October 5, 2009

Tom likes to kid me about my memory. He tells me I have the memory of an elephant (I’m just glad he didn’t say feet). I still remember what he wore on our first date (that shirt is long gone – trust me), our wedding anniversary date, how long to broil the salmon and my grandma’s gumbo recipe. But, as hard as I try, I have trouble remembering Tom’s cell phone number. Why? Because it’s on a programmed speed dial on my Blackberry^®. My other important phone numbers are speed dialed into the Blackberry and into my office phone, plus I have a directory I can scroll through to dial the numbers I want without needing to memorize them.

The email addresses in my Outlook auto-complete so all I have to do is type the name of the person I want to email. Addresses are in the address book so all I do is click and print an envelope. I really have to remember very little (Outlook does it for me).

In short, like probably every other Certified Legal Nurse Consultant, I’ve developed a dependency on external memory devices. The point here is that digital memory, absent a system crash or power failure, is forever. Flesh and blood memory has a time limit. If someone has ever told you “use it or lose it” they’re 100% correct. Sometimes that can be a good thing.

As a legal nurse consulting business owner, I think digital memory is a good thing. I’ve got copies of every report I’ve ever written for attorney-clients stashed somewhere on a server at the office. They’re in Word or WordPerfect, but all are there for my reference. Even those that were typed on a typewriter (Yes, Virginia there really were typewriters and some weren’t even electric!) can be scanned into a Word document using optical character recognition (OCR) – thanks Tom – and then make it into searchable PDF files for later retrieval if I choose. Photographs from my CLNC^® Certification Seminars and the NACLNC^® Annual Conferences are stored where I can easily access them whenever I want. Plus the photo frame in my office keeps my memories fresh. If I were one to watch TV, I could even TiVo my shows or burn them to a DVR to watch later. Instead, Tom and I watch movies on Blu-Ray DVD when we can’t catch them in a theatre.

In short, electronic and optical, external memory has made our lives easier. But at the same time, I need to ask whether permanent memory is such a good thing. I’ve already blogged about the discoverability of social media and the dangers of photos posted on the Internet and comments made in email. We’re all aware that permanent memory lives forever.

But let’s say you need to post something on the Internet and don’t want to worry about remembering to take it down, what to do? Tom introduced me to a website called Drop.io. On this website, I can put up photos from a vacation or gathering of friends, documents for an attorney-client, demonstrative evidence draft or even a video demo. I simply create the “drop,” name it and email a link to the people I want to access it. If I need to limit access and keep someone from accidentally finding my site, I can email a link with a guest password. What I like is that you can also set an expiration date for the “drop.” This not only creates urgency (such as, “I need your comments on this document by Friday.”) but takes away the need to go back and find the files to delete them later. You can even customize your “drop” page with a few short clicks. I found it very intuitive to use. You get 100MB of storage per drop and you can upgrade to the paid version if you need more space.

Take a look at my demo site at http://drop.io/VickiesDemo, you’ll need to use the password “trydropio.” I’ve uploaded a video and some photos from the CLNC^® 6-Day Certification Seminar in Philadelphia. Bookmark the drop.io homepage. You’ll find plenty of use for this site in your legal nurse consulting business. Just be sure to visit the demo before October 7. I’ve set it to expire on that date. (My original drop has expired but you can still view the content here at http://drop.io/VickiesDemo2.)

Now, if only we could select some memories to delete the same way we’d all be happy.

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