From the journal

Google has a quiet built-in feature that decides what happens to your account if you stop using it — a kind of dead man's switch for your digital life. Here's how to set it up, and the one thing it can't do.

A "dead man's switch" sounds like something from an action film, but the idea is simple and old: a system that acts on its own if the person in charge stops responding. Here's how that same idea can quietly deliver a message to the people you love after you're gone.

An "if I die" letter is the message you leave for the people who'll have to carry on without you — part goodbye, part instructions. Here's what to put in one, and how to make sure it actually reaches them.

"Last letter," "final letter," "last correspondence" — they all point to the same quiet idea: a message left to be read after you're gone. Here's what the term means, where it comes from, and what one looks like.

A goodbye letter to the people you love is the hardest one to start and the one they'll keep forever. Here's how to write one — to a partner, to your children, to a parent — without freezing at the first line.

You've thought about writing one for years. Here's how to stop drafting it in your head and put it on paper — without it sounding like a will, a eulogy, or a Hallmark card.

You've thought about it before. Maybe on a long drive, maybe watching your kids sleep. That letter you keep meaning to write — here's why today might be the day.

You can't send an email from beyond the grave — but you can write one now that arrives when it matters most. Here's how.

Staring at a blank page is the hardest part. But your last letter doesn't need to be long — it just needs to be yours.

Combining automation, emotion, and care — how technology can help us say what matters most.

In the digital age, our accounts and data live long after we do. Here's what happens when no one's there to log in.

The story behind the creation of Last Letter, born from a desire to help people say goodbye when they no longer can.