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I follow an acquaintance on Twitter who set up an auto-tweet while he was alive. Now, after his death, he still tweets whenever the weather drops below a certai

by prawn 7y ago

I follow an acquaintance on Twitter who set up an auto-tweet while he was alive. Now, after his death, he still tweets whenever the weather drops below a certain temperature in Scotland.

geofft 7y ago
Now I'm wondering what your acquaintance's tech stack is, and more generally, what the most reliable way to keep running scheduled jobs after death is - since Twitter won't remove accounts that still log in, I kind of want to set up a cronjob to keep my username active for as long as I can. (Assume that the job itself doesn't change, i.e., there's no need to move away from a deprecated API.) Maybe Lambda + CloudWatch Events? AWS probably won't go away for decades. Does your credit card automatically close when your death is reported to the financial system, or can you direct it to stay open in your will + set aside a bit of money to pay off the couple-cent bill in perpetuity?
- philliphaydon 7y ago
  Not sure it would matter if the CC was closed or not. If you're running a Lambda a few times a day you would fall into the free tier for... ever until they change the free tier. So the question would be does your account stay active despite an expired credit card which is never invoked cos you never put your account into debt?
  - TurningCanadian 7y ago
    What if AWS changes their privacy policy
    - philliphaydon 7y ago
      What sort of change?
      - dijit 7y ago
        Any change that prompts you to re-accept? Just like twitters in this instance.
        philliphaydon 7y ago
        I think in the case of AWS, your services would continue to run as long as your bill is settled. It would only affect you if you logged in. So if you fell under the free tier then I'm curious if it would continue to run indefinitely.
  - ralfd 7y ago
    "The AWS free tier will expire 12 months from the date of when you first sign up."
    - wging 7y ago
      Some AWS usage is part of the free tier even after 12 months. "The Lambda free tier does not automatically expire at the end of your 12 month AWS Free Tier term, but is available to both existing and new AWS customers indefinitely." - https://aws.amazon.com/lambda/pricing/ https://aws.amazon.com/lambda/pricing/
      - makerofspoons 7y ago
        I made some Alexa skills years ago that are still up running on Lambda. They've never been used enough to get me charged.
- kick 7y ago
  He probably used IFTTT.
  - mcny 7y ago
    I've tried ifttt. The Twitter recipes will stop in a few months for me. Have to go in and turn it in manually every so often. Just trying to repost from Twitter at a location to WordPress. ymmv
- prawn 7y ago
  There was a case of a military veteran recently in the States who lay dead on his kitchen floor for up to three years. He was still getting some sort of pension/payment and the rent was getting auto-paid from that. They only found him because of a check on tenants in a building/area who weren't drawing any water. In a case like that, I suppose a debit card or credit card with an automatic transfer would stay active for some time.
  - eru 7y ago
    > They only found him because of a check on tenants in a building/area who weren't drawing any water. Wow. Some leaky faucets or automatic plant watering system would have kept him undiscovered for even longer.
    - dijit 7y ago
      It’s rare but not unheard of for people to be found decades after death. https://elpais.com/elpais/2019/10/29/inenglish/1572340728_798340.html https://elpais.com/elpais/2019/10/29/inenglish/1572340728_79...
      - Gibbon1 7y ago
        More humorously I remember reading about a German guy that forgot where he parked his car and it sat in an office garage for 20 years or something.
        marcosdumay 7y ago
        There was a building in my city that was constructed in the 70's to be a shopping mall, but the owner got bankrupt in the meanwhile, and the building was repurposed into a parking lot that run for a couple of years. By 2014 is was imploded. There were around 30 cars still parked there.
        alexfoo 7y ago
        https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/man-forgets-park-car-finds-20-years-later-frankfurt-a8058416.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/man-forgets-...
- ed_elliott_asc 7y ago
  If you setup IFTTT then until that stops running which could be never??
rdsubhas 7y ago
Unfortunately, API tokens are not the same as user logins, and very easy to separate out from user activity. Depends on some policy whim to be counted or not as user activity. Not dependable afterlife.

by prawn 7y ago

I follow an acquaintance on Twitter who set up an auto-tweet while he was alive. Now, after his death, he still tweets whenever the weather drops below a certain temperature in Scotland.

geofft 7y ago

Now I'm wondering what your acquaintance's tech stack is, and more generally, what the most reliable way to keep running scheduled jobs after death is - since Twitter won't remove accounts that still log in, I kind of want to set up a cronjob to keep my username active for as long as I can. (Assume that the job itself doesn't change, i.e., there's no need to move away from a deprecated API.) Maybe Lambda + CloudWatch Events? AWS probably won't go away for decades. Does your credit card automatically close when your death is reported to the financial system, or can you direct it to stay open in your will + set aside a bit of money to pay off the couple-cent bill in perpetuity?

philliphaydon 7y ago
Not sure it would matter if the CC was closed or not. If you're running a Lambda a few times a day you would fall into the free tier for... ever until they change the free tier. So the question would be does your account stay active despite an expired credit card which is never invoked cos you never put your account into debt?
- TurningCanadian 7y ago
  What if AWS changes their privacy policy
  - philliphaydon 7y ago
    What sort of change?
    - dijit 7y ago
      Any change that prompts you to re-accept? Just like twitters in this instance.
      - philliphaydon 7y ago
        I think in the case of AWS, your services would continue to run as long as your bill is settled. It would only affect you if you logged in. So if you fell under the free tier then I'm curious if it would continue to run indefinitely.
- ralfd 7y ago
  "The AWS free tier will expire 12 months from the date of when you first sign up."
  - wging 7y ago
    Some AWS usage is part of the free tier even after 12 months. "The Lambda free tier does not automatically expire at the end of your 12 month AWS Free Tier term, but is available to both existing and new AWS customers indefinitely." - https://aws.amazon.com/lambda/pricing/ https://aws.amazon.com/lambda/pricing/
    - makerofspoons 7y ago
      I made some Alexa skills years ago that are still up running on Lambda. They've never been used enough to get me charged.
kick 7y ago
He probably used IFTTT.
- mcny 7y ago
  I've tried ifttt. The Twitter recipes will stop in a few months for me. Have to go in and turn it in manually every so often. Just trying to repost from Twitter at a location to WordPress. ymmv
prawn 7y ago
There was a case of a military veteran recently in the States who lay dead on his kitchen floor for up to three years. He was still getting some sort of pension/payment and the rent was getting auto-paid from that. They only found him because of a check on tenants in a building/area who weren't drawing any water. In a case like that, I suppose a debit card or credit card with an automatic transfer would stay active for some time.
- eru 7y ago
  > They only found him because of a check on tenants in a building/area who weren't drawing any water. Wow. Some leaky faucets or automatic plant watering system would have kept him undiscovered for even longer.
  - dijit 7y ago
    It’s rare but not unheard of for people to be found decades after death. https://elpais.com/elpais/2019/10/29/inenglish/1572340728_798340.html https://elpais.com/elpais/2019/10/29/inenglish/1572340728_79...
    - Gibbon1 7y ago
      More humorously I remember reading about a German guy that forgot where he parked his car and it sat in an office garage for 20 years or something.
      - marcosdumay 7y ago
        There was a building in my city that was constructed in the 70's to be a shopping mall, but the owner got bankrupt in the meanwhile, and the building was repurposed into a parking lot that run for a couple of years. By 2014 is was imploded. There were around 30 cars still parked there.
      - alexfoo 7y ago
        https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/man-forgets-park-car-finds-20-years-later-frankfurt-a8058416.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/man-forgets-...
ed_elliott_asc 7y ago
If you setup IFTTT then until that stops running which could be never??

rdsubhas 7y ago

Unfortunately, API tokens are not the same as user logins, and very easy to separate out from user activity. Depends on some policy whim to be counted or not as user activity. Not dependable afterlife.