"What Happens to Facebook accounts after death?" from OK Gazette

I was on stumbleupon yesterday, and I found this article about ... exactly what the title suggests, what happens to facebook accounts after death. I thought the article was interesting, because I actually have a facebook friend who died in a car accident last year, and he often shows up on my home page. While I find it a little creepy whenever I see that he was tagged in an album, or someone wrote on his wall, I thought it was a little harsh to unfriend him. Over time, I have just gotten used to these occasional reminders of his untimely death. Being only 19, I know very few people my age who have passed away, but if I continue to use facebook as I get older, this number will inevitably grow.

Anyway, back to the article. I have never heard of the Oklahoma Gazette, so I am therefore making the assumption that it is not very widely read outside of Oklahoma. While I am sure that this article could have been written from several different points of view, this author took the legal standpoint - while there are laws for what happens to almost all other types of property when you die, most states have not yet reached any sort of conclusions about what to do with someone's emails, facebook, twitter, or anything else considered an "online asset". Heather Spencer (the author), interviewed a lawyer who said that "social media accounts essentially have no value except the need to keep privacy", and then went on to say that she has actually had a few cases where family members have had to access online accounts and were prohibited from doing so.

Though it is not particularly easy to access someone who works at one of these websites, it is actually possible to memorialize a person's account. This involves removing more "sensitive information like status updates and restricts profile access to confirm friends only" , while still allowing people to write on the persons wall, look at pictures, etc. It is also possible to close the account if close family members feel the need to do so. Facebook has also recently added some new principles that have to do with topic in particular, though they also add that the easiest way to express what you wish to happen to your social networking site is actually to add it to your will, just as your would any other property, intellectual or otherwise.

Spencer also included excerpts from an interview with a patent and copyright lawer, who is now considering working with a company called "Legacy Locker", which he describes as "the equivalent to an online safety deposit box". To expand, it is a service that stores user names etc, as well as a practical way for a family member to access everything if need be.

I guess I do not think about death often enough to consider this necessary for myself, though I guess that is kind of silly. On the other hand, I do not really know what harm having social networking accounts that belong to dead people could possibly do. Its not like they are taking up space that alive people are not getting.

The original article can be found here: http://www.okgazette.com/p/12776/a/3900/Default.aspx?ReturnUrl=LwBEAGUAZgBhAHUAbAB0AC4AYQBzAHAAeAAslashAHAAPQAxADIANwAyADkA