Please Help Find a Missing Person: Jenifer Martinek

A google of the avatar name shows a few things about a few US people with that RL name and a google of her supposed RL name shows nothing except a few SL related blog comments specifically about this disappearance claim.

So, I must say that I am quite doubtful here.

Would Brazilian websites show up on google this way? In Portuguese?

Yes

On other Google searches, I've received results showing foreign websites so I don't see why this one wouldn't.

I actually did a search on the domain of the email address and got a Brazilian web page that I had google translate - and I then searched that website for all variations of the name.

Yes.. do Advanced Search and specify Portuguese as the language if you want to filter. Doesn't seem to be anything in Portuguese about anyone with what is said to be her RL name who's gone missing.

Sorry Treasure, I think I misunderstood you, in part. You are speaking particularly of LL's involvement.

I think I generally agree with Clarissa. The idea is not to get LL investigating the supposed disappearance, but rather verify a few things, such as the legitimacy of the e-mail address. I certainly don't think LL should be actively engaged in hunting any of us down when we go missing. But a pretty minimal intervention would probably solve a lot of hoaxes.

And if this is legitimate any statement at all by LL could (and likely would) hinder any official investigation by the Brazilian authorities (or any other police organization involved). If LL in a cursory "investigation" finds the whole incident to be a hoax, perpetuated on their grid/forums there is the very real issue of potential bad press...........and what if their cursory "investigation" proves to be wrong and it is not a hoax? Imagine that press. LL, if they are ever aware, are most likely doing exactly what everyone here shoud be doing. WAITING for valid, verifiable facts.

Jumping to conclusions (even if well intentioned) to "err on the side of caution" is not the way to help. Look at this thread...........what has been said that will help find the missing girl?

Something to think about that was brought up in one of my groups -- this could be a scam by someone that wanted to get the RL name of this particular avi out there for some reason, as some of the group notices about the disappearance did include her supposed RL name.

Just to get her name out there and the fact she's been declared missing.

I agree w/Scylla that the harm of not posting it if it IS true is worse than the harm of posting it if it is not true.

And good point about not jumping to conclusions. However if it turns into chain mail that goes on for months or years, it would be nice to let people know it was either a hoax or resolved. (Or ongoing and true.)

Again LL would not be acting on its own but alongside authorities.

Yes. I was speaking particularly and solely of some type of perceived obligation of LL. I don't feel they have one, other than to cooperate with authorities if asked. That was my only point. We can respectfully agree to disagree, though.

Yes, it could be a personal vendetta against that person--a hope that she would be harassed by the kind of character who phones numbers they see on a movie screen.

Or it could be a phishing scam to collect valid email addresses.

Or it could be someone who gets off by seeing people posting about a hoax he or she has created.

But I agree with Clarissa, that Scylla was quite correct to make a thread:

This thread alone is reason enough people should think, not once, not twice, but thrice before meeting people online in RL. You never know what that person is really going to be like or how much of the life they told you they had is true.

I am not saying not to meet people from SL online. I just think people need to wait way longer than 3-6 months that some have.

I know of one person that met her man in SL and 3 months later moved to meet him and within a month of the RL meeting was pregnant. WAYYYY too fast in my book. Not saying it won't work - i am just saying that if you meet someone online, and know them online for 3 months and get pregnant by them in your 1st month of knowing them in RL then you really are not thinking with that thing that sits on your shoulders.

This. (ITA on the rest too.)

Got to disagree. Posting a thread about a missing person that is a member or SL and the person may or may not have gone missing for something, in some way, related to SL would be fine. However, the thread was (and still is) a plea for help. You've got to know that there is next to absolutely nothing anyone can do to help.........we don't know this person, we don't know if she's missing, we don't know anything. Keep our eyes out to help and report it to her father.........what are we looking for?

The posting of this thread is doing nothing to help the person who needs the help (if it's true). It hinders help..........for example, I'll be forever suspicious of anything related to this topic until some official (by that I mean verifiablly official) statement by authorities. I don't think I'm alone in that thought. It hurt the cause...........concern or no concern. It's counter productive, a hinderence. It cames across as an hysterical, OMG moment........sorry, that's the way I see.

That's not even talking about the very real danger of this being a scam or phising expedetion.......or worse.

ya the only rl information is a name..how is anyone supposed to help with just a name and no physical description at all or picture of this person..just brazilian female with no age or anything..

Well, you are right. It probably does not help the person who needs the help.

But it does serve as a warning and a reminder to many to be careful online because the OP could be a reality for someone, even yourself, if not cautious.

First, I think that the vast majority of SL users are suspicious of mass IMs already. A thread in the Forums has no effect on people's tendency to dismiss such IMs as hoaxes. Most people will have thought through the various possible illegitimate reasons for such IMs, without ever looking at the Forums. (I saw this in action today with one of my groups, in which a lively discussion occurred before these two threads attracted attention.)

On that basis, I believe that your contention that threads like this will cause indifference to future reports of missing people is mistaken.

Second, your contention that the threads do nothing positive to help is also, I believe, mistaken. There is always the possibility, however remote, that some reader WILL know something.

Also--and this is no small thing--readers of such threads are reminded that virtual worlds are made up of real people--people who sometimes misrepresent themselves. Or worse. A reminder to be alert and cautious about those we meet is never amiss.

And all that could have been put in a thread without the dramatic, hysterical plea for help. The dangers of the internet (yes, SL is part of the internet...actually even more powerful than the normal internet we usually speak of when talking baout the dangers). That discussion is something that needs to be ongoing and a missing person related to SL is a very powerful topic to get discussions going........I agree with that part completely. The topic was not approached that way though. The poster of this thread choose to treat it as a "news flash" or "breaking news".........but without any facts at all. Second, third or even fourth hand "someone said" is not fact. Stating that E-Amnesty is involved..........without any real facts to back it up (just the source is "very reliable".......for the poster). Everyone wants to help...........but there in no way we can. All we know is that some girl of unknown age, height, weight, hair color, skin color, eye color is missing (or said to be missing). We did get (though I missed it) some supposed real life name........great, if you want personal information devulged to a group of totally anonymous strangers.

Beliving you can help and wanting to help is an admirable trait............but the way to help is not the way this topic was put forth. People can help with information. Information comes from authorities. Pleas for help come from official venues. This is not the same as posting missing persons posters on utility poles in your neighborhood........those posters are officially sanctioned.

I'm not an uncaring person.........but I'm also not a person who does things that hinder investgations either (no matter how much I care). There are proper channels of communications for things like this. And a public forum is not one.

I don't know about trying to impose timescales to this, sometimes you just "click", and patience is an unwanted virtue. However, I agree people *should* be extremely careful. An SL friend of mine had an RL coffee meet with someone a while ago, and although I'm just another anonymous net denizen I made sure she had my details and I had hers, and had her promise to phone me at an arranged time to ensure she was safe. As it happens everything went perfectly and the paranoia was ill founded. This time.

I've met people off the net, and again, a level of security has been put into place to ensure the safety of all concerned.

Anyone meeting effectively a stranger from the web needs to have measures in place to make it as safe as possible. If this is not a scam, and not a woman deciding to have a wander for a few days, then sad as it is, she wasn't wise if she hadn't made arrangements to protect her safety.

or sometimes the person you are interested in, just fakes it and you *click* and they continue to fake it until you meet.

I thought i was being careful, but i did meet one guy in SL that said ALL the right things to me....Yep...I thought we clicked real good, but the truth was that he had learned certain things about me from mutual friends i did not know we had in common, so he knew more about me than i about him and was able to say all those things i wanted to hear because he made it so obvious that we were so alike in many ways... I was the sucker, and thankfully i saw him for the perverted lying, misogynistic sexual age player that he really was.

Time prevents this. It is the rare psychopath that is going to wait 12 months for you to get to know them.

If a person can't wait 12 months for the chance of having a lifetime with the person they proclaim to love or call their cyber-soul mate, then forget it, they really do not want you.

Also, over that amount of time - peoples lies get confused, their stories start to fall apart or they trip themselves up. 12 months is lots of time to sort out some idea of the real person you are talking to. Besides, if you cannot make it 12 months in SL, how the hell do you expect to make it a lifetime in RL?

Words to live by

This is very well said and where I live we call that a "covered date" for which we have free services (especially for women, established by voluntary working women) and also commercial web-services for totaly singles in case someone wouldn't have trusted friends or wouldn't like to involve them. These are services which offer helping staff and phone services (control calls like you mentioned them) and so on - and if not that, then it is strongly recommended to involve persons of trust, friends, etc. plus planning such a meeting first at crowded and well known serious places, best at daylight and all this as a hint for women and men, because everyone can run into a trap easily if the brain is switched off.

I would be pissed as hell were I trying to get away from my abusive ex and he came in world posting this kind of information. You just never know which side you might be helping in a situation like this.

Unless it's shown up from an actual news source and isn't just a plot spoiler for a SL/CSI Miami episode you may be helping to keep a woman from escaping an abusive situation. Often as not, there are very few resources for domestic violence other than to fake your disappearance.

I think its a crock. I think and hope that when/if things like this happen in RL, that people in RL handle it. I think her parents would have notified the proper authorities, and I think the authorities would have contacted LL if perhaps thats where this stemmed from.

I think the hype and chain letter fashion of this lacks a lot of logic, and intelligence but really preys on peoples kindness.

Someone ends up missing in RL so a friend or a family member jumps into SL looking for them? Or asking people for help? I would think that they would contact the authorities first, and then perhaps probe their computer for any links. SL could be one place but I honestly don't see how emails, or other private im programs and skype wouldn't be more appropriate to search for a specific trail. Not to mention phone records. I think people using SL to find someone is a bit ridiculous.