V + M

As we all know the Vermont Service Center as it stands today is:
30 days slower than the California Service Center "CSC"
71 days slower than the Texas Service Center "TSC"
For me, it is most frustrating since I am in Texas.
Had my case not been transfered to Vermont, I would have NOA2 by now.
Everyone has their story, and for that matter their own perspective. So, please allow me to address those who are satisfied with the system as it stands now; If you don't believe in our movement, please just disregard our topic, and please do not divert our energy by engaging any of our posters by submiting contrary opinions, philosophies or beliefs. If you disagree with our topic, please just move-on. To all of those part of the movement, just disregard any posters that try to engage you negatively.
We must stay focussed.
So that said...
Please allow this to serve as the official kick-off to the "K1Vermonters" movement.
To all those who's k1/k3 is in queue to be adjudicated at the Vermont Service Center:
1. If you wait to take action until you've hit the 6 month mark you might be in for a nasty surprise. If USCIS extends what is known as "Outside of Normal Processing Time" (ONPT) from 5 months to 6 months, you might have to wait 7 months before you can submit an "expeditious processing request". USCIS will allow a petitioner to submit an expeditious processing request once their application exceeds 30 days ONPT. But if that threshold is pushed out from 5 months to 6, we will ALL be in a worse position -- WE MUST ACT NOW
2. If you think there's nothing that you can do, that we/you can't make a difference; I promise that's not true -- TODAY ALONE WE MADE A HUGE NOISE on Twitter -- WE MUST ACT NOW
3. Just blogging on VJ (here) might be comforting and provide an outlet for frustration, but in the end it has no effect on USCIS processing times. You can continue to enjoy and chronicle/document your timeline, but I encourage you to put at least some energy into our movement, you never know where your case will be down the road -- WE MUST ACT NOW
4. Even if you are not in the VSC, if your service center starts to backlog and there's no repercusion for the administrative staff, you might find yourself where we K1Vermonters are.. DELAYED -- WE MUST ACT NOW
5. No matter what your situation is, I encourage you to join our movement, to change processing times for current k1 petitioners and future petitioners. -- WE MUST ACT NOW
How and Why must we "ACT NOW"?
Why..
- As the "K1Vermonters" our movement has momentum - we were in the top groups today alone "tweeting" @BarackObama
How..
-Get on Twitter and create a profile
- Write messages to:
@USCIS
@BarackObama
Members of the Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International Law Membership:
@eltongallegly24 @dan_lungren @JudgeTedPoe @zoe4congress @RepHowardBerman @RepJacksonLee @MaxineWaters
- Always keep your messages under 40 characters
- MOST IMPORTANTLY: **ALWAYS INCLUDE "#K1Vermonters" in your Tweet. The latter is the list name that currently has momentum and to which we need to continue to add momentum
- Tweet at least 5 times per day ..think of it as a picket line, a strike. Remember the old days? This is how we do it now.
- Answer other posts/posters on VJ by redirecting them to our movement/topic
If anybody has something to add, please contribute.
May God help us all get our loved ones to our dear country!

Dizzy's VJ TWITTER LESSON
Ok, gang. So a lot of you are brand new to twitter. So I wanted to give a rundown of what exactly twitter is and how it works.
1. The site is www.twitter.com
2. The sign up is simple. All you need is a valid email address and a catchy idea for a user name. Sign up. Verify. And you're ready to tweet.

3. Twitter is based on a very simple idea: 140 character status updates:

4. If you put "@" immediately in front of any twitter user's name (i.e. "@USCIS"), the user will receive your tweet via notification. This is called a "mention" (get it? you are "mentioning" @USCIS in your tweet). If the user is so inclined, they can see the entire list of these "mentions" by clicking on their "mentions" tab from the home page.

5. You can fortify your tweets by adding a "hash-tag". A hashtag is any word used in your tweet that is made clickable by adding the "#" sign in front of it. It basically turns whatever word you have put "#" in front of into a searchable keyword. For example, If you are tweeting this status update "Man, I really love chocolate icecream" and changed it to "Man, I really love chocolate #icecream". the word "icecream" would become a clickable link and anyone could click on it to find other tweets that have the same "hashtag" in it. So, for example...if we clicked on #icecream, we may get to see a list of 300 tweets that are talking about icecream! (this can sometimes be really hilarious)

6. Trending topics. Trending topics are advertised hashtags. They occur when thousands of people are talking about the same hash-tag. For example, when Egypt overthrew their president, they used the hashtag "#Egypt". After thousands of tweets containing the hashtag "#Egypt" had accumulated, the hashtag become a clickable link advertised to the entire world. People clicked on it to see what people were talking about, and that's how we found out that Egypt was trying to overthrow their president.
So, What does this mean for us?
We can create our OWN hashtag and start our OWN trending topic. Luckily, the USCIS has a twitter page located at www.twitter.com/USCIS.
In order for our tweets to become a trending topic, we must all be using the same #hashtag. I suggest we use #VSCBacklog. For those of you NOT at VSC, you can still use the #VSCBacklog to help us trend the topic, while still adding your own flavor to your tweet.
For example "@USCIS My petition is in limbo at CSC!!! Please speed up the I129F Process! #VSCBacklog" Although the backlog does not apply to you, you can still piggy back onto our trending topic to make sure your tweet is seen by millions when our tweets become a trending topic.
It's is also VERY IMPORTANT that you have a profile picture for your twitter. Many times, twitter is bombarded by spambots. A spam bot is an advertisement robot posing as a twitter user. They almost NEVER have profile pictures. In order to be taken seriously (i.e. human) on twitter, it's imperative that you add some sort of profile picture. In this case, a picture of you and your honey would be wonderful (and applicable).
If you have any questions about how to tweet, please ask! I'd love to help.
And remember, it doesn't matter WHAT you say, just so long as you have "#VSCBacklog" somewhere in your tweet, your tweets WILL BE GROUPED with everyone else's.
Good luck!