I’ve just read about an interesting new site. YouDeparted.com, provides an ‘electronic safe deposit box’ that your loved ones can open once you’ve died. The box could be used to store lots of emails telling people what you really think of them, but it could also contain messages, files including mp3 recordings, electronic documents etc to help friends and family deal with your passing.
I think this is an amazing business idea, and it will be interesting to see how popular it becomes. As downloadsquad.com quite rightly point out, it’s a sure sign that the internet isn’t just a plaything for 12-24 year olds anymore.
I haven’t prepared a will for a long time, and I really do need to sort my affairs out just in case something bad does happen to me. For instance the main benificiary of my life insurance, pension etc is an old girlfriend I used to live with 5 years ago. I’d probably want to leave her something as we’re still friends, but not everything!
Since I watched a recent episode of My Name Is Earl, I’ve always wondered though how my family would get in touch with my friends to let them know if I did pass away. In the episode, the person Earl tried to redeem himself with had just died and seemingly had no friends and nobody attended the initial service. That was until Randy turned the deceased’s computer on by mistake, and they suddenly realised that he had hundred’s of friends online who were wondering why he hadn’t been in touch, who then all attended a second ceremony.
I guess my family could start by calling all the numbers on my mobile, but I have nearly 2,000 contacts in my address book so how would they know who are my friends and not business contacts? I guess they could send an SMS to everyone to save time!
But what about my online accounts and services e.g. how would my brother get into WordPress to post my obituary??!! Would he be able to get into my adsense etc accounts and stop or change the payment details? Are gmail, facebook, bebo etc obliged to give my brother my login details, especially as they are not operated out of the UK and presumedly are not bound by UK law? How would my family get access to all the other various services e.g. my online share trading account?
Even if you left all your urls, logins and passwords would you family know what to do with them e.g are they technically savvy? I’m really interested to see what people think about this, or if they are willing to share any personal experiences of having to deal with a loved one passing.
