For those who are under 20, it might be hard to picture a world without the internet. When it appeared it was still pretty out of reach to most people, even more so in the countryside, 500 km from civilization. I felt very isolated, very lonely, because there weren't many people I could exchange ideas with.
The internet changed that. It must have been in 1999 that we started using it. In the beginning there weren't many resources, the connection was dialled, expensive, and there wasn't so much material to research. But that was how I discovered the RES - Round Earth Society (STR in Portuguese - Sociedade da Terra Redonda), in 2000. An atheist site, that was uncommon! I used to save the pages to read later, so I wouldn't stay connected too long. I found out that they needed editors, including English. I sent an e-mail offering to help. They accepted my offer (we all worked for free) and I started translating texts for the site and I also participated in some discussions. This helped me a lot to define what I thought, the whole reasoning process that I hadn't gone through as a teenager for lack of opportunity, I went through after the age of 40. Several of the editors lived in Porto Alegre, so we got to meet personally several times. It was really an enriching exeprience.
The RES lasted about 4 years, and then it simply got stuck, because the President didn't have time to dedicate to it, and he didn't delegate to anybody else the task to take care of the site. It was a pity, but anyway it was a precursor to several other movements, and it fulfilled its role. And there was an article in a magazine, Veja, in which I appeared.
http://veja.abril.com.br/050602/p_084.html
Even nowadays the only way for many atheists to find others is through the internet. And many virtual orgnizations became possible only because of this, in such a huge country as Brazil.
So Saint Google is our "patron saint" and Bill Gates is our prophet. ;-)
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