This article isn’t my own, but I was so moved by this story shared by Derek Sivers in his interview with Jordan Paris that I felt like I needed to publish it as an article on my blog.

Everything below is quoted verbatim from the original interview transcript. Read the transcript on sivers.org or listen to the podcast on jordanparis.com.

Yeah. So, they shouldn’t rely on these companies for anything that matters to them. If something matters to you, don’t give it to a company.

It made me really sad. I had a friend in Singapore that, when his kid was nine years old, merged his personal and his Google apps like business Google accounts into one. Then suddenly, nine years of his family photos of his kid growing up were gone.

He emailed Google customer service, and they said no, there was the warning that when you merge your accounts. His wife was like, “What have you done?”

He has no pictures of his son from birth to age nine because he was depending on Google. You don’t do that. If something matters to you, you don’t give it to Facebook. They don’t care as much as you do.

Derek Sivers (2020)

Derek recommends instead to host your own server to store your images, videos, music, writing, and any data important to you.

I tried searching Derek’s website for his server setup but could not find one. I could tweet him and hope that it prompts him to write one, but I think I can figure it out on my own. Once I do, I will publish a follow-up article.