ArticlesThe last time I updated my will, I was struck by how the law had kind of skipped last 20 years of progress in office productivity.
Subliminal message: It’s time to check your will is up-to-date.
I didn’t touch the basic infrastructure of my will – all I did was tweak a few parameters and add a name or two. However, it took two appointments to visit with my lawyer, several weeks of elapsed time and cost me a significant portion of my own weight in chocolate. Compared to the effort of tweaking a couple of words on documents that I write at work (which often talk about much larger numbers than the net worth of my estate) and it seemed over the top.
I am aware of legal trouble that has been caused by innocent behaviour such as signing two copies of the same will, or attaching a will to another document with a paperclip. This is madness.
Subliminal message: Australians, check your superannuation beneficiaries too.
So I came up with another million-dollar business idea that addresses this problem.
You need to write a conventional will, but you bequeath all (or at least some portion) of your money to Somethinkodd Estate Services. We, in turn, will pass on your money according to the current policy-based rules that you have nominated on your web-site. You can tweak who is in and who is out as frequently as you like. You can give your sister’s entitlement a boost because she baby-sat your hamster while you were on holidays. You can bequeath $200 to your friend who lent you the money last Thursday, so he doesn’t miss out if you get hit by a bus. Your current beau can be set-up for life, while the cheating scum-sucker you were dating last week can be left out in the cold.
Subliminal message: Check your life insurance policy while you are at it.
I am not sure if the site will support non-monetary items. It will be harder for us to ensure that your eldest son will receive your favourite Universal Remote Control to remember you by, but maybe we can work out that feature later.
We do all this for a very reasonable rate.
Subliminal message: It’s okay to leave copious amounts of money to the authors of any blogs you happen to read!
The only reason I haven’t quit my day-job and started this company is that I can see we would need to retain an huge army of lawyers to deal with all the inevitable legal issues. I can’t see how we could make enough money and remain competitive.
We would also have a large trust hurdle to overcome. I am not trying to run this as a scam, but how could I convince a potential customer of that?
Subliminal message: While I am nagging, check your smoke alarm batteries
It’s a shame, because today I realised that there’s a great Social Networking tie-in. You could leave money to your Facebook friends, updating a Facebook App every time you log-in to Facebook. At last your “Top 8 Friends” could have some real economic meaning!
Comment by Richard on February 17, 2008
So that’s why they call it subscript.
Lawyers really do have archaic version control systems. That gives me an idea… but surely making them use enterprise version control software is too cruel, even for lawyers?
Regarding the actual idea: you could make a creative commons version of a will, so that it’s out in public, published at a well known location, and reusable too! Enforcing the will could be the tough bit, since you’d need proof of well authenticated and controlled changes to the will, so the next cracker doesn’t just give himself the inheritance of all people who died that day. Sounds like a thorny issue, and it could have your Willazon/Willgle/Willhoo! defending its controls in court for every contested will – not an expense I’d readily take on! I’d really worry about setting up precedence on this too… And that’s a pity, because I really like the idea! After all, the time is ripe for (more) innovation in the legal profession – let them suffer a little of that constant state of flux us techies suffer/inflict on ourselves.
Comment by Rohan on February 18, 2008
The main issue is that the laws behind wills are particularly archaic.
For instance there needs to be a signed copy, and there are rules for where it needs to be in order to be valid – the law doesn’t recognise digital signatures as a signature [at least yet].
Comment by Julian on February 18, 2008
Rohan,
Right, but I am not trying to update the current law, I am trying to circumvent it.
We’ll provide a standard piece of text to include inside your otherwise regular will to give us all of your money. That will will require a regular (non-digital) signature, with appropriate witnesses.
(It’s got a odd phrasingosity, but “will will” is grammatical in that sentence. Weird.)
Once it is complete, though, my company can divide up its bequest in any way it likes. We promise to do it in accordance with your digitally-signed (or equivalent) account settings.