5 resolutions for a better digital life

It’s the time of year when we make promises for the new year that are routinely broken before that year is a week old. And for this reason, far too many of us simply resolve to never make another resolution. (Because, after all, that’s an easy one to keep.)

But when it comes to the health of your computer and Internet life, it pays to make a greater effort. With that in mind, I’ve resolved to end 2013 with a list of resolutions (and the consequences of not living up to them) to be carried out in 2014.

I will back up my data

The two things that people lie about most are the frequency of their flossing (fewer than 30 percent of people in the U.S. do it routinely) and the integrity of their data backup. “Oh sure,” they claim, “I have a backup.” But dig deeper and ask “And so you’d have no problem if I used this powerful magnet to wipe your hard drive or tapped your iPhone’s Erase All Content and Settings button?” and the squirming begins.

Your dental hygiene is between you and the person standing within four feet of your cake hole but I take this backup business seriously. I can’t tell you the number of times I receive questions about how to recover this or that bit of data only to learn that such data hasn’t been backed up since the last government shutdown.

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