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Tech leaders, websites join national moment of silence for Sandy Hook victims

Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy has asked residents for a moment of silence in honor of the Sandy Hook victims on Friday.

Malloy’s fellow governors in Maine, Illinois, Michigan and several other states called on residents to follow suit with a moment of silence and to ring bells to remember the dead. The National Cathedral in Washington plans to ring its bell 28 times as part of an interfaith memorial.

President Obama will also observe the moment of silence.

sandy hook moment of silenceAdvocates for bringing an end to gun violence are also calling for a national moment of silence at 9:30 a.m. EST and are enlisting websites to promote the message and go silent themselves.

News reports list Twitter’s Jack Dorsey, television host Ryan Seacrest and singer Britney Spears as leaders of the web effort, as well as Salesforce.com chief Marc Benioff, former American football star Joe Montana and actress Goldie Hawn.

Ironically, the National Rifle Association will kick off a media campaign at 10.45 Eastern.

Websites that are joining the moment of silence effort can add a bit of javascript that will put an overlay on the site for five minutes. More than 170,000 have pledged to support the cause as of this writing.

Big name sites supporting the cause, according to its website, include

Other organizations reported to be participating include

  • AOL
  • ESPN
  • TechCrunch

Major web sites used a similar technique in January to bring attention to the debate on SOPA in Washington, D.C.

moment of silence

By Kathy E. Gill

Digital evangelist, speaker, writer, educator. Transplanted Southerner; teach newbies to ride motorcycles! @kegill

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