Your Digital afterlife or the Dead Bloggers Society

It's an interesting subject - what happens to a person's digital footprint after they pass away? Chances are good that you have hundreds, maybe thousands of e-mails stored on remote servers or in your computer. You might have a Facebook page, or a Tumblr or Twitter account. And you might have countless photos in a Flickr album. All that data amounts to a digital profile of sorts, which raises an interesting question: What happens to that online material when we die?

A new website The Digital Beyond has been set up to answer these questions. The site is edited by John Romano and a Evan Carroll.

Romano and Carroll point to blogger Leslie Harpold, who died in 2006, memorably leaving behind a robust online presence. After her death, Leslie's family decided that her blogs should be permanently removed from the Internet. But Leslie had built up a large community of readers and fellow bloggers online, many of whom wanted her work to remain online.
"Many of them tried desperately to contact the family and say 'Hey, can we place an archive of this on our website?' or 'Hey, can we hold onto this content?' but unfortunately, they chose to keep it private," explains Carroll.

In their new book, Your Digital Afterlife, Romano and Carroll outline ways to protect your online legacy. One tip they offer: make sure you name a digital executor to handle all of your digital belongings.
"It's very possible that the person who's handling your estate may not be the person who has the technical understanding to take care of your digital things," Romano says. "And there needs to be an important distinction there."

Visit Digital Beyond for some fascinating information
The Book Your Digital Afterlife is available now from all the usual sources