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Legacy Tip #1: Plan what happens to your Facebook Data and Profile

March 9, 2015 by Leave a Comment

facebook_legacy_memorialisation_friends_change_digital_afterlifeFor anyone located in the US, Facebook has introduced Legacy Contact, a set of features that allow a user to nominate a friend to manage their account, albeit in a more restricted way, after they die. A Legacy Contact is able to update profile photos or add new friends and family contacts in memory of and on behalf of their deceased friend. Importantly, a user can also indicate whether or not they’d like a copy of their Facebook data to be downloaded by their assigned contact or alternatively instruct Facebook to delete their account after their death.

For everyone else, Facebook memorialisation is an option but this process can pose issues as guest blogger Nicole Wright points out. Here are some thoughts on how to preserve your personal history and avoid it from being lost or locked into the social networking site, so you can reminisce over fond memories in years from now and also share these with your loved ones when your time comes.

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Filed Under: Digital Legacy, Facebook afterlife, Social media Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Away For A Bit on ABC7.30 – What happens to your online accounts after you die?

January 7, 2015 by Leave a Comment

Watch this ABC report which explores the digital afterlife, offering an initial look at emotional, practical and legal aspects to consider when managing an online estate.

abc_730_online_accounts_when_you_die“…it’s very important to be considering things like digital wills, which might be an extension of what you’re doing already if you’re managing your estate and speaking to a legal advisor. It also means that the next of kin and your friends and family, who might be in a state of shock, have some sense of what you might want done with that information.” Emily Baxter from Away For A Bit

Filed Under: Australia, Estate planning, Legal Tagged With: , , , ,

What happens to someone’s mobile phone account when they die? (AU)

September 19, 2014 by Leave a Comment
mobile_phone_account_close_someone_dies_death

Credit: Lizerixt

Away For a Bit asked major Australian mobile operators about their policies on how next of kin can close accounts on behalf of someone who has died. Read what mobile operator policies are in the UK. No operators were able to state categorically what costs a family member or friend would need to cover from the deceased’s estate when finalising bills or if they required a handset to be returned in the event that one was included in the account plan. Vodafone did however state that the company does not generally expect the return of the handset or settlement of bills.

Telstra perhaps offered the most comprehensive overview of how their account closure worked in these circumstances, followed by Vodafone. Optus was pretty vague in offering details but did provide a customer number for the bereaved to call in such circumstances.

Here’s a line up of the major Australian mobile operators and what they outlined as their account closing policies for someone who has died.

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Filed Under: Australia, How-to guides, Mobile issues Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

How to limit emotional fall out when planning digital afterlife messages

July 31, 2014 by 1 Comment

There’s a plethora of digital services now available for consumers where they can share messages and information with their next of kin, friends and family after they die. For instance, Facebook based offerings such as Dead Social and If I Die allow users to share pre-recorded and approved goodbye messages to their social networks on Facebook and Twitter. Other digital estate planning services also offer the option to send final notes or messages as part of their portfolio.

While there’s no research that I’m aware of to show how this form of communication impacts the way in which we grieve, anecdotal evidence often shows that people are shocked when seeing images or reminders concerning their dead friends within social media communities.

For those considering a post-mortem social media strategy, consider your audience – the friends, family, colleagues, lovers left behind who will analysis and ponder over your messages as they come to terms with their loss.

Read more about different types of digital messaging and estate management services.

Three things to think about when planning digital afterlife messages

  • When people are grieving, everything has the potential to be a sharp reminder of a memory, thought, experience or regret about someone they will never see, hear, touch or talk with again. What is the impact to your community if you schedule a series of messages over a period of time? Are the messages comforting or are there people for whom this might be distressing? Understanding the likely reaction of your audience will help you determine how you deliver your messages and on what platform.
  • Be clear in what you want to say. Ambiguous, unconsidered messages could be misinterpreted or cause unintended responses such as hurt or confusion. There’s no opportunity for recipients to later clarify your meaning.
  • If you’re planning a series of messages on an ongoing basis, how will they relate and be relevant to the experiences your friends and family are going through?

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What are your thoughts on post-mortem message leaving? Drop your thoughts and recommendations in the comments below.

Find out how ‘messages from the beyond’ can be comforting.

Filed Under: Digital Legacy, How-to guides, Social media Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Who owns your digital history in a future far, far away?

July 24, 2014 by 1 Comment

digital_data_digital_afterlife_digital_historyI’ve been speaking with a variety of researchers on the legal aspects around our digital accounts and what happens to them after we die. Often the discussion focuses on who is entitled to access a deceased person’s online account data – such as email, photos or documents – and the consensus is that it’s complicated.

Some platforms such as Google have started to allow users to nominate next of kin, family or friends to receive their personal information once their account becomes inactive. With the Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act approved in the US (July 2014), we may see a system where a personal representative of a deceased person’s estate has as much right to manage the digital assets of the deceased in the same way they would their tangible assets. Currently ownership of digital assets often remain with online services such as Facebook and Yahoo unless contested through the legal system by a next of kin.

While laws are catching up with digital and social technologies, Damian McCallig, a PhD candidate from the School of Law at National University of Ireland in Galway is curious to know what will happen to our data a generation or more after we die.

As he points out, current copyright laws in countries like the UK and Australia allow someone’s personal information to become available in the public domain several years after that individual has died. Records around births, deaths and marriages are accessible by researchers or family members interested in their genealogy or a previous generation’s history. Unpublished works such as diaries or letters can be published without the permission of their estate, as long as a certain period of time has passed since the author died. In the UK, this is seventy years, although there are specific exemptions.

“Currently a lot of today’s information that is relevant for the researchers and historians of the future is behind walls and owned by companies,” says McCallig. “For instance, Barack Obama has a Twitter account which will hold public tweets but also private messages which are gated. This information will be relevant from a historical and research point of view. Previously these kinds of notes would have become available after a set period of time. What copyright laws apply to this digital data managed by private organisations?”

McCallig believes that Facebook would have been alerted to the opportunity around its memorialised accounts (what is Facebook memorialisation?) when a father campaigned for a ‘look back’ video to be made for his son who died in 2012, attracting widespread support. He wonders if Facebook is assessing the commercial potential for its deceased accounts in the long term. Facebook’s main revenue stream comes from advertising, based on driving eyeballs to ad creative and sponsored posts. Memorialised Facebook accounts offer no value to marketers or monetisation options for the company in its current model.

While he’s not certain on how Facebook would commercialise these accounts, likely scenarios could include charging researchers, educational institutions, public information bodies and even individuals for access to archival information.

“Facebook is able to provide insights on how communities reacted to news and events within specific contexts or a particular point in time. It can detail emotional responses as well as online behaviour across timelines and networks,” says McCallig. “That’s of tremendous value to future historians.”

If this is the case, should these historical insights and archives be available freely to the public or remain in the hands of commercial companies? And if Facebook fails to survive, should there be a contingency plan to protect and share our histories with future generations?

What do you think?

Read more about Damian McCallig’s perspectives on Digital Remains or connect with him on Twitter.

 

 

Filed Under: Australia, Digital Legacy, Legal, Privacy, UK Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Messages from Beyond

June 23, 2014 by 2 Comments
Digital afterlife messages from beyond

Ben Earwicker, Garrison Photography

I love reading through and reminding myself of the messages received from DBS after he died. When I say that, I don’t mean ‘other realm’ kind of messages delivered by a psychic or similar. Instead, I’m referring to handwritten notes or cards written by him and addressed to me which I received after his death.

They provided tremendous comfort and still do. Which has made me think about how I should leave messages to friends and family for when my time comes. It’s not an easy thing to think about but if you’re making a digital will that addresses practical items such as password transfer to next of kin or instructions on what to do with your digital information, including a personal message with this information may be a logical next step.

 

Messages from DBS

In previous posts, I’ve mentioned that my brother preferred committing thoughts down by pen and paper as opposed to using email or social. We weren’t reliable communicators but despite this, I received multiple messages from him over a period of several weeks after he died.

The first message I received from DBS was two days after his death. Sitting in my mailbox, was a postcard that had been sent several weeks previously but took its time to arrive because he’d sent it from a very remote overseas location. Later there was the card he’d scrawled to me in Afghanistan but that he hadn’t had a chance to send which came back with his personal effects.

Months later when sorting through his papers at home, I came across his ‘unofficial’ will, a piece of dated A4 paper in his beautiful, black ink writing stating his intention for his estate. While mostly formal in nature, he’d included a personal message to me. I was touched and moved for days afterwards.

Finally, his diary revealed what I hadn’t been able to discover from Google because of their stance they took (at that time) of not sharing an account holder’s data with next of kin without going through legal proceedings. When DBS died, one of the first things I wanted to know at the time and eventually obsessed about, was whether or not he had read my emails that I’d sent to him while he was stationed in Afghanistan. Somehow, not knowing if he had received them meant that they started to represent something more significant for me; whether or not he knew that he was in my thoughts and that I loved him.

When I eventually brought myself to read his diary months later, I saw an entry dated 21 October that opened with…. ”Today, I received another lovely email from Emily….”

Words cannot describe how I felt at that time. It seemed as though I had received a personal answer from him to the question that had hounded me for a significant period of time.

Learn how to transition your email and personal data to next of kin using Google Inactive Manager.

Things to consider when working with digital services offering to send messages to loved ones

DBS hadn’t planned the way in which I received messages from him after he died with the exception of his handwritten will. I feel fortunate though that I received them and the emotional benefits are unquantifiable. On each occasion, his notes gave me a real sense of happiness and I almost felt as if he was visiting me in some way. I still glow when I think about them and value these mementos.

For anyone considering estate planning, I’d recommend including this kind of personal touch for friends and family for conveying love and providing comfort.

Given my own experience, I’m a fan of planning with handwritten notes however, there are now a wealth of digital services that you can work with to leave messages for loved ones with. A note of caution though. If you plan to go digital, check with the company to check their stability and financial status. A few companies I’ve researched from 2007 have been acquired or simply shut up shop, such can be the fleeting, temporary nature of digital. Also beware of the organisations that don’t have a long term vision or plan for their business. You want to be confident when signing up to a service that it will comfortably outlive you and honour your wishes in the future.

In all dealings with companies assisting you with digital afterlife services, I’d suggest researching with the following questions in mind:

  • How long is their commitment to providing digital services? Are they thinking day-to-day terms or over fifty years, hundred years?
  • What is their financial status?
  • What will happen to customers’ planning services in the event that they fold/are acquired?
  • Where how/will they share your final message? If it’s via a third party social networking platform, what happens to your message if the platform no longer exists?

It’s a new digital realm so it’s wise to do your background research. And spend some time understanding terms and conditions, particularly around what kind of jurisdictional rules may apply to you from a legal perspective and on what basis the company will share private data.

If you’re not confident about a digital service, do your own video recording and give it to your solicitor or a close family member or friend to look after while attending to your estate planning. It doesn’t have to be complicated. Based on my own experience, a simple handwritten note placed somewhere safely or with someone can make all the difference to those left behind.

NEXT ON THIS: DIGITAL AFTERLIFE MESSAGE SERVICES

Filed Under: Digital Legacy, Estate planning Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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