The Terminal Exception
So many years ago, when I was a programmer for ABS-CBN News Online, and things were starting to get a bit dicey, my boss (a grizzled old newsman who survived martial law) made me come up with a crazy technical setup where we could keep publishing to the Internet, through a satellite hookup in a van. Or through cellphones. Or through a rotating bank of dialup modems. Or through smoke signals if necessary.
As a programmer I had to ask about the terminal exception. When were we going to stop?
"Until we can't anymore", he said matter-of-fact.
That was just a seat-of-the-pants plan decades ago. Before streaming video. Before social media. When digital news was just a room in a basement. Since then they've had years to build up their online assets - and the government wasn't exactly subtle with its plans. So if you thought these people were just going to roll over and die...If you thought - for one second - that it would be that easy to kill an organization that driven to serve, then you assholes are even bigger idiots than I thought.