It turns out there is a lot of ‘helpful’ advice on the web for faking your own death. Here are just a few:

• How to fake your own death from Everything2
• How to fake your own death from eHow (heavy on the etiquette and a little light on the practicalities)
• Faking  it: How to do a Reggie and get away with it from The Independent

I think it just got a lot easier thanks to Webwill. Unfortunately unless you speak Swedish you won’t get a lot from this site right now and might find it easier to get a little more background info in English. If I understand the premise correctly, you decide what you want to say on your various social media profiles in the event of your death and hand over the virtual keys to a trusted friend to actually click the final button.  There doesn’t appear to be anything to prevent the ‘friend’ from being your other gmail address so as long as you go to the library so the IP address doesn’t give it away, you could get the viral buzz going without having to go to the more traditional extremes of car crashes and bridge jumps.

Neither Twitter nor Facebook have anything regarding “death” in their Terms of Service although presumably Webwill requires the handing over of an account and password which does violate most everyone’s terms. Of course if you’re dead, or effectively dead in this persona I suppose you don’t really care.

For those not planning an illusory exit, now you not only have to figure out what catchy phrase to put on your tombstone but how say goodbye in under 140 characters which seems to me to require a great deal more foresight and planning than most Americans are prepared to do.  I think I prefer the alternative of getting through to Lisa Williams after the fact and hoping someone catches it on her monthly bulletin board.

I like people that are confident enough in what they’re predicting to say it’s going to happen within two decades – whether it’s meeting aliens or predicting the end of the world. This time though, it’s the aliens (read the story at the Daily Galaxy.)  So it’s time to start figuring out the appropriate etiquette, place settings, Hallmark card (we’ve been waiting?)  etc.  We don’t want to look like the galactic ignoramuses we probably are.

On the other hand would it really matter?  The SETI folks (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence) do warn that first contact is more likely to be with something resembling Star Trek’s horta (the large blob of styrofoam) than the babes in green body paint.  They’ll already have Google access apparently, so what else will we have to say?  This is going to be like Facebook reconnect air kisses isn’t it? (I never thought I’d talk to you again!… and now I find I have nothing new to say.)

Now might be a good time to get your earthling dog tag, however…. just in case.

People think they’re being tolerant  of unusual names and being  multicultural by having enough spaces on the form and making a desperate attempt to sound things out without creating swear words inadvertently.  But what about people with well, funny names?  Legitimate, multi-generational family names like Pancake or Six? Turns out the discrimination is rampant and the jokes unending.  Being on Facebook is getting to be like having a social security number – hard to function in the modern world without it, but Facebook assumes these are fraudulent applications and makes the appeal process extremely unappealing.  Read the article in the Washington Post and if you are lucky enough to have a funny name, revel in it!