A quick Google reveals there are around 5000 suicides in the UK every year. These are realised in a variety of different ways, including by train and gun; these often involve unwitting witnesses.
Given the prevalence of the WWW, it’s entirely reasonable that one of these 5000 (let alone over many years) would try to do it in front of an unwitting online audience, which is exactly what happened with Kevin Whitrick (which unfortunately was tragically successful).
Now instead of accepting it as an unfortunate inevitability of statistics:
BBC.co.uk wrote:
A coroner has called for "insult chatrooms" to be banned after a man took his own life while being watched by others on a web cam.
Chatroom warning after web death
Now try to define "insult chatroom" – C+?
Anyone with any experience with internet knows that any chatroom can turn into a flamefest at anytime.
What this idiot coroner is actually asking for is for all posts, messages and webcam streams to be vetted by moderators before release into the public domain. Disregarding the lunacy of it: does he really think doing so would make any difference? Would someone who has "long-running problems with depression.” great enough to actually attempt suicide, simply find another way?
Well done Michael Gwynne, now you’ve got your 15 mins of fame - for being a total tit!
[/rant]
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