But consider my recent situation: My mother entrusted her will and other important papers to her lawyer. After her death, I discovered the lawyer had died several years previously, and his widow sold the business, including my mother's documents, to another lawyer. After much investigation, I discovered the name of the second lawyer and managed to contact her. Once. For several months, I heard nothing and my calls were unanswered. Just as my own lawyer was about to begin a long and expensive process for settling the estate with a will gone missing (much harder than if there is no will at all!), I got a call out of the blue from the missing the second lawyer. She had taken sick and had been hospitalized in serious conditions for months. Within a few days she had located the documents and shipped them to me.

I also have an "attic" directory and I use it for files that don't need to be backed up in my regular backup schedule. It contains stuff that I've already archived or that wouldn't be badly missed if I lost it. I'm also considering a adding a place for stuff I know won't be of any use or interest after a few years. I do this already with my dead tree files of receipts and such. I keep things in the order filed and throw out some of the oldest when the file drawer gets full. I should be able to do this for similar computer based data by occasionally purging files with old dates.

The attack on VoIP systems started last week -- in the U.S. House of Representatives.