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Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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Chris Lightfoot Chris Lightfoot, occasional commentator here, well-known blogger, and technical wizard, is dead. It has been a confidential matter for a couple of weeks, but can now become public.
I didn’t know him very well, but will miss his awesome intelligence. NO2ID will miss his capacity just to fix things while lesser techies were squabbling among themselves about how to do it.
Other people, here, and here, for example, knew him better and have more valuable things to say.
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Sorry to hear this, Guy. I never met him, but he clearly was a good man. My condolences to his family and friends.
I was quite shocked when I first heard. We need more like him. On every level his passing is a great loss.
Yes it is indeed very sad that Chris Lightfoot has died, and so young.
However, on a technical point, I think you probably indulge in hyperbole when you write:
It has been a confidential matter for a couple of weeks, but can now become public.
So far as I am aware deaths which occur in the UK must be registered within 72 hours and become a public record. Unless there are very special circumstances relating to Chris Lightfoot’s untimely demise then I can see no reason why news of his passing should have been embargoed, rather than simply kept private so that his friends and family could arrange his funeral in private and commence the mourning process in a calmer atmosphere.
Bill,
I think it’s just out of common courtesy to friends and family that an announcement was delayed- particularly if there were circumstances permitting.
Nobody has an obligation to inform you of a stranger’s death.
On another note, it’s only with Chris’ death that I’ve come to appreciate his efforts and commitment to helping others and providing them with tools to enable them to wrest control of information for its better use. Sad that it should take someone’s untimely demise to highlight their shining attributes.
The political Internet will surely be missing his innovative contributions in future.
Nobody has an obligation to inform you of a stranger’s death.
Of course they don’t, and I never stated or implied that they did. However, as the Register of Births (,Marriages and Deaths) is a public record it cannot be kept ‘secret’ either, unless there are some special circumstances surrounding the event, if someone chooses to go hunting in those records to see who may have died in the recent past. I quite agree that the family in this case, and in many other cases too, decides not to broadcast or announce a death so that their grieving may be done quietly – perfectly normal and understandable. The way the post was written, however, seemed to me to state something that was unlikely to be factual; that is all.
That is a great shame. I attended several No2ID events and met him several times.