I have a question to all authors who write online. Who is protecting your content? If you can't answer that question with a simple, "I am", then chances are, the answer is "no one". It's amazing how much time someone would put into a blog, but never take the time to do a backup.
Whether you host your blog on a shared server or a managed blog host like blogger or wordpress, you are the one that needs to take responsibility to make sure your content isn't lost.
If you don't believe me, just look at some of the terms of service for blog sites. First, let's look at a section of Google's Terms of use:
LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
15.1 SUBJECT TO OVERALL PROVISION IN PARAGRAPH 14.1 ABOVE, YOU EXPRESSLY UNDERSTAND AND AGREE THAT GOOGLE, ITS SUBSIDIARIES AND AFFILIATES, AND ITS LICENSORS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR:
(A) ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL CONSEQUENTIAL OR EXEMPLARY DAMAGES WHICH MAY BE INCURRED BY YOU, HOWEVER CAUSED AND UNDER ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY.. THIS SHALL INCLUDE, BUT NOT BE LIMITED TO, ANY LOSS OF PROFIT (WHETHER INCURRED DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY), ANY LOSS OF GOODWILL OR BUSINESS REPUTATION, ANY LOSS OF DATA SUFFERED, COST OF PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES, OR OTHER INTANGIBLE LOSS;
(B) ANY LOSS OR DAMAGE WHICH MAY BE INCURRED BY YOU, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO LOSS OR DAMAGE AS A RESULT OF:
(I) ANY RELIANCE PLACED BY YOU ON THE COMPLETENESS, ACCURACY OR EXISTENCE OF ANY ADVERTISING, OR AS A RESULT OF ANY RELATIONSHIP OR TRANSACTION BETWEEN YOU AND ANY ADVERTISER OR SPONSOR WHOSE ADVERTISING APPEARS ON THE SERVICES;
(II) ANY CHANGES WHICH GOOGLE MAY MAKE TO THE SERVICES, OR FOR ANY PERMANENT OR TEMPORARY CESSATION IN THE PROVISION OF THE SERVICES (OR ANY FEATURES WITHIN THE SERVICES);
(III) THE DELETION OF, CORRUPTION OF, OR FAILURE TO STORE, ANY CONTENT AND OTHER COMMUNICATIONS DATA MAINTAINED OR TRANSMITTED BY OR THROUGH YOUR USE OF THE SERVICES;
(III) YOUR FAILURE TO PROVIDE GOOGLE WITH ACCURATE ACCOUNT INFORMATION;
(IV) YOUR FAILURE TO KEEP YOUR PASSWORD OR ACCOUNT DETAILS SECURE AND CONFIDENTIAL;
15.2 THE LIMITATIONS ON GOOGLE’S LIABILITY TO YOU IN PARAGRAPH 15.1 ABOVE SHALL APPLY WHETHER OR NOT GOOGLE HAS BEEN ADVISED OF OR SHOULD HAVE BEEN AWARE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF ANY SUCH LOSSES ARISING.
I highlighted the important part. If blogger goes down and your blog is accidentally deleted. Too bad. Google is under no legal authority to restore your content or replenish your loses do to the loss of your blog. Google is not alone. Wordpress offers no such warrenties either. From sections 11 and 12 of their terms of service.
Even if you did find a service that took responsibility that they would never lose your content, there's still alway id10t error. You may accidentally hit delete or your account gets hacked.
Disclaimer of Warranties. The Website is provided “as is”. Automattic and its suppliers and licensors hereby disclaim all warranties of any kind, express or implied, including, without limitation, the warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. Neither Automattic nor its suppliers and licensors, makes any warranty that the Website will be error free or that access thereto will be continuous or uninterrupted. If you’re actually reading this, here’s a treat. You understand that you download from, or otherwise obtain content or services through, the Website at your own discretion and risk.
Limitation of Liability. In no event will Automattic, or its suppliers or licensors, be liable with respect to any subject matter of this agreement under any contract, negligence, strict liability or other legal or equitable theory for: (i) any special, incidental or consequential damages; (ii) the cost of procurement or substitute products or services; (iii) for interuption of use or loss or corruption of data; or (iv) for any amounts that exceed the fees paid by you to Automattic under this agreement during the twelve (12) month period prior to the cause of action. Automattic shall have no liability for any failure or delay due to matters beyond their reasonable control. The foregoing shall not apply to the extent prohibited by applicable law.
So what should you do to protect your story? Backup, Backup, and Backup. For my blogger account, about once a month I like to download a copy of both my layout and also an export of all of my posts. I do something similiar for the blog fiction forum. Whenever I change or upgrade, I copy all of the files from my webserver to my desktop and then also export the a copy of the databases.
Granted, my content isn't 100% protected on my computer either. However, I find the chances that my computer's harddrive crashing at the same time as either Google's or my ISPs to be remote. So that's what I'm doing to protect my content. What are you doing? or should I say, what SHOULD you be doing?
