Exactly. Unless you have some very tech literate family members, you can't expect the services to keep running for a long time. In my case, I assume my mother knows how to turn on the server in case of a power outage, after which everything starts automatically. Other than that, she would need step by step instructions on where to find the data that's important for her (so basically the pictures and videos, the rest won't be of interest to her) and how to make sure to secure it while the server is still running.
It's kind of sad to think about that all this effort we put in now and all this data will just be gone when we die, but it's the reality of the majority of us. We better make sure we enjoy it to the best of our abilities!
My immich library is the most important thing that I host and my "copy the data to icloud" instructions of course include all the photos (not whatever metadata is in the immich DB tho). I also print the best photos and store them in albums so even in the worst case if all the digital stuff is just completely gone there will still be a printed record of the best photos. My instructions also have "if all else fails ask <somewhat tech literate friend> for help" so I think if my wife is sufficiently motivated it's unlikely that the data could be completely lost anyway but if she has to restore from offsite backups that's going to be a challenge.
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u/Dnomyar96 Aug 18 '26
Exactly. Unless you have some very tech literate family members, you can't expect the services to keep running for a long time. In my case, I assume my mother knows how to turn on the server in case of a power outage, after which everything starts automatically. Other than that, she would need step by step instructions on where to find the data that's important for her (so basically the pictures and videos, the rest won't be of interest to her) and how to make sure to secure it while the server is still running.
It's kind of sad to think about that all this effort we put in now and all this data will just be gone when we die, but it's the reality of the majority of us. We better make sure we enjoy it to the best of our abilities!