Confessions of a Digital Hoarder

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“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” – Chinese Proverb

There is a house in my neighborhood that I think of as the hoarder’s house. In the 20+ years I’ve walked by this house, it has been filling up with stacks of boxes which I can see through the dining room window that is near the sidewalk. And once the boxes hit the ceiling in that room, they started to spill out onto the front and back porches.

I think I’m fascinated by this house because what I’ve noticed in my computer consulting business, is that we are becoming digital hoarders.

When I started in the business, IT departments largely operated the nuts and bolts of company software on servers in one or more data centers. When a server failed, ran out of disk space or software had to be upgraded, there was a very real cost of having to buy and insert some new hardware and plan software upgrades. Because of that, companies made hard choices limiting the amount of data to be stored.

Now a great deal of the companies I work with have their operations to the cloud. Email, collaboration software and more are all run by a 3rd party who provides all the hardware and software management. All companies have to do is sign up for a plan and it usually comes with a large amount of data storage with an upgrade to more space just a click away.

The result is that companies don’t have limits that encourage people to throw away digital assets. Often times, deleted items go to a deleted folder that essentially becomes another filing system.

On the unseen side are the huge datacenters that house all the hardware and software. These datacenters often sit in locations where electricity is cheap and the data center can be cooled. For instance, there’s an enormous Microsoft datacenter that sits by the Columbia River in Washington State because of its proximity to cheap hydroelectric power and water. (To be fair, Microsoft has pledged to be water positive, replenishing more water than they consume by 2030 so I’m thankful for that corporate conscientiousness.)

This goes for the personal software we use as well. Companies that store our data run redundant data centers which we appreciate when we want to access a file, picture or song at any time of day or night. But these data centers require a massive amount of electricity, cooling systems and hardware. A 2015 article in The Atlantic quotes a 2013 Facebook sustainability report in which Facebook reported that its data centers used 986 million kilowatt hours of electricity that year. The article points out that is the same amount used by entire country of Burkina Faso in 2012.

Thinking of all the places I store data – iCloud, Amazon (books, movies and music), Shutterfly (photos), Dropbox, OneDrive, Google Docs, WordPress, Facebook and Instagram to name just a few, many are free or charge a small amount to increase storage limits. For a picture that I like, it sits on my phone, is backed up to iCloud, I might post it to Instagram, upload to one a site to make a calendar for my mom, another site to make my yearly photo album and use it in a WordPress post. That’s 6 copies of one picture and I’m rarely incentivized to remove any data and so I don’t. I’m a digital hoarder.

Yesterday when I walked by the hoarder house, I saw a young woman sitting on the front porch taking what looked like a much needed break in the sunshine. There was debris all around her that made me think she was cleaning out the house and sure enough, there were no boxes visible in the dining room window any longer. Many of us don’t want to leave that kind of physical job to our friends and family when we die – but we need to consider doing the clean up of our digital assets as well.

Do you delete digital files? I know Ashley just posted that she consolidated and removed old posts that weren’t getting any views – but does anyone else do that?

(featured photo from Pexels)

54 thoughts on “Confessions of a Digital Hoarder”

  1. As someone who works in IT, I appreciate this post on so many levels!

    I endeavor to delete what’s superfluous, but it’s a very imperfect endeavoring. About once a year, I go through a mass purging and tell myself, “This is the year I’ll keep it going!” before almost immediately devolving into my more customary ongoing inattention to the matter.

    Progress not perfection? 😉

    Liked by 4 people

    1. Isn’t it fascinating how IT has changed? Remember when people had servers under their desks? 🙂

      Good for you for doing a yearly purge. I need to do that. But you are right – progress counts and we just need to keep doing it!

      Liked by 1 person

  2. I believe I live next door to a hoarder house. Lovely woman- retired kindergarten teacher who inherited her grandparents house, but the stacks of stuff that never move seen as I walk by her windows. It’s also interesting that she never has anyone over to her house…. As to digital stuff- I delete and toss all the time- although this was a good reminder to go through all my old WP photos. Thanks Wynne!

    Liked by 3 people

    1. Isn’t it interesting? And I would think that not having people over would be common if you are hoarding – too hard to get around?

      I’m so inspired that you delete and toss all the time. I need to build in that practice!

      Liked by 1 person

  3. I’ve always been pretty minimalistic, and it’s something I probably picked up from my dad. I get pretty easily overwhelmed by digital clutter, so I pretty regularly go through and weed out things that are no longer useful.

    Liked by 4 people

  5. I’m guilty of digital hoarding, although I have a lot of stuff stored on external drives so it’s not in the cloud. I probably need to get more diligent about the stuff I have in the cloud.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. It’s such a hard problem. All these companies give us storage at no or low cost so we aren’t pushed to be diligent as you say it so well. It’ll be interesting to see if things change the pricing as our world’s storage costs grow!

      Liked by 1 person

      1. That’s a good point. I’ve noticed that the amount of free storage space on Dropbox for instance has diminished drastically, and they push to purchase more space. So right now it’s about profits and not the environment.

        Liked by 1 person

      2. Oh, that’s so interesting. Not surprising that corporations are focused on profits but it means that we need to do the part of pushing them to care about the environment, I suppose!

        Like

  7. I have a bit of a digital hoarder frame of mind. I have loads of ancient emails and even a floppy disk or two! I’m working on minimizing, but as a memoir writer I tend to hold onto the past.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Whoa – a floppy disk! Yes, I understand the need to hang on to it all – but I find it’s harder to find what I need as my storage grows. Somewhere in here is an elegant solution, right? 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

  8. I am very guilty of this! I have one email account that I keep tidy and in which I delete unneeded messages. I don’t ever delete pictures and am glad they are “safe” in my backup and various social medias. And with regard to the blog I have been running since 2016, I have never deleted an old post (as I find that once in awhile, somebody goes back and starts my story from the beginning). How interesting though the luxury of being able to hoard in digital space versus how cluttered things would get in our physical space! I have a lot of empathy for hoarders. In some ways, saving everything helps them to feel a sense of safety and permanence in a world that is impermanent and constantly changing. Great share, Wynne! Have a beautiful weekend 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

    1. What an interesting perspective you provide about hoarders. I think it’s great to have a lot of empathy for them. And your point about different email boxes – yes, I do that too! Oh geez! 🙂 Hope you have a great weekend too!

      Liked by 1 person

    1. I hear you on that. I either have to delete it right away (as in choosing between the version I like) or when I look back, it’s too hard to delete a photo! But good for you on the other stuff!

      Liked by 1 person

  10. I try to declutter my files at least annually, and if I get a message from a provider that my cloud storage is almost full and they’d be more than happy to “rent” me more space, I quickly purge. I’ll be honest, as a retired IT person going back a very long way, I don’t like trusting all my files, and possibly communications, to a cloud service. You’re right about the electricity and impact on climate change, and anything could happen to it, unintentional or otherwise. I do purges and I back up on memory sticks.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. This makes me think of your February challenge, Jane. I bet it wouldn’t be hard to purge 100’s of digital items!

      Your perspective as an IT person is so interesting! Thanks for reading and chiming in.

      Liked by 1 person

      1. Lol. I did actually consider counting deleting files for my Feb decluttering challenge, but I figured counting old spoons and expired medications that I threw out was enough cheating! 😏

        Liked by 1 person

    2. I found a corollary to Murphy’s Laws: the way to desperately need something is to delete it, an within a month, it’ll turn out to be the answer to one of the world’s most pressing questions 😀

      Liked by 1 person

      2. Ha, ha, EW! Murphy’s Law must be why Microsoft puts things you delete in the recycle bin for 93 days after you delete. They don’t want to be responsible when it turns out to be the answer to the world’s most pressing question. 🙂

        Like

  13. Interesting post. I have to say I’m the opposite. I obsessively declutter at home and at work. I block off some time Friday afternoons to declutter. It’s very therapeutic!

    But yes, I can definitely see digital hoarding becoming a really issue in the years to come.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Oh wow – blocking time to declutter. That’s brilliant, Ab! I know I find it therapeutic to do the physical decluttering so I need to schedule some digital decluttering as well. Great idea! Have a wonderful weekend!

      Liked by 1 person

  14. I’ve been doing more digital declutters lately – it goes so much more quickly than physical declutters! It is so much easier to accumulate digital clutter though..I can imagine that the scope of the problem is huge for large corporations.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. What a great point – that digital declutters are faster but data is easier to accumulate. I know that’s true for me because I don’t see it! Thanks for adding this to the conversation!

      Like

  15. I am glad someone was cleaning out the hoarder home that is a tough job for a caregiver. Regarding digital files. I have learned with Microsoft, you can set  photos, documents and music as “memory of the day”  I have set them up, and review everything that pops up. some time I resave (giving documents an appropriate title and date) other times I hit delete. Apple Music also has a feature that shows you how many times you have or have not listened to a song. I will load the unlisten song options and listen to them at random times, and delete the ones I have no interest in. 

    Liked by 1 person

    1. What a wonderful method of having what you haven’t listened to resurface for review — and photos, documents, and music. Thank you so much for adding these ideas to the conversation and making me think I should do the same. Fantastic!

      Liked by 1 person

  16. I have read about people who keep hoarding and it is difficult for me to imagine what their homes must be like. I keep disposing things which I don’t need. I give it to someone who does. Even my saris and other dresses. Just recently I gave four saris and other dresses 5o Vimala. She kept two for herself and distributed the rest. And I do the same with photos and other files in my gadgets. I note that I don’t really see them after some time. I feel as if a burden has been removed 😊 If they are permanently deleted are they really deleted or are they somewhere adding to the trash? Thank you for this post.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Wonderful comment – a burden has been removed indeed! And I love your practice of giving it to someone who does. That seems like the best thing we can do to make it so we have to consume less new stuff! Beautiful!

      Liked by 1 person

  17. I was thinking about this yesterday as picture after pictre I dislike showed up on my computer’s screen saver. And like you, there are multiple copies of most in various locales. Save photo albums. We don’t do that much anymore.

    Liked by 1 person

  18. I do delete as many digital files as possible. And I also get rid of stuff that I don’t use. A friend of mine says that he would like to have only 23 kilos of things, that is the weight allowed for one luggage on a plane. This is what I aim for physical things and proportionally for digital files (though I don’t have a clue of what amount could be). I must admit that I am still far from that but the intention is there.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. What a beautiful way to state your intention and start from there, Cristiana. I think that’s a great practice and good for you for starting with deleting as many digital files as possible!

      Liked by 1 person

  19. I’ve never considered deleting old posts. I guess because they’re sort of a journal of stories of my kids. I’m relieved to know that house is getting cleaned. I can’t help but wonder about the mental state of hoarders. What makes them do that? Fascinating but sad.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. I totally agree – fascinating but sad. Someone suggested that it was a sense of security. Maybe so.

      And yes – I agree, it’s a journal of stories about my kids. Yes, Betsy, you nailed it!

      Liked by 1 person

  21. Great topic here Wynne, I 100% agree with you we live in a digital age where data is now stored in different platforms and that data is key because it is a communication unit for other softwares such as emails and social media. I personally don’t delete data that is important to me😫

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