Shoebox vs. Mailbox analogy (Score 1)

Recently one of my close friends died and I found it upsetting that her emails are impossible for her family to access, if only because she left no password behind. She wrote often and I kept correspondence between us. I keep some letters, but I understand that if I die, my family will discover them. I can censure what I decide to keep. Emails are different in that a password implies that only I can read those emails, so there may well be material which might be hurtful to others once I'm gone. Unless a family is left a password in a will, those emails should remain private, as they may not have been filtered in the same way as a collection of letters in a shoebox would have been. A family can never be sure if their loved ones would approve. However, I'm sure historians would sleep more comfortably at night if users were able to opt in to have their emails archived for a hundred years in the event of their death. On the other hand imagine the SPAM they have to contend with! My advice. Leave passwords in wills.