Privacy and the Fourth Amendment: Will They Soon Become Extinct?

Posted on May 20, 2021 by mestengobooks

Source: Google Images/protonvpn.com

Recently I read an interesting but unsettling article in the Guardian about Amazon’s Ring and how it is “the largest civilian surveillance network the US has ever seen.” (Cringe) It’s a good piece of investigative writing to read, especially for any aspiring investigative journalists out there.

WE’VE GOT OUR EYE ON (ALL OF) YOU

Here are some highlights of this well-written, informative article (some are direct quotes):

1 in 10 police departments can now access Ring videos of privately owned homes without a warrant. Once that content is released by the owner there is no way to revoke access or control how the content is used or shared by law enforcement.
Ring doorbells, according to this article, “pose a serious threat to a free and democratic society.”
Since April 2021 (some law enforcement agencies have had a relationship with Ring since 2018), there have been more than 22,000 individual requests for video access.
“Ring cameras are owned by civilians [and] law enforcement are given a backdoor entry into private video recordings of people in residential and public space that would otherwise be protected under the fourth amendment.”
“Ring blurs the line between police work and civilian surveillance and turns your neighbor’s home security system into an informant. Except, unlike an informant, it’s always watching.” (bold added for emphasis)

“Ring is simply not compatible with a free society”. – Max Eliaser, an Amazon software engineer.

This surveillance “dragnet indiscriminately captures everyone” – this means children as well people of color/sex/race and “class-based inequities when it comes to who is targeted and labelled as “out of place” in residential space.”
With the development of facial recognition technology, many experts are concerned of its use with Ring regarding racial and gender biases. In the past, Amazon has sold their facial recognition technology to law enforcement but placed a one-year moratorium on it (due to pressure from civil rights groups and AI researchers), which expires in June 2021.

NOT THE EYE YOU HOPED IT WAS

On a slightly more positive note, an article published by NBC reports police say “cute little videos but little evidence.” Based on an NBC interview with police in Winter Park, FL, the police department there hasn’t made a single arrest as a result of Ring videos.

Ring promised that neighborhoods would be safer with their product (they claim burglaries are reduced by 50 percent). “But an NBC News Investigation has found — after interviews with 40 law enforcement agencies in eight states that have partnered with Ring for at least three months — that there is little concrete evidence to support the claim.”

Hmmm….

WASTE OF TIME OR DANGER TO OUR PRIVACY?

Most of the time, officers reviewed videos of “racoons and petty disagreements between neighbors.” Still, every move you make, every interaction you have outside your house, in your neighborhood, is watched by Ring and maybe at some point, law enforcement.

“Thirteen of the 40 jurisdictions reached, including Winter Park, said they had made zero arrests as a result of Ring footage.”

I agree with the Guardian article and its concerns about privacy and Fourth Amendment violations. Where do we draw the line between people’s privacy, safety and catching criminals in the act? How much of your privacy are you willing to sacrifice for what may be a false sense of security and safety? While Ring may deter B&Es (burglary, essentially), it certainly won’t deter rapists, white collar crime, even homicides unless a perpetrator is caught on a neighborhood camera. What are the odds? What if you have neighbors who racially profile people who don’t live there?

I have a feeling we’ll be discussing and arguing these issues for some time. I, for one am not willing to give up my privacy and my freedom to move about undetected and undeterred. Time will tell which way the pendulum will swing on this issue. If we lose that freedom, what goes next?

#fourthamendment #privacyrights #ringdoorbell #amazon #neighborsapp #fightingcrime #civilrights #freesociety

Writers: In These Covid Times, Are You Prepared For The Unthinkable?

Posted on November 19, 2020 by mestengobooks

Thinking of the Unthinkable

It’s a topic I’ve covered on two other occasions (first post; second post). Now we’re in a pandemic and I’m once again compelled to share this vital information for all writers out there. We’re living in unpredictable times and no one can afford to be arrogant or in denial about the unthinkable: not surviving a Covid infection. I won’t bore or scare you with statistics or probabilities. Covid is a real infection, a real threat. Writers, you must get your Digital Assets (DA), aka intellectual property (IP), in order.

So I ask:

If It Comes Down to It, What Will Your Writer Legacy Be?

Is this a conversation you’ve even had with yourself or loved ones? Procrastination will only draw out what could become a painful situation for your family. It’s vital you prepare for what may come. Just in case.

“In this new digital world, our lives are complicated by our dependence on many devices, each with its own password and accessible only by you.” A Writer’s Legacy, part 2, January 2019

Your first step is to take inventory of all your intellectual property, both completed and unfinished works. Are your files backed up and easy for others to locate in online folders or another organized system? Now is a good time to get it all organized.

Your Legacy To-Do List

The following is a reiteration of a list that is by no means finite, from a previous post. While it may be time-consuming, you’ll be glad to do it because it’s an opportunity to clean out any work you know you won’t finish.

Do you have a PayPal, Google Pay, or any account, in addition to personal banking, with monetary value? Who will have access if you die? What happens to the money? Whom will you designate as your beneficiary? Who will you appoint as your Literary Executor (look this up, it’s important)?
What about personal and business email accounts, blogs, and podcasts? Personal and business websites? Do you want them up and running for people to read/listen to your when-you-were-a-breathing-starving-artist work?
Do you keep a list of logins and passwords to all of your online accounts? Make sure your designated Estate attorney has the most recent copy on file or at least your computer password so s/he can access the information (best kept in one location, like a cloud account).
What electronic devices do you own that need a password for access? Do you have a laptop, smartphone, tablet, DVR/Tivo, Ring, or a home security system? How many apps do you access from your phone? Does anyone else have the access code for your phone so they can access (and delete) the apps?
Do you bank online? What about mortgage payments, investment banking, utilities, airline, or other memberships? Which memberships automatically renew online? You’ll need to spell out which to cancel and which to keep active for your heirs/estate.
Do you have any Social Media accounts like Facebook, LinkedIn, or YouTube? Any accounts with e-commerce sites like Amazon, Netflix, Hulu, Ebay, etc.? Check the policies of these companies regarding access by another person. You’ll need to legally designate someone if you want that person to clean up your online life.
How much of your work is unfinished? Do you want someone else to finish it? Or would you prefer your Executor/Executrix just heave every incomplete project, every potential novel/poetry book/best-selling short story into a shredder? What will you do with the work you have completed? Who gets the royalties? Who will do the marketing to keep the sales going?
Do you have translations of your book? Movie deals? Audio books? Who will oversee these if they are optioned after your death? Who will make the decisions about maintaining and growing your work after you’re gone?
Will you leave the option to own, sell or operate your business and control your intellectual property up to your heirs? Or will you decide so your heirs don’t have to? One option is to designate a micro-publisher to oversee your work so that royalties will be properly paid to your heirs.
What about cleaning up your personal information collected by data-mining companies? If you think it won’t matter once you’re gone, you’re wrong. Someone could use your identity and gain access to your intellectual property and online life, and then your hard-earned money. This can affect any heirs you designate and their ability to oversee your IP or pay any monies owed. Many sites mine all sorts of personal information; you will likely need to join now to have access to your personal information and request they delete it.
You need to be concerned with writer scams popping up all over the web offering unauthorized copies of authors’ books or scamming writers out of money. Writer Beware is one of many sites that track predatory sites and unscrupulous people trying to steal our IPs. Make sure all is good before passing it on to the heirs.

“It’s a sobering experience to think of your life in these terms, but in the long run you’re doing your family or loved ones a favor by setting it down on paper.” A Writer’s Legacy, Part 2, January 15, 2019

#covid19 #coronavirus #intellectual property #digitalassets #bookAholic #storytellers #writersoninstagram #writer #amwriting #author #writerbeware

Are All Your Eggs in One (Amazon) Basket?

Posted on March 18, 2020 by mestengobooks

Source: Google Images

New Priorities

In case you don’t already know, Publishers Weekly sent an email titled “Amazon Deprioritizes Book Sales Amid Coronavirus Crisis.” Amazon is working diligently to prioritize “the surge in demand for household staples, medical supplies, and other high demand products.” Publishers (self and otherwise) are one of the suppliers whose goods (meaning books) will receive a low priority in shipping until at least April 5th. This makes sense; a good decision on their part, I believe.

So if you have your books self-published only through Amazon, this will pose a problem of lost or delayed sales. Hopefully you have listed your books (eBooks and hard copies) with other publishing sites like Lulu, Smashwords, Ingram, and the like. Because my book is published via Lulu Press and distributed to Amazon (and other retail sites), readers can still access my book here. Not a good idea to have your works all at one location, not at anytime but certainly not in this current climate.

Amazon is aware of the negative trickle-down effect of this decision and is working diligently to add 100K new positions in fulfillment centers across the U.S. The good news is that many of those folks out of work (restaurant servers, retail jobs, etc.) will have an opportunity to earn instead of falling into financial ruin or bankruptcy while waiting for businesses to reopen.

Plenty of Options

Which is why I’m glad I’m with Lulu Press. So far, I don’t see any announcements on their site re shipment issues. Not yet, anyway. But I’ll keep watching.

In times such as this, it’s best not to put all your eggs in one publishing basket. While sales may droop overall, it’s not the end of the world (despite what some preppers may believe). There are plenty of self-publishing sites to list your work on; make a list of which ones would best benefit your genre/s. Widen your net, keep your options open. Put a few eggs in many different baskets.

Will Illegitimate Books Tip the Scale Back to Traditional Publishing?

Posted on August 20, 2019 by mestengobooks

Source: Google Images/eff.org

Counterfeit Books on The Rise

An article on Twitter by Publishing Perspectives caught my eye today while reading posts from Writer Beware®. Written by Porter Anderson, the article outlined and discussed illegitimate online book sales and Amazon’s response (since so many of these deceitful sales take place in their bookstore). It all started when journalist David Streitfeld of the New York Times wrote in June that “Amazon takes a hands-off approach to what goes on in its bookstore” in reference to the surge in counterfeit books on Amazon.

In his article, David recounts his purchase of “numerous fake and illegitimate Orwell books from Amazon.” I’m not surprised; the advent of the Internet brought with it a host of ne’er-do-wells intent on making money off the backs of legitimate authors. The global marketplace is vast, to say the least; tracking a counterfeit copy of one of your books (or by someone famous like George Orwell) can be time-consuming and expensive, and many authors simply don’t have the resources. It’s a Digital Wild West – every man (or woman) for himself (or herself). The digital gold rush is ON.

After reading this article, one question that concerns me is, how can we be sure that what we’re buying is the real deal?

Make the Old New Again?

In trots the old workhorse: traditional publishing. I believe that at some point, authors and their readers will tire of the con jobs, counterfeits, price gouging, and other deceptive practices running rampant online. Perhaps going back to the way things were with traditional publishing, at least to some extent, can possibly protect authors from the shady side of self-publishing in a digital world.

“While Amazon is the company that has, he’s right, made it possible for even the most marginal books to be suddenly available to everyone everywhere from the most earnest but artless authors (self-published or from the trade), it can also enable the chicanery of ruthless forgers.”

I personally have had my first fiction novel illegally downloaded and offered for free (not illegitimate but definitely illegal) and it was difficult to get the cons to stop, especially since they know there’s not much we can do about it other than request a DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act) takedown. To my knowledge, my book was not forged in any way. However, deceit is deceit and authors can lose royalties and fan bases as a result of these illegal acts, especially if the thieves are halfway around the world.

The integrity of the written word is under attack and we must diligently protect our works.

Copyright Issues

Amazon responded by stating there’s an issue with the “differing copyright timing between countries and sometimes even different titles within the same country.” They also wrote that “there is no single source of truth for the copyright status of every book in every country that retailers could use to check copyright status.”

Should there be a central body where authors can list copyrights for their intellectual property (IP)? What do you think? Amazon is at the forefront of this issue because they created it to begin with – they gave access to everyone (too much of good thing, perhaps), including liars, cheats and counterfeit thieves looking to make a quick buck.

As written in the article, perhaps there is a need for a “central international registry of published works’ copyright status that can support the burgeoning book publishing industry with a reliable test of copyright status.” Would that mean they’d catch all the illegitimate books? Maybe some, maybe not. It would be naïve to expect that every book thief/forger intent on making money from our work would be caught. Part of the problem is the absolute explosion in book inventory. Once a manageable almost one million titles in 1998, according to Bowker’s, there are now more than 40 million titles to track.

We’re needles in a global haystack.

The Bungling of Bundling Book Reviews

Another problem is that Amazon bundles its book reviews together, David writes, “regardless of which edition (legal or not) they were written for. That means an unauthorized edition … can have thousands of positive reviews, signaling to a customer it is a valid edition.”

I can’t help but think that this illegitimacy issue might work in favor of traditional publishing, that it might strengthen their stance in the global and online publishing worlds. It might even help cull the aforementioned “earnest but artless authors” inundating self-publishing book sites. Perhaps traditional publishing will once again become the vanguard and the proverbial measuring stick.

Someone needs to be.

To read the Publishing Perspectives article in full, click here.

#amwriting #blogger #publishingperspectives #amazon #bookreviews #writerbeware

Amazon Gets Bulk of Complaint in AAP Filing With US Trade Commission

Posted on July 2, 2019 by mestengobooks

This just in from Publishing Perspectives:

An interesting read!

The Association of American Publishers filed a statement with the FTC supporting scrutiny of big tech companies, especially Amazon and Google.

Source: Amazon Gets Bulk of Complaint in AAP Filing With US Trade Commission

An Author’s Responsibility to Readers

Posted on September 18, 2018 by mestengobooks

crowdfunding1

A New Concept or 21st Century Begging?

Something has been nagging me since I watched the news the other night – the concept of crowdfunding. It’s strange to me that it has become acceptable for people, including writers and authors-to-be, to ask for free money, meaning without strings attached, from strangers to help with a book/situation/health condition. I get asking for help with disaster relief but is the money given truly free? No. You have a responsibility to spend that gifted money on what you campaigned for and nothing else (or you might end up in legal trouble).

What I don’t understand is how writers can ask for money to help publish their books, then ask people to spend more money to buy their books.

There are many affordable and even free options out there; you just have to do the research: Lulu Press, Amazon KDP, Lightning Source (Ingram), just to name a few; these are great options. Check their criteria to see which one fits your needs best. I’ve always used Lulu Press and have had good results. They pay me on time every month, without a hitch. To get your book into bookstores, libraries and other public venues, Ingram Spark is the way to go. There are a few up front expenses that you must budget for: book cover (eBook or hard copy), editing (developmental or finishing touches), and layout. And there are so many options out there for these, you certainly can find what you need to fit your budget.

On the news the other evening, there was a blurb about a new website called GoFraudMe. Its purpose is to expose fraudulent crowdfunding campaigns, mainly on GoFundMe; an inevitable invention if there ever was one. I searched through the site and read about several campaigns where people have fraudulently collected a lot of money. One was for over $400K for a homeless guy who never saw the money. People spent the money but NOT on the issue of the campaign or just plain faked the health issue or situation. Luckily, the folks at GoFraudMe are bringing these cases to law enforcement and many are or have been charged with the crime of fraud, some as felonies.

So be careful where you donate your money.

That said, if you have a campaign to help with publishing your book, make sure that money only goes towards publishing and keep receipts/details of your expenses. I’m thinking that because others have paid for the publishing and other miscellaneous expenses (editing, layout, etc.), you cannot claim them on your federal taxes, as these were not paid for with your money. You might want to check with a tax specialist to be sure, or call the IRS, to be safe.

I read about a new crowdfunding option to publish one’s books on one of the author blogs I follow. A new site where crowdfunding campaigns can lead to a publishing contract is Inkshares. This is a legitimate site where, if you navigate their process successfully, you can land a publishing contract. After a quick read, I surmised that this might be a more plausible option. Inkshares will offer a publishing contract if you can secure a pre-order of 750 books. According to their FAQs page, they write: “We publish any work that successfully hits a pre-order threshold on our platform.” Sounds like a good deal if you’re on SM and have 750 friends who might be willing to ante up. Certainly is worth looking into, don’t you think?

Inkshares appears to be a safer, smarter crowdfunding option for those who choose this road. I still question the integrity of asking the public to pay for both the process and the finished product. When it comes down to it, as writers, we have a responsibility to be both self-sufficient (to earn a living this way) and to provide work that is worthy of the price we charge.

That, in my opinion, is an author’s responsibility to their readers.

#authorsoninstagram #WritersDigest #fiction #nonfiction #amwriting #crowdfunding #Inkshares #GoFraudMe #GoFundMe

Graphic Un-Design

Posted on June 10, 2018 by mestengobooks

graphic design image

Memorial Weekend loomed and my anticipation escalated; I’d been looking forward to this for a long time. Over the past year or so, I have contemplated changing the eBook cover to my fiction novel, Rescue on White Thunder. The basic cheesy cover was not really helping sell my book and I obsessed over making a change. I also discovered a few writing errors I’d missed with my hundreds of previous edits, so I set about making those changes to the manuscript but delayed a new book cover due to budget constraints. With all the options out there on the World Wide Web, surely there was someone I could afford to have design a new cover for my eBook.

Or so I thought.

The Fiverr Foul-Up

I stupidly went to Fiverr to get an affordable book cover since I’d had good luck with my nutrition book there (well, sort of…long story that ended in my favor). I located a young woman here in the U.S. (which is difficult, since many of the people on Fiverr are not). After reviewing her book cover portfolio a few times, I made the decision to purchase a book cover from her.

So much for that bright idea.

First, the order arrived later than promised. When I saw the email that my work was completed, I anxiously opened the message, anticipating a sparkling new cover that would sell gazillions of copies of my book. The new cover looked NOTHING like the book summary I’d sent. Did she even read it? She’d created an urban design (think tall city buildings, paved streets, gray/neutral cover colors) for an adventure that takes place in eastern Idaho (think woods and mountains). I sent the cover back with a revision request, my hopes dashed in an all too quick moment of ecstasy.

I waited for a response.

And waited.

By now, Memorial Weekend was almost over and still no response. Perhaps she’s working on the revision, I tried to convince myself. It is a holiday weekend, maybe she’s out having fun, I excused. By the end of the weekend, there still was no response. With great regret (and an imagined loss in gazillions of book sales dollars), I cancelled the order and requested a refund. Oddly, she responded to that request within twenty-four hours.

Hmmmm…

E-book Epiphany

It made me rethink the whole eBook thing. With scammers on the rise and sites offering free copies of eBooks illegally (I had this problem and it was a pain to clear up), I made the decision to take my book off of Amazon, at least for a short respite while I re-evaluate. Instead, I will invest in a new book cover for a hard cover print book because I think that will serve it better than even a paperback style. Seems to me that print books sell better, as people still like to ‘curl up with a good book’ and a hot cuppa. I know I do. (Just today I finished a fabulous fiction titled Three Souls by Janie Chang – what a fun ride this book was.) And I’ll have better control over scamming issues, since it’s harder with print books. I imagine I’ll still have to deal with the occasional idiot third-party seller on Amazon trying to sell my work for an ungodly amount.

Less Is Not More

Part of what bothers me is how devalued graphic design work has become with the advent of the Internet and the multitude of websites where we can find these so-called experts in graphic design. I’ve reviewed many portfolios and now see a pattern: each graphic designer has a singular style that is used for all of their projects, changing only color, font, and background as dictated by the genre.

Even the young woman who created my nutrition book cover falls into this repetitive pattern as a blueprint in her portfolio, which I didn’t notice until after the fact. It’s bad enough we have additives in our foods to make them all look and taste the same in every bottle and can; now graphic design is following suit. Conformity, lack of style and originality; unless we can afford only the best of services, many writers are doomed to copycat book covers with little novelty.

Caveat emptor, my fellow writers – Buyer Beware.

And, lest you forget, you get what you pay for, so make it worthwhile.

Book Sales Fraud or Smart Marketing?

Posted on September 12, 2017 by mestengobooks

Today is a day off for me so I decided to catch up on some online work and update my books’ Facebook, Lulu, and Amazon pages. I came across something on Amazon that I have encountered there before; I wasn’t happy about it then and I’m not happy about it now. Have you (authors) found someone, a third party seller, trying to sell your work for an unreasonable (and I mean ungodly) price? I published my first book, a creative nonfiction, back around 2007. A few years later, I retired the book (it was a personal memoir and I’d moved on by then) but Amazon never completely removes the page (their policy). There are probably two dozen or so copies of the book (yeah, I was a monster publisher back then, ha ha) in circulation, most of them signed by me at a book award ceremony back in 2006 (yes, I actually won an award for that little book). Not that my “autograph” begs that kind of money, mind you, but I do have to question the veracity of the seller when my simple paperback is available for ONLY $629.81!!!!!!

Unbelievable.

When I encountered this issue with my nutrition book (a third party seller was offering it for a huge, unrealistic amount, again on Amazon), I contacted a publicist and book marketing expert I’ve been following for some time now. She was nonplussed about the situation and told me I already got my money so don’t worry about it. Am I worrying too much about this? Or is this fraudulent activity? At the very least, it’s misleading since the seller lists the book as ‘new’ and there are no new copies available. What would motivate someone to price a book at that level? Have any of you experienced this? What did you do? Were you successful or not? I’d love some advice here…maybe it’s just me but I’m perturbed about some greedy idiot trying to overcharge for one of my works…and offering it as ‘new’ when it’s not. Not that anyone’s buying it at that price, I’m sure…but I did contact the seller via Amazon so we’ll see what happens.

In the meantime, it’d be nice to hear from some of you about your experiences and how you handled them. In this Digital Age, I think, some illegal activities will be beyond our control…including when it affects one of us personally. Like I don’t have enough stress in my life…

Sheesh.

Update 09.18.17: the fraudulent offer has been removed! It’s sad to have to monitor our work so closely in this Digital Age; lots of scammers out there and people who ruthlessly take advantage of hard working writers. A flick on the forehead to them.

Six Tips on finding a Literary Agent, from Bestselling Author Jo Furniss #WriteTip

Posted on August 28, 2017 by mestengobooks

This is a good article, I recommend it..if only I were on Twitter..

Source: Six Tips on finding a Literary Agent, from Bestselling Author Jo Furniss #WriteTip

Learn From Your Book Reviews

Posted on April 14, 2017 by mestengobooks

Hi all, I’ve been out of touch the past couple weeks – no excuse, really, just no desire to sit and write another blog on writing. I mean, how many topics can there actually be? Yet here I am, with another blog…

So I’m going to cheat a little and let Sandra Beckwith, owner of Build Book Buzz, share some neat tidbits on how we can all learn from negative or not-all-that-nice reviews of our work. I’ve been lucky so far; all my reviews are 5-star – then again, I only have THREE of them for my fiction novel. I’ve asked people to say something nice when they finish reading the book, but they do seem to forget or get distracted elsewhere.

I’ve never written a negative review; if I can’t say something constructive, why bother? Then again, perhaps some positive critiquing is necessary from time to time, as we often can’t see the weak spots in our work as easily as the reader. So don’t take it personally. Use it to your advantage, as an opportunity learn where you may have missed something – with characters, dialog, or scenes/chapters – and go back to the original work with fresh eyes.

Why Authors Shouldn’t Obsess Over One-Star Reviews

Authors, prepare yourself for the inevitable one-star review. In the publishing industry, one-star reviews are practically a rite of passage.

And no one is immune. Whether you’ve got 10 best-sellers to your credit or it’s your first book, you can expect at least a single one-star review.

There are the one-star Amazon reviews that make you roll your eyes.

“If possible, I’d give this pile of garbage zero stars.”

“Not really of much use for me. Seems like just a lot of useless information to fill up a book.”

“The best part of this book is the cover photo.”

https://buildbookbuzz.com/one-star-reviews/

A Writer’s Legacy in a Digital World

Posted on November 21, 2016 by mestengobooks

I’m not trying to be morose but something has been nagging at me for some time now, and it’s important to discuss with all of you. I’ve been wondering what to do with my intellectual property (as well as my material property) once I’ve walked on from this life (or become incapacitated in some way). Perhaps some of you have pondered this as well if, like me, you’re in the second half of life. I perused a few articles and even asked an acquaintance, who happens to be a lawyer, about this issue. He mentioned that since this is such a new situation, it has presented some difficulties and obstacles when drawing up the paperwork for a client’s estate: Will, Power of Attorney, Health Proxy, Advanced Directive, etc. Did you know that most Americans don’t even have a Will? They figure the family will somehow work it all out. Believe me, they couldn’t be more WRONG. (I would’ve had a nightmare situation with my family if I hadn’t taken my mother to an attorney to complete all the paperwork years before her death.)

Attorneys refer to these as your Digital Assets (DA). Do you trust someone enough to have access when you’re unable or gone? Need to think about this one, because not everyone’s as trustworthy as one might think, especially if money or personal information is involved. First step is to take an inventory of your DA:

Do you have a Paypal or any account that has monetary value? Who will have access in case you’re incapacitated? Or worse, if you die? What happens to the money? Who benefits?
What about email accounts (personal and/or business), blogs, and podcasts? Personal and business websites? Do you want them up and running for people to read your when-you-were-a-breathing-starving-artist work?
Do you keep a list of logins and passwords to all the accounts you use? I do, and I update it regularly. But I abbreviate the logins so no one else will figure them out if they get their hands on the list. I also keep an updated copy in one of those many cloud accounts in case something happens to my computer. The list is getting longer, though, since one can’t shop on sites as a guest anymore. I just cleaned out my list and it’s still a full page of two columns (it had been two pages)!
What electronic devices do you own that need a password for access? Do you have a laptop, smartphone, tablet, DVR/Tivo, or a home burglary system?
Do you bank online? What about mortgage payments, investment banking, utilities, or airline memberships?
Do you have any online accounts like Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube? Any accounts to e-commerce sites (Amazon, Netflix, Hulu, Ebay, etc.)? You also need to check the policies of these companies regarding access by another person – which is why you will need to legally designate someone if you want that person to clean up your online mess.
How much of your writing is unfinished? Do you want someone else to finish it? Or would you prefer your Executor/Executrix just heave every incomplete project, every potential novel/poetry book/best-selling short story into a shredder (digital or physical)? What will you do with the work you have completed? Published? Who gets the royalties? It’s a bit mind-boggling to think about it. But you MUST think about it – and DECIDE.
What about cleaning up your personal information collected by those data-mining companies? If you think it won’t matter once you’re gone, you’re wrong. Someone could use your identity and then perhaps gain access to your DA and online life – and then your hard-earned money.

Whew. This is not an exhaustive list but it will hopefully get many of you thinking more about your DA and how to protect it (in perpetuity) or do away with it. It’s a sobering experience to think of your life in these terms, but in the long run you’re doing your family or loved ones a favor by setting it down on paper. If you’re not sure you can trust someone to take care of everything, why not designate your attorney? They’re legally bound to follow the client’s directives, so your DA would be protected or disposed of according to the terms of your Will.

I’m planning to do this; at least then I’ll have some peace of mind about what happens to my work when I’m gone. Perhaps I’ll set up some sort of trust so that revenues (royalties) from my books will be donated to nonprofit organizations of my choosing. That will be my legacy.

What will your legacy be?