of the campaign is what Homer J and F1ghter and a couple other people here have pointed out — that we can live without the computer and get a friggen life for at least a day. We really do need it. I love my computer, but I know it’s not a good thing that the first thing I do in the morning is turn it on, and the first thing I do when I get back from school/work is to turn it on.
Geeze, this is stupid... can't get the use about this... and you're making this all THRU a computer!! Lollish.