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Ask Slashdot: Dividing Digital Assets In Divorce?
An anonymous reader writes "I am a long time Slashdotter and currently find myself in the beginning of a divorce process. How have you dealt with dispersing of shared data, accounts and things online in such a situation? Domains, hosting, email, sensitive data backups and social media are just a few examples."
You shouldn't have destroyed your individuality by combining all of these things. If you hadn't, maybe you wouldn't be getting divorced.
I'm only saying this so that others may learn from your mistake.
Sig: I stole this sig.
burn it on a dvd and call it a day
How have you dealt with dispersing of shared data
If only there were a way to make multiple copies of digital information...
If yes, just tell your lawyer that number. Don't have a lawyer? Stop wasting time asking the Internet for advice and get one.
Secondarily, do they sentimental value? Most courts are willing to take that into account as well.
Shared accounts?!? I'm married, and as a principle, we have no shared accounts. All other data can be simply duplicated, as that is the nature of data. You have this problem because of sloppy identity management. Talk it over with the Ex, if that still is an option. As for domains and hosting, well, also a talking point, I'd say.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
Just been through this myself. My solution was to let her keep all the photographs, videos, accounts, etc etc. So I get a clean break, and no unwanted reminders in the future of a very dark period of my life. Seriously, you should at least consider the benefits of leaving it all behind, and letting the past stay in the past.
That was the most round-about way ever of saying "My parents are throwing my 38 year old ass out of the basement."
Trolling is a art,
Can't you simply make copies?
Work around it. If it's something you absolutely need for work and the like, you're just going to have to play nice and share. There's plenty of couples who still talk and get along better after divorce, so just avoid trying to absolutely screw each other over in the meantime. As for file based things that aren't account based, I'm sure you're already in the process of making copies.
Seriously, this is a terrible question for the /. community. You're going to get mocked, and maybe told that you shouldn't have married him/her/it if you didn't want to give him/her/it 51% of everything you own (round-up errors).
More seriously -- it's all about classifying property. Depending on state law, you may be able to retain individual ownership of some accounts / and anything business related, like a domain for a small business. Any interest you have in a company is likely to get split in half, if the company owns the digital assets then the ownership is derivative. If you have domain names you need for work, consider asking your spouse to consent to a flat evaluation at the price of registration -- create a corporation/LLC for your business identity and trasfer the assets out for good value.
Else -- SEE YOUR LAWYER.
-GiH.
I'm not really trying to sound like an ass, but if you merged your email addresses, you're on your own.
Foresight. Use it.
You'll have to wait for the Redigi case to play out. If the courts decide that downloaded music can't be sold used, they might also evaporate in a divorce. One downloaded song certainly can't be used by both parties after they separate.
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
Create separate accounts to replace the shared social network accounts and separately contact other people.
Take all backup data you each get a copy (and close old backup accounts), so each person can keep the things he/she wants. This is way easier since it's digital.
Register new domains / hosting and set up forwarding for email, temporarily keeping the old accounts open for a few months. Let one person pay the other for any domains that you both want to keep instead of letting them lapse. Nothing is priceless.
This is an easier situation than the non-digital equivalent, so I don't understand the difficulty.
Is most of that really shared? I guess having a shared email account makes a kind of sense, but not really.
If you have a combined email account/Facebook account you cannot really just have one person take over the use of them. I think your divorce has rendered such things as worthless.
Other things on that list come off as something you can continue to share.
But at the end of the day it is all a case by case scenario. What are you expecting? /. to come out and say: "ah, Domains, well obviously those always go to the husband, but the wife gets the email"???
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I went through a (by all counts HORRIBLY messy) divorce myself, some years ago. But at that time, despite both of us being avid "computer people", there was no such thing as "social networking" websites or "cloud storage".
I'm not even sure there was much in the way of "digital data" we felt we needed to divvy up?
As I think about this now, though, I think it does make yet one more strong argument against DRM. It would have been a much bigger hassle if all of my purchased music, video content, or even digitally downloaded software titles were authorized for her use (and vice-versa), and then we had to concern ourselves with how that would be handled after going our separate ways. In our situation, there were a few instances where she had a user account for a paid MMORPG game or what-not, and I simply let her keep it, while cancelling any credit card attached to it for billing purposes. That made it her problem to pay for it herself, moving forward, or just opting to let the account go.
I don't know how amicable your particular divorce is, but I can tell you this much: In the long run, it'll make things go much more smoothly for both parties if you do the "right thing" in such situations as perhaps having a Dropbox account with some of HER data trapped in it. Back it up onto DVD-R or CD-R for her and give her those backups of her share of the content. Don't just wipe it, no matter how satisfying that idea is at the time. It's not worth starting an escalating battle over it, where she may well be able to delete some of YOUR info you're not even thinking about right now....
Wife took the whole damn planet in the divorce...
Just put all the spouse's stuff on the Internet, and that way they can get to it anywhere they are. They''ll thank you for that!
As a person that has been divorced and lost everything in the process, I can tell you this will not end well.
Sorry, this is flawed in a lot of ways.
In a sense there is no economic advantage between just living together as lovers and being married. One funny example used to be that the standard deductions of one Head of Household and one Single, both triggering on lower overall brackets was cheaper than the married rate on combined income, and other tricks.
Then there's the very real cost of the alimony/child care process. Guy starts out with house, guy should end up with house. But watch the number of times she gets it.
Or the kids. Woman starts out poor, woman has a kid, woman divorces two years later, woman keeps kid, woman gets payments GREATER than they would have spent together on the kid being frugal.
Plus the copyright angle of making "full backups" of database based assets is hysterical.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
I think however took the picture, holds the photo copyright. Therefore that person should decide if the photo can be shared as a copy. If a stranger on the street took the picture for you (and didn't run off with your camera, phew), then you could both have a copy.
Burn FAT not OIL
"I just heard about the settlement negotiated by my attorney.
My gets the car, I get the car payment book.
She gets our two houses in real life, I get the ones in Second Life.
She gets the garden, I get the Farmville properties..."
Some (possibly obvious) points for you to consider:
If the "digitial assets" have significant monetary value: ask your lawyer. (the "digital assets" probably have low monetary value, or you wouldn't be asking about them here.)
If the "digitial assets" have significant sentimental value: burn yourself a copy, hand them over to your future-ex, and sincerely say "Thank you for the wonderful memories."
(Just out of curiosity on my part, what kind of advice did you expect to get without actually describing the nature and value of the "digital assets"?)
Lastly, consider this: how important is it for you to win?
Divorces can be ugly. I've seen friends destroy each others sanity and inflict long-term damage on their souls in order to "win" and "be right"
Five years from now, would you rather be busy enjoying a new chapter in your life or sipping daily from a nasty glass of old & bitter resentments?
toss the server in the bath tub
Unlike all other assets, which she gets... technical assets go to the one who can manage them, which is usually you. Otherwise, you can try to divide them down the middle, or to something you agree on. Good luck with that.
This signature has Super Cow Powers
John Kerry, whichever way the wind blows.
I always wanted to know how to divide future revenue (after the divorce) for IP that was started but not completed before the divorce. I had thought to just give each party a copy of the IP to finish as they see fit. The alternative is that one party finishes the work and the other party reaps the benefits. This later case seems unfair.
when my 12 yr old grows up and moves out a lot of the games, but not all, were bought more for his benefit. I don't mind getting logged out occasionally now since he'll generally ask since he's in the house anyway. But when he moves out and 1/2 way across the country, potentially, co-ordinating the use of a single account will be a pain. I'll probably have to create a 2nd account for my exclusive use, since most of the money is tied up in his games...
Domains - the name listed in whois is the owner of record.
Hosting - the name listed on the account. The other party should get their own hosting account (any pre-paid hosting should be pro-rated at 50% to the other party).
email -for each PAID email account, the name listed on the account is the owner. For freemail accounts, you don't "own" them anyway, so each of you just get a new account already - it's not like it costs anything - then set the auto-responder in the freemail account to give both your new email addresses, then give the account login info to someone in trust who will change the secondary contact info and login to something random. Or give it to the kids (if any).
data - you each own your own data, as per copyright. Whoever created the original data, they own the rights to the backups as well. Be nice - share anything that the other person is in, such as pictures, since they also have a right to those. Exceptions: "intimate" pictures - give them to the person who is in the picture and destroy any other copies - don't you even think of "sharing" those without permission, and you'll end up with a police record, same as Libby [last name redacted]'s ex boyfriend did when he "shared them" with her parents, grandparents, etc.
social media - why is this a problem? Social media accounts are not "property" and you do not "own" them, as per your contract with whatever provider you're using. If this is about a "family" account, each of you create an account under your own name, post a note on the family account pointing to the new accounts, then as part of the agreement the family account is either nuked, or given to a 3rd party in trust who changes the contact information and password, then deactivates it.
It's a divorce - the two biggest words are move on. None of the stuff listed above is worth fighting over 99.999% of the time.
Give it all the shared stuff to her and get on with your life, trust me you will all be happier.
just give her every other byte.
Assets that can not be shared, split them. ie ebay accounts etc.
Or develop an ongoing share relationship for a fixed period of time.
Assets that can be duplicated, duplicate (photos)
Private information you don't want shared, only let the owner keep a copy.
The only big issue I see is intermingled backups.
If you have no trust, it's messy, otherwise separate and backup your data now, and destroy the comingled backups. or set a date for their future destruction.
If it's a messy divorce, you're screwed.
but why would want to own a shared facebook account after a divorce? Wouldn't it be more prudent for each of you to have your own account afterwards? "Digital assets" per se are information. Why would either of you want a constant reminder of a failed marriage while you go through routine tasks of checking email, updating facebook status (I am told that's a thing -- don't know myself), and so on and so forth?
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Is the correct answer
Judges always sympathize for women. Must be all that crying they do.
-- By all means let's be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brains drop out.
Most of the posts talk about copies and burning discs. This might not be possible. For example, what if they bought videos on iTunes or Amazon? You might not think that's a lot of money but some people have significant collections. I have 783GB of content from iTunes. In my case, my wife and I figured out that we needed different iTunes accounts about 6 months in. Still, it's not like splitting a DVD or Blu-ray collection.
I think the first step is talking with the content provider and see if they'll do anything for you. I'd guess not. If you can't split it, do as others suggest and talk about it with a lawyer.
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
How do you divide up digital assets in a divorce you say? Well, it's the same as you do with kids in a divorce.. Split right down the middle, with a chainsaw.
I could never figure out why all the websites sprouted "share" buttons. At first I could only vaguely guess what that meant. Promote? Draw attention to? Provide testimonial? Spam your nearest and dearest?
Finally I figured out that the root system for the word "share" is the soil of quasi-victimless theft. We don't really care when we lend a book to a friend that the author gains no recompense in tangible currency, since the author is almost certainly being screwed by the publisher anyway, and who wants to support that? And peer-to-peer is giving it to the man in general (which I say not entirely facetiously).
A better word than "share" might have been "perkolate". African dictators also like to distribute the goodies within their close circles of cronies. We are all alike, at heart. Now the sharing generation has no idea what an asset actually looks like and can't figure out how to draw the knife. My confusion about the word "share" was thinking it made some kind of deeper logical sense to anyone else. No, it was just a term to fudge matters all along.
So what is the problem here? There are possessions that can be either cloned (photographs) or partitioned (the $300 bottle of balsamic vinegar). For everything else, you negotiate, then sign a settlement contract. Or is the question about how to navigate these dark waters without disturbing your fudgy new-age embrace of neo-communism? If your needs go way beyond what is codified by law, you could always hire The Adjuster.
The movie seems to turn (if one can hazard a guess) on the notion that material division tends to be far from the central matter.
This is the most important thing: if you don't have to 'win', you'll probably be much happier in the long run. Divorced twice and just happy to have avoided war and lawyers both times. "Got" much less than 50%, but using lawyers to fight it would have cost even more.
It might be worth just deleting the whole sorry mess. That way no compromising photos (or either party) can find their way onto a social website. The question then becomes: who trusts who to delete everything and not keep a copy for themselves.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
I found early on that sharing digital assets was a mistake, and ended up opting out of all of our shared accounts and creating my own digital presence. I lost some money and resources on the short term (having to abandon accounts that contained money that was mostly mine) but it worked out in the long run. In the unlikely event that we separate, I have sole access to my digital presence and have no interest in hers. (Lawyers might decide differently, but that's always a risk in divorce.)
Maintaining separate identities has the added benefit that it minimizes the damage when one spouse has trouble controlling spending. When it was "our" money, it was my fault when we ran out. But when she only had direct access to her own money, she had to reluctantly learn some self control.
It's not very romantic, but one does what one must to keep a household functioning.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Domains, hosting, email, sensitive data backups and social media are all good examples but what about the really important stuff. How do you plan on splitting all that World of Warcraft gold?
If you can copy it (CDs, MP3s, data on cloud storage), each person gets a copy.
If it's locked down with DRM (iTunes) assign a value and divvy up along with physical assets.
If it's a photo from your time together, put it in an archive directory called "/poisoned" and never open that directory again.
Most email accts and social media are per individual, but if not, just let it go and start fresh.
If it's critical to your future (the domain for your business), cover it in the divorce decree.
First off I'm sorry for your loss. Divorce is never a good thing. As for your problem, I would look at two approaches:
1. Where possible you should copy data as both of you have equal right to the data as it currently stands. The only exception to this rule is personal data (like resumes) that you can divide up as normal.
2. For services, you need to identify the costs behind the services (monthly costs, plus startup costs to duplicate the service after the divorce). Divide these costs as you would all other items of wealth in the divorce. If you have a blog or site of awareness value, you need to offer the cutesy to your former partner by advertising their new site on your site for a specified period of time (probably 6 months).
Guy starts out with house, guy should end up with house. But watch the number of times she gets it.
Even if she gives up a career to raise the guy's children? If there is a specialization of roles in a contractual relationship, then one side may have an advantage if the contract is severed. This is why people sue for breach of contract. Well, marriage is also a contract.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
It depends on whether there was a marriage contract or not, and also when the assets (for example, the domain names) were acquired, as well as their purpose.
Domains that were acquired as a hobby and have no pecuniary value go with the person who is listed on the whois, unless that person was listed just for conveniences' sake - then they should go to the real owner.
Domains that have a financial value that were acquired before the marriage generally stay with the person who brought them into the marriage, same as other assets generally (YMMV, of course, depending on local laws, etc).
Domains that are worth $$$ that were acquired during the marriage in the course of business stay with the business. So, it's all about how each party is compensated for their contribution to the business. Does one party buy the other out, or just get a share of the business itself if it's a multi-million-buck operation (not likely)?
WARNING: Many places have special laws concerning copyrights staying with the original author even if the material was created during a marriage (it does not become part of the "partnership" assets)! The question rarely came up in previous decades, so most divorce lawyers are totally clueless about this.
However, I was the computer user in my first marriage, now I'm married to a 'Net-savvy woman.
We still have have our own email, iTunes, and various web accounts. However, we are starting to share online backups, etc.
As others have said:
1. Contact an attorney
2. Don't delete anything
3. Make backups of stuff you care about in case the other person doesn't follow rule #2.
Suggestions:
1. Bank accounts and other related items with actual assets - these will be divided according to your divorce agreement.
2. Non-shared personal accounts (e.g. email, Amazon, slashdot) should remain personal accounts.
3. Shared email accounts - the divorce agreement should indicate that these are to be deleted (unless it's part of a business).
4. Online backups - don't delete them, but at least disable backing up of their stuff, as it may contain private attorney-client communication - and don't look at it! I would propose that the person who originally signed up and paid for the account remain the owner, and give the other party a copy of common and shared data before removing the other party's data at an agreed time.
5. iTunes accounts - if they are associated with an individual's email, then these should remain with the individual. If it's a shared account, then it will have to assigned based on the divorce agreement. It may be that nobody gets any of it, and that it's all deleted.
6. Social Media - you will probably want to drop or remove the other party from your social media sites. At the very least, "banish" them (and any of their close friends) to a group that minimizes what they can see. These really shouldn't be shared accounts, and should belong to an individual. If you share a twitter account, I suggest deleting it unless it's used as part of a business (in which case it has value, and thus needs to be divided according to the divorce agreement).
7. Domains - these are usually individual, or business related. Something truly shared (e.g. smithfamily.com) should go with whoever bought it or offered to the other party if they intend to keep that name (e.g. Smith in this case). I know it sounds weird.
Virtually everything that is really important to you should be spelled out in the divorce agreement. Minor division of assets can be negotiated outside of that (e.g. she took the physical photos, I kept all the negatives).
All your data belong to us.
Just make sure you leave yourself full hidden access.
Use said electronic property to collect incriminating information about ${OTHER_PARTY}.
Then go back to court, take everything, including the dog you lost the last time around.
Or you could be civil about it, and share domain names, etc on an as needed basis.
Check your premises.
Literally everything. And start over.
It'll be fun. Well, more fun than fighting someone you can't live with any more, anyway.
Just my lame ass advice... I don't know your situation. But it's what I'd do.
One real advantage in many cases is health insurance. Many companies only allow spouses to be covered by the insurance plan. Though I think mine does allow registered domestic partners, but *only* if they are same sex...
The #1 cause of divorce is marriage.
The easiest way to end divorces is to end marriage.
The second-easiest way would be to make it a contract that is for a set term, renewable on mutual agreement - no agreement at renewal time, the contract (and marriage) simply expire. No messy divorce.
So here's the question - what "law" prevents two adults from making a marriage that auto-terminates if it isn't renewed every 5 years? It seems to me that a contract is a contract, and that this would be the way to go.
If children are involved, and I know this will be hard for your, make sure you get a copy of their pr0n too.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
You won't be needing it now that you can go to the bars and pick up some strange on the weekends again.
Compared to that, really, who cares about a crummy freemail account?
I've never understood the need to be right to the detriment of one's own life. I'd much rather be happy and wrong, then correct and bitter.
As more of our assets are moving to the digital domain, DRM protected, the bigger the problem will get.
When it happened to me, I burnt some DVD's and gave her a copy of everything that was hers and of everything that was "ours" (shared pictures, etc).
We didn't have a shared domain, but if you can't decide on an equitable solution, then just keep it as a shared domain. She gets the password with admin rights, you get the password with admin rights. Get your own separate domains and migrate things there. The only shared account we had was Netflix and we canceled that and each started our own account.
The dog was the hardest to "split" - we ended up with a shared custody arrangement that was actually quite convenient for both of us - we got part-time dog ownership and a built-in dogsitter for vacations. Worked out well for a few years until she moved away to another state. She moved to a nice house + yard, so she got the dog.
YOU SHOULD NOT HAVE SHARED THOSE THINGS IN THE FIRST PLACE!!! Otherwise, I hope you get over the divorce soon. It sucks but it gets better. Good luck.
http://www.acetonestudio.com
First wipe the hard drive with the data on it. Remove it from the computer. Pound on it with a sledge hammer. Tell her you can have all of it, here it is.
Next divorce question please.
Why isn't she the one to be saying "Thank you for the wonderful memories, and putting roof over my head, and feeding me, until I found someone else toe leach on"?
People like you are just week, pathetic delta males, who rationalize their loses the way you just did. Real men, Alphas, they win.
Bitch is NOT getting my 85 warlock! She won't treat him right!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
This being Slashdot, congrats on actually having had sex with a woman.
Everything else is of minor importance.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
The beauty of a digital divorce.
What are you talking about? So according to you the father should think of the kid as "his"? And yes, plenty of mothers give up careers to nurture their children in their early years. This is perfectly human. The hostility with which you address is quite bizarre. And yes, he does put the roof over their heads. But he also gets to develop in his career. While a mother staying at home does not. Her skills begin to dull and she doesn't progress as far as she would if she were to stay in the work force (hint: more experience = more pay). That's a specialization of roles. Are you really so dense as to suggest that there is no advantage to specialization of roles in any human association? Well, specialization gives greater combined benefit, but when the association is broken, those who took on the role which wouldn't pay end up at a disadvantage. It doesn't have to be the mother, but it usually is. While no one may be forcing her to give up the career, it is generally a mutual decision. Marriage is not to strangers hanging out. It's two people building a household.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
That's part of the deal with getting married. Historically, the reason to get married was so that the man would have a woman to sire some kids with, and who would be obligated to raise his kids. When that man then dumps the woman, she's left having to take care of the kids (because he doesn't have time for it with his career), and doesn't have the income he does, so the State tries to fix that by making him make payments to her to pay for both raising the kids and to compensate her for not being able to pursue a better career.
The lesson here is: be very careful who you marry, especially if you're a man with a good career. It's not quite so bad these days if you don't have any kids before you divorce, but if you do, it gets very messy and expensive. It's really better, for both the kids' sake and your own finances', to just stay together until the kids are out of the house.
Copy everything that can be copied. Compile a list of what remains that can't be split. Take turns choosing from the list.
Having done a merge/purge on our physical libraries, we had a somewhat different situation but our solution may be helpful. The departing spouse selected all the books he wanted to take with him, then the remaining spouse selected from those books the ones she really wanted to keep. The husband selected from that group the books he really really wanted. This give and take continued until there was only one book left in dispute, whereupon a replacement was purchased. The contested book was an expensive text on advanced topics in the underlying architecture of graphics systems.
Divorces can be ugly. I've seen friends destroy each others sanity and inflict long-term damage on their souls in order to "win" and "be right"
Behaving honourably is being right. I tell my kids, "Make sure you marry someone you think you could live through a divorce with." I married a good and decent woman, and it didn't work out (these things happen) and we've been happily divorced now for almost as long as we were married. Our kids have had two loving and happy homes instead of one unhappy one.
Even if you never want to see your ex again, remember it was your mistake in marrying them in the first place, and accept the consequences of that. It can take more love to get through a divorce unscathed (or at least less scathed) than through a marriage.
So yeah, focus on "winning" and "being right": behaving with honour, generosity and what love you can muster up. My lawyer hated me for being so non-combative, but that gave my ex nothing to fight over even if she had been so inclined.
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
Depending on your local law, you can likely use a common-law relationship to force companies to treat you as spouses when you desire. However, this whole area of law is complicated since companies may attempt to redefine common-law or spousal relationships to suit their own needs.
Give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day, but teach a man to phish...
I was able to get the home stereo system in exchange for the GuildBank and 20k Gold worth of Leveling Supplies
If you are in the US, this is a rhetorical question. She is going to take everything she wants, everything you want, and leave you with stuff neither of you wants.
they're not 'his' kids.. they're hers, see it's 'her body her right.'
I have had to deal with digital data collection of deceased loved ones, but I have not thought about having to divide digital files up between people. The collection was very difficult in its own right, and I imagine the dividing/duplicating could get quite tricky also because you are having to have multiple inputs from people into the problem. Damn. Good luck to you.
They are his and hers.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Hopefully the divorce is amicable. In that case, you and your divorcing spouse might have different interests, ideas, and conceptions about what's valuable, what you'd like, etc. Rather than trying to determine some objective way to split it then starting the discussion there, a mediator can help begin by finding out what she wants, having you explain what you want, and looking for a mutually acceptable outcome. Since you're divorcing, communication problems between you two are likely; a mediator is trained to help keep the discussion productive.
If the divorce is not amicable, anticipate that her interests might also include her trying to harm/punish/annoy/deprive you by disputing ownership on things she doesn't otherwise actually want. In that case, it makes sense to simply ensure that you have secured copies of all sensitive data, then write off everything you've listed as lost and start over.
Right, so he owes her his home and a living for the rest of her life. Nice entitlement complex - and you wonder why there are so many misogynists.
Really guys, if you want access to sex on a regular basis it is far better to pay per diem.
I've been divorced twice. In the 2nd divorce there was a domain that I had been using (since 1992!) and my soon to be ex was currently using for her business. I did not want to give it up, its age alone was important to me. We negotiated a deal where both of us used it as an email address and the homepage became a landing page leading to each of our new domains. Then of course, months after the divorce, I decided to sell her the complete domain. In that contract I have first right of refusal if she sells it and she must maintain an email forwarder for me and an actual email address for me mom. (Mom's always enter into it, and no way do I want my mom to have to change her email address!) So the marriage went south, digital assets are just assets. The only difference was a humorous one. When we were before the judge he read to her from the Divorce Agreement what would happen with the domain, the landing page and the email address. He then asked her, "Do you understand this?" She, of course, answered yes. He then said, "Good, because I sure don't!" Good luck with it! Posting anonymously...
If you have digital documents, like photos, then treat them like physical ones. How would divorce law handle a physical album of photos? Would it allow duplicates to be made? Then make copies for both parties. Same goes for emails. How would divorce law handle handwritten letters? Would it allow duplicates to be made? Then make copies for both parties.
Assets like accounts should be treated no differently. A joint email account should be treated the same as a joint P.O. Box. A joint PayPal account should be treated the same as a jointly owned safe (the super-heavy kind you have in your home).
Why people think the law should treat a digital item different from the analogous physical item is beyond my understanding. A digital document is the same as a physical document. Would a police officer be allowed to open a box and look at the documents inside it? It's no different if the documents are in someone's phone or computer. Is access to the document restricted by a password (operating system or file level)? It's no different than if the document were in a box (or filing cabinet, or desk drawer, etc.) that was secured with a lock. Sure, you may be able to take the hard drive out, put it in another computer and copy the files, but that's no different than taking a physical box apart by removing the screws. If the law doesn't allow it for the analogous physical version, then it doesn't allow it for the digital either.
Okay, enough tangential ranting. The point is, just treat it like a physical object. Jointly owned website? Same as a jointly owned brick and mortar storefront. You get the idea.
You are confusing a wife with a gf or mistress. As I have told my little brother, who wasn't sure if his live-in gf was a marriage material, "if she is already doing your laundry, she is not just a hot blond you are screwing, anymore."
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Just post all your private home videos to the appropriate websites and call it a day.
In my divorce, I kept the domain name that I was the primary user on, I gave my ex the information necessary to transfer her domain name to herself. Email, she set up her own account and told me to delete the one that was tied to the home ISP. The only online account we both used was for purchasing ebooks, I have not removed her access to that, although she says she hasn't used it for a while because her roommates have their own account and maintain local copies on their home servers she can easily access. Any documents she needs (such as copies of old tax returns) are forwarded to her on request. I'm presuming she copied anything she intended to keep off of the home backup servers as she has not felt the need to ask for any of those files (early drafts of some of her writing, story ideas, etc). Technically, anything she left in my house after a certain date was forfeit, but I don't have to be a prick about it, I'll accommodate reasonable requests, but I also won't feel bad if I'm cleaning up and dispose of something that had been hers and she later tries to ask for it.
Seriusly, try to figure out went wrong with your marriage and make a SERIOUS attempt to fix it. That's the easiest and best route in the long run. People do not understand the havoc a divorce will have on your life for years to come and how much it will cost you, both mentally and monetarily. One of the pieces of advice I give people is if they are contemplating divorce, take sixth months and go out of their way to be as nice to their spouse as possible. Listen politely to them, think of their needs first, do nice things for them unexpectedly, communicate to them about things and treat them with respect even when they aren't being respectiful. After awhile, the spouse will usually start responding in turn.
How many career women actually give up their career ? On the other hand, some women in their early 20s keep jobs that don't require a "career" and are easily restartable (bank clerk, waitress, teacher, realtor(tm), etc). They are, by their own admission, looking forward to quitting that work in order to take care of kids after getting married.
There are many instances where someone with no serious career prospects marries a rich celebrity and receives half in divorce after a few years, millions which she would never hope to accumulate in gainful employment in her "career". After all, unmarried women and men that kept their careers still exist and woulnd't be hard to see where they're at financially.
I understand the idea of making someone whole when things go sour, but this one-sidedness goes too far and does not help society, as it turns some women into the kind of golden ticket chaser that throws away her life for a chance at striking rich - possibly ruining a child life in the process, as having a child makes things even better in divorce.
depends on the situation. they're his if it benefits her in some way. if it benefits her for them to not be his, then they're not.
They share a Steam account & they're not sure how to divide up their TF2 items.
Who gets the Hat of Undeniable Wealth & Respect?
Who gets the gentlemanne's service medal?
Who gets all the unusual hats?
Think of the children! Think of the children!
IAADM (I Am A Divorce Mediator).
I worked once with a couple who had a major point of contention over 10 years of family photos stored on the family computer. While he had physical possession of the computer, he claimed the hard drive failed so there was no way to recover the data. She claimed there *must* be a box of negatives somewhere. He responded they had shot only digital for the last several years. I asked if anyone had thought to keep backups for this irreplaceable community property. (of course not). I offered to refer them to a data recovery firm. (can't afford it, too many legal bills already).
Long and the short was, they spent many more $$$ paying their lawyers to litigate who gets to keep the dead hard drive.
Please, please, please, don't expect the law or the courts to solve this problem for you. Sit down together like adults and work it out!
Isn't one of the basic tenants of GPL that software (and other digital assets) can be copied for no cost.
But I suppose in this case there are costs - even its only the lawyers.
Lots of people on here are giving answers that to a techie makes perfect sense, but in the real world do not.
Assuming you live in the US, are you in a Community Property state? In that case you might both own all of it. If not then other things come into play, but "who took the picture" and "who owns the copyright" and "in whose name is the domain registered" are stupid questions on their own.
You need to consult a matrimonial lawyer and not get advise from people who are giving "common sense" answers which are likely neither.
Being divorced myself, I can tell you that there's no perfect way to divide physical property, let alone digital and intellectual property. No matter what rules you set up front, there are gonna be exceptions. You're better off each just going through (alone) and making a list of the things you want, prioritized. Don't bother listing the stuff you don't want (or if it's digital or intellectual, list it somewhere without assigning a priority). Do not allow each other to see these lists, at least not until ALL items are divided.
Then, set a time you can meet for 2 hours. During this meeting, go through the house start by dividing the stuff that neither of you want, just to get it out of the way (in fact, you could just offer it all to your spouse so you don't have to move or deal with it). If an item that was on either list gets divvied up here, check it off the list, but do NOT look at each other's lists; it could foul up the way this works, maybe even subconsciously.
Next, play it like the opening bit of a game of Risk. Each of you goes every other turn, starting from the bottom of your respective priority lists, making a claim on the item. If you run across an item that you simply can't agree about, set it aside for later. DO NOT ARGUE ABOUT IT NOW. Just set it aside. Continue on, working your way to the top. As you get closer to the top, expect to agree less, as these items will probably be more desirable to both of you, but keep going, and again, do not fight yet. Agree at the outset to just set stuff that you don't agree on aside for later. Be grownups.
This technique will leave you with just 10 or 20 "biggies" that you set aside. It'll be a fair way to pare things down, and removes the hundreds or thousands of items that WILL obfuscate the entire process if not dealt with first. From here you can negotiate, and if necessary, fight over them. Be prepared to let things go in trade, or altogether, if necessary. It's just shit, at the end of the day. I let a LOT of things go and don't regret it for a second. I stuck to my guns on things I really did need in the aftermath (my computer, a tv, the guest bed, etc), but more importantly, I kept my sanity by letting a lot of it go instead of extending the divorce process to fight over a bunch of stuff. If you still can't work things out after 2 hours, take a break for a few days to think about it. Then tackle it fresh. Don't spend more than 2 hours negotiating though; after a while it's just a waste of time that causes even more resentment.
Especially if you don't get along, trust me, all of the combined stuff isn't worth as much it seems, while getting out quick and being able to work on your new (free!!!!!) life is worth much, much more that it seems.
Since the woman almost always walks away with the children, it's hard to see how the man is favored by the separation. And when the woman backs out she is obviously the one breaking the contract, since a wife's obligation is actually not just to raise children. In any case the general terms should be upfront. Every prospective groom with a house should know that he is giving it to his girlfriend so that she can quit the job she hates to fulfill her baby-making instinct and subsequently stop having sex with him.
My advice is to not marry another nerd who knows what any of those things are.
By all definitions, the past is in the past and starting over is the luxury to begin anew without dragging the past with you. Move on. Live again.
The same goes for anything and everything you share, including kids. The more tied together you are, the harder it is to split. Splitting becomes less likely, but of course a bigger disaster if it does happen.
Your choice... but if you're going to live like roommates then you might as well just stay roommates.
Even if she gives up a career to raise the guy's children?
Life's full of hard choices with no guarantee for any of them. By your logic the woman's financial state should be guaranteed simply by getting married.
I'm married. If I lived in those states, I'd have to create a holding company for the vehicle, with my wife and I each getting an ownership share. WTF! That is way too much work for something that should be simple and obvious.
If you are married, ideally you should not even be able to get title with just one name on it. At the very least it should require notarized consent of the party being left out.
Just think logically about who uses the domains now and who would use them in the future. If you both use familyname.com, unless the reason for the divorce is that she wants to marry your brother instead, she won't have use for that in the future, so that would go to you. The nice thing to do would be to link to her new site/email for awhile, but in that case I would say it is her responsibility to inform people of her new domain/email.
If you've got hernameandyourname.com, neither of you have use for that, so get separate domains and have links (hername is now at hernewdomain.com, yourname is now at yournewdomain.com) and then just let the domain expire. If you both use an ambiguous domain name, well you could either do things the hard way or the easy way. The easy way would be to again just get separate domains and link until the shared domain expires. The hard way would be you each pay the price of the domain to a third party, this third party manages the domain, and you each have a subdomain with separate accounts. The main page would be liked to both sub domains. You'd have to have some sort of contract that states that should either party choose to not renew the domain name, the other party can gain full control if they choose.
If you're talking about an online business domain, you're going to have to let lawyers divide that up just like any other business.
Hosting, just each go your own way with that. It's totally possible to even do the subdomain thing on separate hosting accounts.
Email, just set up an autoresponder; "Hername can now be emailed at hernewemail@gmail.com, Yourname can now be emailed at yourname@gmail.com."
Social media, just put links to both your new separate accounts.
Data backups, you each get a copy.
Oh that's easy, just accuse your spouse of domestic assault and then remove them from the bank accounts. Extra points if you still live at the marital residence, the automatic restraining order will keep them from ever being able to come back. That should be sufficient leverage to get a default judgement in your favor.
with ResierFS.
http://geekz.co.uk/lovesraymond/archive/so-i-married-a-kernel-programmer
If you are the soon-to-bachelor anyway. Because you ain't gonna have it anyway!
Well, there in lies the problem. What if you have been working on a new program that is potentially worth a fair amount when it's finished? Does he / she get a copy of your source to sell to the highest bidder? What if he / she purposefully takes a copy, as a personal fuck you, and hands it to your competitors? Copyright would argue that the creator of the code is the sole owner, and marriage laws can die in a fire. However, Intellectual Property appraisal with divorcees could be a significant issue: never underestimate the greed of an ex, or the lawyer she has found. There was this one case, popular years ago, where a company laid claim to the idea in a man's head; if he ever created it (after he left their employment), the company wanted a piece. I believe the courts sided with the company.
Remember, a divorce, despite what others might tell you, is about resources. It's about money. One person might be heart-broken, but the in a society of "no fault" divorces, your recourse may be limited here. In the event of a divorce, it's safe to assume your ex made up his / her mind months ago, and has already moved key assets out of the line of fire: it's an ambush. Quietly recording you, making sure he / she has footage of you yelling at him / her / the kids, just for an extra $$$$ / month...it's a setup, but one apparently allowed by our society. Sometimes it's seen as a 'good thing' -> your husband beats you or your wife is cheating on you, and you have evidence. Sometimes it's just two terrible people sniping at each other. All courtrooms are political theater...the truth is usually lost in it.
So, when dealing with an ex + a divorce, it's safe to assume he / she grew horns / bat wings / tail overnight (and that you're not fond of that sort of thing, internet fetishes being what they are these days...) and hired the Devil himself ( or the Anti-Christ, if the Dark Lord isn't available) to support him / her. In such cases, a Scorched Earth strategy is worth pursing (there is no such thing as a nice divorce, if he / she has already hired a lawyer, and trying to 'get everyone to come to their senses' usually ends up with you in the gutter, or some form of slavery for the rest of your existence). You can, of course, always try counseling, but it's in your best interest to plan for the worst case scenario: assume the worst, prepare for the end, and be happy / surprised if things do not turn down that unlit road.
So yes, go with the pre-nup. It's kind of like insurance: you don't want to ever use it, but if you need it, you need it right then and there; and the penalties for not having it can be severe (forced to pay alimony / child support in excess of your capabilities, jailed repeatedly for your failures, not able to see your kids because he / she engaged you in a loud argument (after having primed you the day before) and getting your "over-reaction" on tape (Exhibit 'A') / all of it, of course, culminating in your suicide). And yes, the judge / jury, at least in the US, is already biased to letting one gender have the kids over the other. The court records do not lie.
That marriage can be treated as the lottery these days...I don't think it's the gays who are destroying the institution of marriage...there might be a reason to the male populace's refusal to 'commit' these days, and it has nothing to do with being dishonorable...it's fear of the consequences of their actions, and how the law will all but kill a man to serve 'social justice.' Might as well be hanging your ass out the side window of a moving car, and into oncoming traffic.
I am John Hurt.
she gets the 1's and you get the 0's
Don't divide up the belongings, divide up the wife..... know what I mean?
Why don't you keep all the 1 and leave the 0 to your spouse? That should make it about half and half.
How have you dealt with dispersing of shared data, accounts and things online in such a situation?
In short, the answer is: I didn't give a damn
We spent almost 99% of our time arguing about the details of custody, and 90% of the remaining 1% discussing alimony. For almost everything else, I just gave a blanket statement, "take whatever you want". In my case home property wasn't an issue because neither of us owned real estate, and we were renting.
Of course, my wife took advantage of this situation by taking the best gadgets (my mom was absolutely miffed that she got the washing machine), but I DIDN'T GIVE A DAMN.
My marriage was a disaster, to be honest. I was just trying to save my son and my parents. Most divorces are ugly, and the usual pain points are:
1. Custody, custody, custody (god bless those couples who don't have children - and I'm an atheist)
2. Real estate property (I'm so blessed)
3. Alimony
When it came to household appliances, I later realized that she took away some really nice pots and pans - but it bothered me for all of 5 minutes.
Data? Well, she didn't even bother to think about it, and I keep coming across her photos, some documents, etc. I usually do a ctrl-A shift-Del in such cases.
She gets all the 1 bits; he gets all the 0 bits.
Yes, I said it...
Just another "Cubible(sic) Joe" 2 17 3061
Umm, no I am afraid in this situation there is an actual true dichotomy. They are either his kids or they aren't. And being his doesn't preclude them from also being hers.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Only fags and idiots divorce.
By your logic the woman's financial state should be guaranteed simply by getting married.
Marriage is, among other things, a financial partnership for most people. Yes, my wife should be guaranteed not to be dumped on the street with no assets or income so long as I am capable of preventing it, particularly if her needs include providing for my children.
I make pretty good money, much more than I was making 10 years ago when I married her. I have been able to pursue my career, working long and inconvenient hours partly because I have left much of the rest of life for her to look after. Despite the paycheck being in my name, it really is a join effort to make it come in and she deserves her cut.
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
Make a tar file of all the files and data (compress it if needed). Then just see how large the file is and use a file splitting program to split the file 1:1
What?
Whenever you have to hire a lawyer, no matter what the reason or the outcome, it's ugly. Even if you win, you lose. You pay in time, effort, hassle, obligation, and disgust.
(I'm the type of person that, upon being rear-ended and receiving a dented bumper, tells the guy "don't worry about it" and drives away. Yes, I know it's illegal, and I'm damn proud of it.)
The 1950's called and asked for their anti-feminist views back.
Seriously, it's troubling to observe how backwards our culture is becoming. Research clearly shows that "homemakers" (bah!) Only reluctantly leaves the society of free and grown up individuality.
Similar research has been conducted with slaves and wwii era jews; if you tell someone they are homemakers they will eventually know their place as one.
I would not raise my daughter, if I ever had one, to become somebody's housepet.
Defining Statistics and Social Research
Five years from now, would you rather be busy enjoying a new chapter in your life or sipping daily from a nasty glass of old & bitter resentments?
Depends. Would that nasty glass happen to contain a good amount of gin, too?
Historically, all that shit was true, but today it's only slightly likely to be true. Further, a woman can find a new man and still get paid, which is beyond wrong; if the reason she's getting paid for the divorce is that she is helpless and needs to be kept (which, let's face it, is what alimony is about) then when someone new is keeping her it should be definition release any other parties from the same obligation.
I agree with your lesson, though, for the most part. Unfortunately, the system is set up to force you to get legally married. If you don't then you do in fact lose certain rights, like being able to see your partner if they're in the hospital or incarcerated. Anywhere marriage is defined along Judeo-Christian lines, this ought to be unconstitutional, but welcome to the modern Christian Theocracy.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
While I commend your effort to turn a matter of divorce into a discourse on the importance of a good backup scheme, you lose points for lacking a basic understanding of good backup schemes.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
I do agree: if the woman has a low-paying career compared to the man and is getting alimony, that should cease as soon as she shacks up with a new boyfriend. What happens now is she shacks up with some other loser, but never gets married, so she can continue getting alimony, which is BS.
I think the whole institution of marriage should be revamped using standard contract law, so that two (or more) (legal adult) people can enter into whatever civil union they want, with the terms and conditions set out in their contract. The only limitations on these contracts should be laws requiring them to have certain issues addressed in them sufficiently (like how children will be handled, what happens in case the union is broken, etc.) If this were done properly, not only would people be able to have just about any kind of union they want (and they can go to a church and call it a "marriage" later if they want), whether it's hetero, homo, or poly, but divorces would be much easier on the court system too by making sure these contracts also include what we now call "pre-nuptial" clauses to make separations much less painful.
You think you have it hard? When I divorced my wife, we owned an ISLAND in second life!
An island in SL is hosted on a server. You can't own "mainland" lands (the world is divided into 64K sqm sections, each of which is hosted on one server) but you can buy plots off shore as long as they are non-contiguous with any land not owned by you. Up front I think it was $1250 to buy the damn thing and $200 / mo for maintenance fees.
And the worst part... its a nondivisible asset. Sure I could've claimed she owed me 32K sqm sections, but the whole point of us getting an island in the first place was that as a SL developer, I would have control over all the island settings as well as the land settings for the plots I was deeded... owning half an island is not half of owning an island, if that makes sense.
And the vendor wouldn't help, they don't care to get involved without a court order.
At the end of the day, and recognizing that as long as I stayed in SL that little bitch would keep causing drama for me, I just ended up giving up my half of the island. Never mind that I paid EVERY penny of the fees to buy and maintain the island...
And that's the story of how Merlin's Tower shuttered and left all of its many corporate clients in the lurch on services...
Emails to both of you, shared address book with common friends, pictures of your romantic getaway? Yes.
But that second life island you built for the last 2 years of your marriage while your lazy wife was asleep, played with the kids, or did some diddly house cleaning? No way!
not as long as she has legal sole proprietorship for the incubation period. To be clear, and filter out any would be 'this is how it is' arguments, I"m referring to the hypocrisy involved that causes a lot of the grief in divorce. The way the law is written now basically gives her the right to mow over his rights when it's convenient. in this situation, the kids are often used as weapons, either as proof of liability for financial compensation, or as emotional deadweight used in visitation/custody rights. my statement above is correct.
If this were a "Christian Theocracy," then "divorce" would not be lawful except in the case of adultery. I for one would prefer that over the mess we have now.
Nonaggression works!
That is my point. Your insistence that some arbitrary division of the data enhances or detracts from a solid backup scheme cuts to the core of your blatant lack of an understanding of the problem domain.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
A dance teacher with an existing example.nl built quite a succesful dance school after he met a young female dancer and moved to her region. After 3 years they divorced and she kept the location and he the domain name. As she had an equal role in the growth of the dance school and website she made her domain exampleproductions.nl and her dance school also Example Productions.
One year later she changed her name again - this time to something completely different - as search engines largely disregarded her site as its URL and content looked just like a fake imposter site, and because of its age and shorter domain name, the original example.nl website took all traffic away from her site.