Sunday, February 1, 2009

Digital will?

I'm not a very good member of Facebook I must admit. I don't contribute very often and I can't really find a good reason for doing so. It is however fascinating to see the commitment of many friends in there who clearly use Facebook to keep up with friends and socialize. However one drawback is that once you've made friends with someone you are allowed to view all their on-line activities. People who publish party photos/films/discussions in the public part of Facebook must realize that this material is available to even their most distant "friends" - like me perhaps ;-)

I read an article in the freebie Swedish daily paper Metro (seen on every bus and train in the country) about a girl who is desperately trying to delete her late boyfriend's Facebook profile. Once you're on Facebook it isn't easy to delete it and even harder to do so if you don't have the person's user name and password (as in this girl's case). I can understand that she finds it disturbing that her boyfriend's profile lives on in Facebook and it would be good if there was some way of deleting it or even informing his network of his death.

If we think of all the networks we belong to it might be an idea to write down all passwords and store them somewhere that would be accessible to a family member if the worst ahould happen. Should we have some kind of digital will so that our identities, blogs, avatars etc can be laid to rest with dignity?

1 comment:

  1. Very thought provoking posting, indeed. Maybe you are right, maybe we need to collect our online presence, for our own sake and others.

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