It definitely was a set of unfortunate circumstances for the author. If he was told about the messy divorce, it would have been standard procedure to get the ex

It definitely was a set of unfortunate circumstances for the author. If he was told about the messy divorce, it would have been standard procedure to get the ex-wife's side of things, especially since she had been a manager at the bar for nearly 2 decades. But I'm assuming she's dead, if she had stage 4 breast cancer in 2014. And that might have led the author understandably to think that "messy divorce", and drinking problems, was as problematic as it got. I completely agree with you that the author still had a good point. I think his article is particularly resonant today, with the growing fear and resentment of social media oversharing, online harassment and doxxing, and even data retention (e.g. "Right to be forgotten").