Bit of a sad one...
 

Sorry, but bit of a morbid one. A friend of mine who subscribed to FT, has sadly recently passed away. It just got me thinking about how many subscribers may in fact be deceased and if in fact, there may be a way of advising you guys as such ? Or even if you want/need to know ?

My condolences.
I have thought about this, too. You just think the person got bored with FT, stopped travelling and/or generally moved on, where reality may instead have been rather less pleasant...

Sorry to hear about the loss. I though the quoted poster had passed away when he stopped posting a year or two ago.

My condolences for your loss. :( There was just a thread a week or two ago about someone who had stopped posting some time back who had turned out to have passed away.

I can't really think of any good way for the board to know if someone has passed, though. I mean, I registered for my FT account with an email address that I don't use for anything else (i.e., none of my friends know it). I have a few friends on FT who know my real name, but these are mostly internet friends... they probably wouldn't know if I had passed away in the night (wow, that sounds sad).

blooming heck! I was just busy enjoying the free booze onboard CSA. :D

Please accept my condolences on the loss of your friend. I personally think of many of my FT friends as my family and appreciate you sharing this loss with us.

There have been several threads about the deaths of FT members - one very recently. But we do have to consider whether the member (or their families) would be happy to have threads about their deaths on FT as well - death can be a very private affair and some people will just not want a large fuss made - and others might!

After a discussion around this subject, I've now created a FT will - I've told some close friends (who are also on FT) what I want to be done on FT in the event that I die untimely. Now, it's up to them to decide if they want to follow my wishes, but I've also told them what I said to say about anyone who choses to ignore my wishes ;)

But I think it will always remain a difficult topic for us, and I'm sure there are many members out there who have died and we are simply not aware of their deaths.

The FT will sounds good. I think I need to make one, too.
Problem is, as 3TAL said, that most of my friends here are internet ones so wouldn't be able to know straightaway.

Sorry about the loss of your friend.

When I die, I would like my FT will to release a post that flames all the flammable, so that I will be permanently banned. I'll call it my eternal flame. That way I won't waste any more time thinking about what I'm missing.

My condolences to you and your friend's family.

I'm so sorry for your loss :(

Even in our day-to-day world, one of my bosses insists we call in, even if we're going to be late to work. He's had a couple of situations in the past where single coworkers who failed to turn up at the office were later found to have died in their sleep at home. By making sure his staff calls in, he has an idea of who might need a home visit to ensure that they're okay.

It did sort of creep me out a little when a friend of mine who's a cop mentioned to me that if I ever got a call from "Andy," it would not be a good sign. Apparently, I'm on his "call if something happens to me" list.

Thanks one and all....no, I'm still around..although slowing down a bit nowadays....40 odd years on the road, around the world, I think is taking it's toll a bit on me now ! At the last count I still have around 3 million+ odd 'miles' to burn....couple of trips planned for me and my wife...but apart from that, I'm going to treat and spoil my kids, (and theirs,) with some surprise tickets...(if I can get hold of them, which seems to be an ever increasing problem nowadays.) Regards to all.

My condolences.

As FT is now 10 years old, there are going to be members who have left us. I personally felt it was a mark of respect that bernie's passing was noted on CommunityBuzz. I also read that this was mentioned on TalkMail. The above posters raise thoughtful points. I think most FTers do want to be know if another FTer moves on, especially if they had corresponded with him/her on FT, attended DOs that he/she may have organized... Otherwise, as graraps writes, one would only assume that person's interests had changed.

Jenbel raises the point that some members may not want their passing noted on FT. I surely think this would be a minority. We are talking about giving members an opportunity to express their appreciation to someone for their contributions to FT. As always, an individual's handle is used, not their real name.

Like ILeftMyHeartInTexas, I have come to regard many of my FT friends as family. When the time comes for my member number to be "retired", I would be glad if this were noted here. Otherwise they might conclude I'm just being rude, ignoring their PMs. :) However I'm not sure how this would occur - when my mailbox overflows, when I fail to sign on for an annual DO I usually attend ... ?

Sorry mike turnbull for your loss. Thank you for raising a good point.

Among FTs large membership there must be a number of people who only post occasionally (even if they lurk very regularly) and whose non-posting may not be missed until a long time after their last post.

Of these, some are getting past their golden years and may not be in the best of health, or whose family may not be online. All of us could be taken by accident, ill health or something else, if not by age- or health-related causes.

Thanks Jenbel for sharing your FT Will plan as this would be worthwhile for many of us, especially those who post infrequently and who are among our eldest generations.

I've met some lovely people (of all ages and interests) on FT or catching up around Sydney. I am always glad to see they are still posting, some of whom are much, much older AND wiser than me. :)

I often wonder what happened to certain people. More often than not, I click on their handle to find that they're suspended or banned. However, there are probably others who post anonymously, that we may never know about one way or the other because they don't have any personal relationship with anyone else on the board. Then, a couple years ago, we had member who turned out to be involved in criminal activity and took his own life, in a violent way IIRC.

There is one person I wonder about who was a poster in a particular forum I frequent. I heard he may have had a drinking problem. I wonder how he is.

I also wonder about the extremely nice poster from Texas who shared great stories of his family and his experiences as a gay black man raising a son with his partner. His posts were always very thoughtful, regardless of the subject.

I guess, in many cases, we'll just be left to wonder.

SpottyDog! I wonder about him too!

Its a difficult scenario.
 

I work in law enforcement and at least every day we have somewhere in western and southwestern sydney someone who has died at home alone. Sometimes its days or even worse weeks/months before a neighbour raises the alarm, due to mail build up, lawns not mown or a bad smell.

I know that I can go for several weeks without seeing a neighbour, but how do you force someone who does not want to interact - interact.

As far as FT etc - it would be nice to have some way to notify, as its a friendship that counts.

My Dad recently died, and we got feedback from the strangest places and people, about how much they enjoyed talking to him and what a nice man he was. Which was interesting as many people had the opposite to say about him too. So it was nice to know that in recent years he had mellowed and the people he came into contact with in the last 12 years of his life had a different view.

Not sure what the answer is?

Maybe the combined wisdom of the forum will produce something.

Adam

I stumbled into FlyerTalk nearly 10 years ago and was astounded at the intelligence, humor and real caring that existed in that tiny group of cyber friends. I fell in love with them and FlyerTalk almost instantly and that love has never waivered over the years.

Way back in the very beginning, I can remember wondering what would happen if one of us passed away. At that time, we only knew one another in cyberspace and had no real-life connection with one another or our families.

Then the miracle of meeting one another in real life began and we became real friends, in real life, and a real community.

Since then I have lost four very dear FlyerTalk friends. johna, who gave me my very first upgrade certificate when I switched to UA in 1999, became very ill during a FlyerTalk party in Montreal and, when he returned home to SFO, directed a friend to advise us of his passing. Raeban who was an active poster, was also the wife of a then active original member. She actually died during a huge FlyerTalk event, wearing her (PIP) Party in Paradise T-shirt as she passed into her final paradise. Nathan Detroit had been ill for some time and when he stopped posting, I became very worried and called his wife who advised that he had died two days earlier.

The last of my good friends to pass was bernie, the incomparable host of the DUS Dos. He had no partner, or family that we know of, to advise of his passing. Several FlyerTalkers had tried to e-mail and/or call him with no results so we suspected that perhaps he had died. This was finally confirmed by FLYGVA who actually went to bernie's old flat and to his favorite cafe to inquire. Next week, Hunki and I will fly to DUS and will toast a drink in bernie's memory at his beloved Cafe Bernstein. We will share the thoughts and memories of the Cafe Bernstein staff when we return.

I did not know Bart Watson, but, knew several FlyerTalkers who counted him as a friend, and grieved when I read his very sad story.

RIP, to my beloved FlyerTalk friends, and to those deceased FlyerTalkers whom I never met during their journeys around this sphere.

I think you're talking about PlatBrownGuy. He came on the 2006 Brooklyn Reality Tour. Nice guy.

No, Missy had it right (SpottyDog) - unless he changed handles. :)

This does pose quite a conundrum--one of you on this thread knows who I really am, and I hope you'd mourn my passing, but on the other hand, how would you really know? I suppose I should give a letter to my attorney saying, "these people know me only on the internet--if anything happens, let them know". I wouldn't want you to be sad; I just wouldn't want to leave you in the dark.

My condolences to the original poster on having lost a friend.
Close friends of mine (who also happen to be on FT) know exactly what I would, or wouldn't, want said. There's also something to be said for respecting an individual's privacy. @:-)

Bingo!!! Wise words. Perhaps people didn't know because it was really none of their business and they weren't as great of a friend as one thought? :confused: