By JON RONSON
FEBRUARY 12, 2015
As she made the long journey from New York to South Africa, to visit family
during the holidays in 2013, Justine Sacco, 30 years old and the senior director
of corporate communications at IAC, began tweeting acerbic little jokes about
the indignities of travel. There was one about a fellow passenger on the flight
from John F. Kennedy International Airport:
“ ‘Weird German Dude: You’re in First Class. It’s 2014. Get some deodorant.’ —
Inner monologue as I inhale BO. Thank God for pharmaceuticals.”
Then, during her layover at Heathrow:
“Chilly — cucumber sandwiches — bad teeth. Back in London!”
And on Dec. 20, before the final leg of her trip to Cape Town:
“Going to Africa. Hope I don’t get AIDS. Just kidding. I’m white!”
She chuckled to herself as she pressed send on this last one, then wandered
around Heathrow’s international terminal for half an hour, sporadically
checking her phone. No one replied, which didn’t surprise her. She had only
170 Twitter followers.
Sacco boarded the plane. It was an 11-hour flight, so she slept. When the plane
landed in Cape Town and was taxiing on the runway, she turned on her phone.
Right away, she got a text from someone she hadn’t spoken to since high
school: “I’m so sorry to see what’s happening.” Sacco looked at it, baffled.
Then another text: “You need to call me immediately.” It was from her best
friend, Hannah. Then her phone exploded with more texts and alerts. And then
it rang. It was Hannah. “You’re the No. 1 worldwide trend on Twitter right
now,” she said.
Sacco’s Twitter feed had become a horror show. “In light of @Justine-Sacco
disgusting racist tweet, I’m donating to @care today” and “How did
@JustineSacco get a PR job?! Her level of racist ignorance belongs on Fox News.
#AIDS can affect anyone!” and “I’m an IAC employee and I don’t want
@JustineSacco doing any communications on our behalf ever again. Ever.” And
then one from her employer, IAC, the corporate owner of The Daily Beast,
OKCupid and Vimeo: “This is an outrageous, offensive comment. Employee in
question currently unreachable on an intl flight.” The anger soon turned to
excitement: “All I want for Christmas is to see @JustineSacco’s face when her
plane lands and she checks her inbox/voicemail” and “Oh man, @JustineSacco
is going to have the most painful phone-turning-on moment ever when her
plane lands” and “We are about to watch this @JustineSacco bitch get fired. In
REAL time. Before she even KNOWS she’s getting fired.”
The furor over Sacco’s tweet had become not just an ideological crusade against
her perceived bigotry but also a form of idle entertainment. Her complete
ignorance of her predicament for those 11 hours lent the episode both dramatic
irony and a pleasing narrative arc. As Sacco’s flight traversed the length of
Africa, a hashtag began to trend worldwide: #HasJustineLandedYet. “Seriously.
I just want to go home to go to bed, but everyone at the bar is SO into
#HasJustineLandedYet. Can’t look away. Can’t leave” and “Right, is there no
one in Cape Town going to the airport to tweet her arrival? Come on, Twitter!
I’d like pictures #HasJustineLandedYet.”
A Twitter user did indeed go to the airport to tweet her arrival. He took her
photograph and posted it online. “Yup,” he wrote, “@JustineSacco HAS in fact
landed at Cape Town International. She’s decided to wear sunnies as a
disguise.”
By the time Sacco had touched down, tens of thousands of angry tweets had
been sent in response to her joke. Hannah, meanwhile, frantically deleted her
friend’s tweet and her account — Sacco didn’t want to look — but it was far too
late. “Sorry @JustineSacco,” wrote one Twitter user, “your tweet lives on
forever.”

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/magazine/how-one-stupid-tweet-ruined-justine-saccos-life.html?_r=1&referrer=

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...was gonna post an advise,but just couldnt pass on this lengthy rules! haha

just mind what you post online, cos you can't tell who reads it. Happy Val to y'all.
(its my birthday).

Was gonna post an advise,but just couldnt pass on this lengthy rules! haha
just mind what you post online, cos you can't tell who reads it. Happy Val to y'all.
(its my birthday).

[/quote]

Hmmmm...If only Justine Sacco was familiar with some of nairaland rules.BTW, Happy birthday and val to u @ BigBang666.Many more fruitful years ahead.