3 ms·

I mean Facebook should treat the account as part of the estate, to be controlled by whoever controls the estate. If you're the heir of all their miscellaneous p

I mean Facebook should treat the account as part of the estate, to be controlled by whoever controls the estate. If you're the heir of all their miscellaneous property, that would mean you get to prove that to Facebook and they hand over the account to you. Maybe Facebook doesn't want to deal with the messy papers and signatures involved in that.

abricot 9y ago
You are essentially advocating that you should be able to inherit the identity of a person, and not just the photos and messages of that person.
- shagie 9y ago
  Controlled doesn't mean "I am writing as Grandpa" but rather "I am writing on behalf of Grandpa." Part of what needs to be addressed is "is what I write and what I control online part of my _identity_ or part of my _intellectual property_?" No, a person inheriting the estate doesn't have the right to pretend to be Grandpa and collect social security checks or defraud people based on that identity. Yes, a person inheriting the estate does have the right to take the collected poetry and essays that Grandpa wrote and publishing it. ... even if they are published on Facebook. Are Facebook, Twitter, Github etc... in the first category or the second category? Microsoft outlook has a neat feature to "send on behalf of" (account settings, delegate access). Such an approach would be something to consider for an online presence to distinguish who is doing the sending - the deceased or the estate.
- adventured 9y ago
  > You are essentially advocating that you should be able to inherit the identity of a person Just because eg the person's wallet is now technical property of the estate, doesn't mean the identity information contained within (driver's license, credit cards, etc) now acts as a form of identity inheritance or transferal. That's not how estates work legally.
PeterisP 9y ago
The article states, for example, "... even where it feels right to turn over private messages to family members, laws may prevent us from doing so. The Electronic Communications Privacy Act and Stored Communications Act, for instance, prevent us from relying upon family consent to disclose the contents of a person’s communications." So simply handing over the account isn't a possibility, they'd have to remove the nonpublic communications first.

abricot 9y ago

You are essentially advocating that you should be able to inherit the identity of a person, and not just the photos and messages of that person.

shagie 9y ago
Controlled doesn't mean "I am writing as Grandpa" but rather "I am writing on behalf of Grandpa." Part of what needs to be addressed is "is what I write and what I control online part of my _identity_ or part of my _intellectual property_?" No, a person inheriting the estate doesn't have the right to pretend to be Grandpa and collect social security checks or defraud people based on that identity. Yes, a person inheriting the estate does have the right to take the collected poetry and essays that Grandpa wrote and publishing it. ... even if they are published on Facebook. Are Facebook, Twitter, Github etc... in the first category or the second category? Microsoft outlook has a neat feature to "send on behalf of" (account settings, delegate access). Such an approach would be something to consider for an online presence to distinguish who is doing the sending - the deceased or the estate.
adventured 9y ago
> You are essentially advocating that you should be able to inherit the identity of a person Just because eg the person's wallet is now technical property of the estate, doesn't mean the identity information contained within (driver's license, credit cards, etc) now acts as a form of identity inheritance or transferal. That's not how estates work legally.

PeterisP 9y ago

The article states, for example, "... even where it feels right to turn over private messages to family members, laws may prevent us from doing so. The Electronic Communications Privacy Act and Stored Communications Act, for instance, prevent us from relying upon family consent to disclose the contents of a person’s communications." So simply handing over the account isn't a possibility, they'd have to remove the nonpublic communications first.