“In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes”, said Franklin. The exception list keeps growing. We had Mitchell adding childbirth to the list in Gone with the Wind. And I, humbly want to add blogs (or tweets, if you will), to this list.
We know that there will be no death to taxes but what will happen to blogs after death? Have you ever wondered? I was searching for counter arguments against Health Industry Standard “HL 7” and I got it in a blog; specifically, in Barry Smith’s blog. This got me thinking. How much of knowledge and information is locked up in blogs? Do we know? Does anyone know?
Who gets the key to a blog when a person is no more?
We know your rich aunt’s property, copyright, toothbrush and soap can be her bequest to you. But is there a legal framework for bequeathing blogs? For example, I am sure Michael Jackson must have had a blog going. What happens to it now? There must be huge amount of public interest and other information locked up in his blog. What happens to it now? Will it be gone from the face of the earth or will it be claimed by Project Gutenberg and added to its voluminous data?
Enterprises are doing eDiscovery to leverage out information from loose files and emails. I am not sure people will give a handle to their blogs. Forrester in its Jan2009 issue says that electronically stored information, or ESI, will be relevant to eDiscovery and I quote:
Quote:
Although a wide variety of electronically stored information (ESI) can be relevant to eDiscovery under the revised US FRCP, most litigation to date has focused on email, loose files, and employee desktops. In 2009, other content types will become increasingly important for eDiscovery.
Unquote
Yet, will libraries and individuals be able to unlock blogs and have a look see after a blogger’s demise? Who will inherit a blogger’s legacy?
Who knows, many years later, it may well be possible for a blogger to log in from up there and continue blogging. But till then will a blogger please write her will?
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2 comments:
a very interesting thought !!
maybe some answer can be found in the Intellectual Property Rights ... after all a blog is also an intellectual property
Thanks for the input.
I guess a person who is treating it as IP will have methods to monetise her blog.
My concern is more for contents which folks put in blog and then fade away.
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