This is an area of planning known as "business continuity planning" and as part of this process, you should have a document and written procedures that are executed by humans, not computers, and tested as part of this. For example, your BCP should include people who are already trusted and know how your infrastructure works, and you should do a dress rehearsal on a yearly basis at least. A notification tool is one thing, but realistically this should be just one of your tools.
Nice, i have similar idea for a while, with some additional features:
- Easy to use, my idea is just have a telegram/facebook chatbot, people talk to it in plain English, what is their message, the receiver and the watch time.
- Multi reminder: For example, you can set 3 days to send message 1, 10 days to send message 2 and so on. The idea is the message 1 can be "You are receiving this message because XXX has something to talk, please contact them if you can ASAP". So that if you forgot to "kick the dog" 1 day, your deep personal message won't be sent immediately.
From my experience, there is no everlasting digital system, no matter how many fallbacks you add. So I wonder, how can you ensure, this still works after e. g. 1 year?
The system checks with contacts after one year to reconfirm. If I don't receive my weekly check-in email I check the server. This is a best effort attempt to ensure business continuity for me if I'm dead. It's better than not having a plan for me. There's a health address you can point to that checks the system is working from an outside monitor. :)
Hi Peter. This is advice I give to every AI product now, not just yours. Nothing personal.
It's fine to use AI to create the product – but please, for the love of god, write your own copy. When someone can't be bothered writing their own landing page, I assume they're just not that bothered about the product.
Fair call on the copy, I may tweak it. The product came from a brief I spent two days on, so the thinking is mine even where home page's words aren't entirely. This is a free product. I'm happy to have my Switch in place because my clients are loving the plans.
I was into it until you considered this a level of assurance
feels like you’ve been out of the software industry for a decade or two
but maybe you know your clientele and they would find this validating. I’ve entered into a couple industries over time where complete non sequiturs are what sold products. “So-and-so has this random unrelated credential, and thats why he will be the trusted partner for this commodities shipment he has no experience in”
Fair enough. The readme contains the rehearsal script so you can make sure it's working for you. We don't host this service so you are ensuring the product works for you via rehearsal and usage.
Also, if you miss the first email two more reminders are sent to you before emailing your next of kin. It's only when your next of kin says there's a problem, or doesn't answer, your lawyer and/or 2IC are informed. It's a great point you've raised.
It's designed to send one email to check on you per week. Currently for me this is 9am Monday. I can't miss it because I'm selling my clients the death plan in my contracts. You can change the timing of the email to suit your needs. Thanks for the great feedback :))
For version 1 we decided for the check-in to be weekly because it can still take 13 days for the Switch to tell the lawyer and/or the 2IC where our master keys are held. Thanks for the link, this isn't locked to google accounts, it's more so for the 2IC to ensure business continuity with servers domains Dropbox etc.
> What if I go missing or die? The right people are told and my business can continue to operate for *my clients*... I was hospitalised in 2012 and lost my business back then and I couldn't get the data to my technical 2IC in time without frustrating *my clients*... *My clients* are telling me this is a strong sales feature when they trust me with their hosting and technology accounts.
I am not sure why this focus on clients in a context like this feels unsettling to me, but it does.
I'm building a business for the long term and those clients are investing money into me. My next of kin is notified first. It just seems sensible to give my clients long term security if I have another health issue or die.
I can see some decent reasons for a dead man's switch, like notifying people in the situation where you live alone and have pets (though you'd want it to be much shorter than a week) or to send a goodbye or legal documents to a loved one, but I'll be honest, I don't feel the least bit of obligation to anyone who is just a business contact after I'm dead. They can figure it out, or not. Not my fuckin' problem anymore.
I'm always too embarrassed to show the things I make on here. Some voice keeps telling me "they aren't really outstanding or novel qnd nobody will care"
But seeing the front page the past few months, maybe i should.
Or not, I honestly don't know how to feel.
İ like people sharing and having the courage to put their work out, but if this place gets cluttered with "i installed Linux on my AI laptop"
Where then to go to find any interesting info.
There is arvix? No frivolous things there right? :p
I liked the project by the way, even if it's a bit trivial.
most posts do not show up in the front page at all, the ones you're seeing are the ones that are actually good (in an ideal world, in reality a lot of this is controlled anyway). But yeah even if you make the best thing you've ever dreamed of, do not think posting it on HN = automatic front page. Most content never makes it and gets like 1-2 upvotes. I've hit #1 only once even though i post regularly. Just as long as you're not spamming or breaking any general rules it's alright to take a chance with anything you deem interesting or worth tinkering with.
I shared it because my business had the need and to inspire others to think about succession. It's dead simple to build with or without AI for a seasoned coder:))
All those various regular code popularity surveys place it above Rust and Go.
It’s still the most easily-deployable language to build web apps in, and there’s nothing particularly missing from it now.
Also AI writes it really well (is good at using the latest features etc.), it has a remarkably un-fucked-up package manager, Laravel is fairly easy to work with, etc.
- Easy to use, my idea is just have a telegram/facebook chatbot, people talk to it in plain English, what is their message, the receiver and the watch time.
- Multi reminder: For example, you can set 3 days to send message 1, 10 days to send message 2 and so on. The idea is the message 1 can be "You are receiving this message because XXX has something to talk, please contact them if you can ASAP". So that if you forgot to "kick the dog" 1 day, your deep personal message won't be sent immediately.
It's fine to use AI to create the product – but please, for the love of god, write your own copy. When someone can't be bothered writing their own landing page, I assume they're just not that bothered about the product.
wowww 42 unit tests that Claude made up
I was into it until you considered this a level of assurance
feels like you’ve been out of the software industry for a decade or two
but maybe you know your clientele and they would find this validating. I’ve entered into a couple industries over time where complete non sequiturs are what sold products. “So-and-so has this random unrelated credential, and thats why he will be the trusted partner for this commodities shipment he has no experience in”
By the way Google has had this for a while and I signed up for it back in 2018 or so.
they check in it feels like quarterly at most
https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/3036546?hl=en
I am not sure why this focus on clients in a context like this feels unsettling to me, but it does.
So, you haven’t had enough time to even encounter most edge cases :)
Are you OK bro?
But seeing the front page the past few months, maybe i should. Or not, I honestly don't know how to feel. İ like people sharing and having the courage to put their work out, but if this place gets cluttered with "i installed Linux on my AI laptop" Where then to go to find any interesting info. There is arvix? No frivolous things there right? :p
I liked the project by the way, even if it's a bit trivial.
It’s still the most easily-deployable language to build web apps in, and there’s nothing particularly missing from it now.
Also AI writes it really well (is good at using the latest features etc.), it has a remarkably un-fucked-up package manager, Laravel is fairly easy to work with, etc.