91–100 of 173 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That would depend entirely on the cost of the initiative and what other things, including potentially more effective ways of rescuing kidnapped children, could be done instead.
Your answer makes me want to quit HN forever and move to the planet Mars where humans don't live.
I appreciate the noble motives behind this, but programs like the AMBER alert have not proven very effective[1]. Furthermore, abductions by strangers are incredibly rare; most abductions are by people that the child knows well (such as an estranged parent/relative, etc.). These are the cases for which the AMBER alert is most likely to have success, but they're also the cases for which it is the least likely to be nec…
A friend of mine growing up had an older brother who was abducted. His mother quit her job and spent the next 5 years looking for him. Eventually, she found him. She called her mother's home and her son picked up the phone. He had been abducted by his uncle and told that his mother had sent him to live with his extended family. No one suspected it. Now, I know n=1 is not a good sample size, but to downplay the signif…
Why would a kidnapper would post pictures of a child they kidnapped on FB? Criminals are not always rocket scientists, and even then they aren't always rational(1). The kids also tend to go to birthday parties, school, and other places where other people post pictures of them that get posted on social networks.
I appreciate the noble motives behind this, but programs like the AMBER alert have not proven very effective[1]. Furthermore, abductions by strangers are incredibly rare; most abductions are by people that the child knows well (such as an estranged parent/relative, etc.). These are the cases for which the AMBER alert is most likely to have success, but they're also the cases for which it is the least likely to be nec…
If even ONE SINGLE CHILD is found and returned back into the loving arms of a parent due to a repurposed 404 page, the initiative is a great success. Don't you think?
Let me put it this way: Let's say it take 500 hours to find a child without someone calling in and 5 hours to investigate a claim.
If the website method has a success rate of 1% or less the time needed to investigate the claims outweighs the time it would take to find the child without the 404 pages at all.
I don't have any numbers for this but surely that is one scenario where this could cause more harm than good.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That would depend entirely on the cost of the initiative and what other things, including potentially more effective ways of rescuing kidnapped children, could be done instead.
That would depend entirely on the cost of the initiative and what other things, including potentially more effective ways of rescuing kidnapped children, could be done instead. No, that is incorrect. The program would be regarded as successful if it rescued one child at any cost. It is possible that there are more effective ways, but the existence of those possibilities does not preclude a less effective way of being…
But surely this isn't the case or each of us would personally have to dedicate all of our own time and money to finding every missing child, correct? Why aren't you using your salary to run ads on Facebook with the faces of missing children? It might work...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
And they would let him, why?
If they won't, he knows something is up. Did they never let him outside in public, never go to school, never have contact with anyone who could help? If so, he was basically just locked in the basement, the whole thing about saying he was sent there didn't actually matter.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
A friend of mine growing up had an older brother who was abducted. His mother quit her job and spent the next 5 years looking for him. Eventually, she found him. She called her mother's home and her son picked up the phone. He had been abducted by his uncle and told that his mother had sent him to live with his extended family. No one suspected it. Now, I know n=1 is not a good sample size, but to downplay the signif…
It would be more effective to have the FBI do face recognition on everyone's vacation photos on Facebook. Assuming that the kidnappers want to raise the kid as their own, they are bound to post pictures of him. This won't work for the 75% that chimeracoder alleges are murdered, but it might for the scenarios like the one you described. Why would a kidnapper would post pictures of a child they kidnapped on FB? Crimina…
Is it just me or is there no sample page on the site? I had to go to a participating webpage and find their 404. It's a noble idea, i don't know if 404's are an appropriate place, and i don't know if it'll have any real impact. Noble, though.
Were you able to find one? I clicked through to a couple of their "participating websites" (google.com and hilarious.be are listed), generated a 404, and got bupkis. At that point I assumed this was some sort of bizarre joke.
Awesome idea and very noble. I wonder however if any users will have objections to this.
If it's "for the children" one is not allowed to object or to hold any opinion other than "that's the most excellent idea ever".