Patch is among the many websites which will display a tribute to victims of the Sandy Hook shooting over their sites on Friday at 9:30 a.m.
According to Patch's sister site Techcrunch, the online campaign was inspired by a call for a moment of silence by Connecticut’s governor — and follows a coalition of tech leaders calling for more gun control.
The awareness strategy seems inspired by the SOPA [Stop Online Piracy Act] website blackouts from January. Instead of completely blocking functionality of participating websites, though, the tribute message can be closed to resume normal browsing. Alternatively, people can click a link in the message to find out what else they can do to aid the campaign.
The moment of silence on websites will coincide with one across social media sites. Over 100,000 people have pledged not to tweet or post to Facebook, including Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, Britney Spears, Suze Orman, Tyler Florence, Goldie Hawn, and Joe Montana.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has also ordered the state to observe the same moment of silence, and has asked that state buildings that have the capacity to ring their bells 26 times during to observance in memory of the victims.
