Tech tips for people who are going to die someday (2015) | Hacker News Reader

Tech tips for people who are going to die someday (2015)

medium.com

98 pointstosh16 comments

This is the legendary Tom West from Tracy Kidder’s “Soul of a New Machine”

I don't know what I learned from this, but it was as touching a eulogy as I would ever hope to receive.

I learned to cherish manual controls and to think about the will and documenting the basics (I'm 14 years younger than Tom West was when he died).

Thanks. I miss my dad a lot.

While I am not planning to die, there is a few sheets of paper stapled together in the bottom of my safe, saying how I want to be buried and what should be done with my assets (should prevent any undertaker taking advantage of grief), but I haven't included any passwords for anything. That is intentional -- not only does my e-mail hold some pretty personal things (not all of them mine) but I don't see a point in having anybody else go through my personal stuff.

Anybody feeling like that?

I am not a/your lawyer, but what you are describing is known as a ["Holographic Will"](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/h/holographic-will.asp). Such a document may not be sufficient depending on your state/circumstances, and may not be respected by the probate court if the document is lost, destroyed, or otherwise called into question.

What you want is a [Testamentary Will ](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/testamentary-will.asp) that has been notarized and/or signed in the presence of witnesses.

My father died several years ago, and in spite of how organized he was, we really struggled through the digital aspects of his passing. I would add...make sure the digital mementos are backed up and easy to access. Make sure family knows where it is.

It's unpopular to say these days, but Facebook was the service most prepared for his passing. We memorialized his profile and my sister was able to manage communication on his behalf to his friends. We were very grateful.

Sadly, 1000memories.com seems to have disappeared.

Seems like if you want your memorial site to last "forever", just host it anywhere and make sure the Internet Archive crawls it once.

Rather shameful for a company backed by YC to not follow through with their promise. They were acquired by ancestry.com which still exists so I imagine they could have made sure that in the case of any acquisition the new owner would commit to follow through on that at least.

I had a very long and angryish set of dealings with them about this. I finally got an engineer to let me download the archive but man... promises promises...

Beautiful. A wonderful tribute. And a sobering reminder that final goodbyes can come quicker than we expect.

https://seeyourfolks.com

I will never die.

Even if you invent some science fiction means of attaining immortality, even if the universe is not doomed as all current physics predicts, the most infinitesimal probabilities inevitably occur on an infinite timeline.

You will die someday.

I guess you missed the point.

in most societies, specially western, death is never a concern unless you are terminally ill. which is insane.

I read the comment you are replying to as a joke of the article title. As in, how can something be for "for those who will die someday" instead of "everyone" plain and simple.

I read the title as the joke: it's really for everyone, with a built-in reminder that you are mortal.

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