Have you appointed some online executors to sort your digital legacy?
However young you are, you may need to think about an executor for your affairs and one or more online executors for your online business.
You may have made a will. You may have read recently that a court overturned a will that had cut a woman out of any inheritance from her family. She got the money and the deceased’s wishes were ignored.
But what about all your digital possessions? What will happen to them? You may not care, of course, but those you leave behind certainly will.
Well, Facebook has come up with the ability for users to nominate an ‘online executor’ in your settings following advice last year from the Law Society that people should leave clear instructions about what should happen to digital assets after death.
One Final Post
These online executors will be able to post one last message for all the departed’s followers, update profile pictures and, apparently, will even be able to approve new friend requests.
Facebook are styling these online executors as ‘legacy contacts’ and they will be welcomed. What happens now is that when a user dies his or her account is either deleted or frozen, which has the effect of turning it into a memorial.
The option to order the deletion of your pages will still be there, but as we know, once online it’s there forever, so your routes will be sustained as long as digital survives.
There, does that feel comforting at all?
No, I thought not!
Have you appointed some online executors to sort your digital legacy?
However young you are, you may need to think about an executor for your affairs and one or more online executors for your online business.
You may have made a will. You may have read recently that a court overturned a will that had cut a woman out of any inheritance from her family. She got the money and the deceased’s wishes were ignored.
But what about all your digital possessions? What will happen to them? You may not care, of course, but those you leave behind certainly will.
Well, Facebook has come up with the ability for users to nominate an ‘online executor’ in your settings following advice last year from the Law Society that people should leave clear instructions about what should happen to digital assets after death.
One Final Post
These online executors will be able to post one last message for all the departed’s followers, update profile pictures and, apparently, will even be able to approve new friend requests.
Facebook are styling these online executors as ‘legacy contacts’ and they will be welcomed. What happens now is that when a user dies his or her account is either deleted or frozen, which has the effect of turning it into a memorial.
The option to order the deletion of your pages will still be there, but as we know, once online it’s there forever, so your routes will be sustained as long as digital survives.
There, does that feel comforting at all?
No, I thought not!
Some related older blogs but still with catching up on:
If You Like My Thoughts, You Must Be on the Facebook Telepathy Button! 22 July 2015
You Have Just Two Years Left to Live, According to Your Death Test! 9 September 2013
Will Your Digital Afterlife Make a Good Novel After You Are Dead? 10 September 2012
Old Rockers Don’t Die, They Keep On Rolling Forever, 7 August 2012
Vice Before Death; Virtual Life After Death, 25 June 2012
Intellectual Property Rights Are Web’s Grey Area, 21 March 2012
Image: Sigismund von Dobschutz
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