Derek K. Miller has been online since the turn of the 1980s. In 1983, his family got their first modem. By the mid nineties, he had a web page and a few years later he created a blog. Derek estimates his online writings are double the word count of War and Peace. He has a big online footprint when you add up his writings, his podcasts and the music he creates, not to mention all the photos on Flickr.
Derek blogs about all aspects of his life, from his hometown of Burnaby B.C., to his kids, to his cancer. At the beginning of 2007, he was diagnosed with cancer and he’s currently fighting stage 4 metastatic colorectal cancer.
One of the things that Derek has been thinking about his digital legacy, and what should happen to our web presence when we die. Do we need to appoint a digital executor to oversee our online belongings? Someone who would know all of your passwords and keep up the payments for your domain name, for example, so your site would live on even after you have gone?
Nora interviewed Derek yesterday and you can find their uncut interview below or as an mp3 here. An edited version of this will air on the April 30 and May 3 episode of Spark. It’s a poignant conversation and Derek is so generous with his thoughts that it’s really worth hearing in full.
Play audio:
Original photo by penmachine.
I have read Derek’s blog for some time.
Interviewing him is a great thing that you are doing.
He is a great Canadian Blogger and we all could learn something from him.
I have two boys and I cannot bear to think of what I would do if I were in his shoes.
I’ve really admired Derek’s courage and frankness about his illness.
The idea of a digital legacy will be an increasingly complicated and vexing problem. I expect a profession will emerge (if it hasn’t already) to help people handle these issues.
I must say, Darren, I hadn’t ever thought about these issues before one of our listeners flagged Derek’s podcast about the issue for me. But I think you’re right; I can imagine a whole new category of ‘personal digital archivists’.
Full length “Spark” interview available already: “…It’s unusual enough for a radio or TV program, publicly funded or not, to post full-length versions of edited interviews online. But to do it days *before* the final version appears is still more innovative….”
I have also read Derek’s blog for quite sometime, listen to his podcasts and had the pleasure to meet him in person recently and spend some time with him and the circle of people who surround him. He is an amazing human being and being so frank about how he deals with life, it is invigorating. He LIVES his life, not ever yielding to the disease.
He just includes cancer as one of the many things that he writes about, and his overall writing is awesome. Kudos to CBC Radio for such a great interview.
I have been a fan of Derek’s writing for some time (and even featured some of his music on a Podcast I used to do.) To be able to put his heart on his online sleave is quite commendable.
Considering the subject matter of the interview, having the full version available really gives us the big picture on the topic. Bravo!
@Kevin,
Yes, as a general rule, I’m a fan of shorter-is-better; usually the discipline of having to fit an interview to a short time line is helpful, but I think there are cases where a story really benefits from being able to ‘stretch its legs’, or where there’s content that people who are really ‘into’ a particular topic can enjoy hearing something longer. It’s so great to be able to offer that content online. I’m really enjoying this aspect of making Spark.
Incidentally, as I mentioned in the long interview, Dave Winer of scripting.com brought up this topic in March 2007, before I’d thought of it seriously, and blogged some useful suggestions about how to preserve your digital ideas in the long term.
Derek lost his battle to cancer on May 4, 2011. May the fouth be with him…..always.
We will all miss you Derek!!!!