I stole that title. It was too good not to.
So, here’s a little story about this actor in Hong Kong, who decided to take in his computer to get fixed. Not such a big deal. Normally.
Except this dude had 1300 photos of himself on the hard drive. Naked photos. With naked women. Doing naked things. With him. And not just any naked women, but many of the most famous young starlets in Asian cinema and music. Photos he liked to show off to his friends.
Photos that were downloaded while his computer was being fixed—and then posted on the internet.
Dumb. So dumb. And oh, the scandal.
But here’s the deal—as a writer, I consider my stories as sensitive and personal as any sex tape or nudie photo. I don’t want anyone seeing my writing but me. I don’t even want folks sniffing at the titles. Which makes me totally, utterly, paranoid about getting my computer fixed. Only once have I taken my laptop in, and I sat there for three hours while the dude fussed with the hard drive. I can’t imagine ever mailing my computer into Apple for care—even if I deleted everything that mattered. I don’t trust those curious cats.
Best Buy had a scandal not long ago when its Geek Squad was caught stealing personal pictures and porn (always porn!) from computers left to be fixed. Of course, it was trap waiting to be sprung, but the point is, those guys had to go looking for that stuff in the first place. As in, they were exploring personal private files that should have remained private. And you can’t tell me they’re the only ones. Heck, even US Customs is getting in on the action.
Writing is a business. Stories are, in essence, trade secrets (a little melodramatic, but I can live with that). I looked around to see if anyone had good tips on how to protect your private files from busy little bees, but the most common advice was this: if there are files on your computer you don�t want anyone to see, then take them off your computer and keep them on external data storage devices.
Duh.
I don’t consider that much help. And maybe there is no such thing as a complete privacy when getting your computer fixed. But when your work is your computer, what do you do?