Zuckerberg: Now share your organs with Facebook friends Facebook is about "connecting and sharing" - especially now it can help you donate your internal organs, Mark Zuckerberg announced today. Describing it as "a life-saving initiative", the tousle-haired CEO officially announced a special button for people wanting to tell their friends that they are organ donors. "Became a organ …
Now, can you please enter your immunotype info on that as well.
It will make an excellent data set to feed into a "prediction" of when you are next to have an accident leading to a vegetative state. Just correlate it to the income of recipients expecting a "donation" and voila...
If you are not helpful enough to share your immunotype information, do not worry, we will compute it from your relatives which have shared it with us.
This just went waaaaaaay off the Orwell-Huxley-Dick dystopia scale. Somewhere into Ira Levin's Perfect Day territory...
I give it weeks before it emerges that FB defaults to "share all my organs" and starts using the picture of your face as one of the people that "likes" this idea, next to the ads of organ banks. I suspect FB will sell them the names for "shares" at quite a rate.
I think it's a VERY bad idea for an unmanaged, barely controlled entity to broadcast your apparent permission. I rather like a properly signed form, witnessed by a solicitor - there are plenty of people desperate enough to make harvesting a very profitable crime, and "oops" is not going to cut it if your FB page appears to say "yes" and they ripped a kidney out.
Not for me, thanks. My FB experiment is almost complete apart from a Data Subject Access request, and after that I'll do a Kaiser Sose..
Once you pop your clogs, your body belongs to your next-of-kin, to do with as they wish. So it's them that decide whether you get chopped up for spare parts, or for the dog's tea...
You didn't think all those pork pies grew on trees did you?
Well, dinner aside, your donor card has no legal validity. It's down to the doctors bothering to ask (as they don't enjoy that particular conversation with relatives), and your family saying yes.
There's been talk of new legislation to change this for years, but nothing ever seems to come of it. There seem to be 3 options on the table:
1. Insist all doctors have to ask, in any situation where organs would be usable.
2. Make it opt-out (Facebook style). You're up for the chop, unless your relatives object, or there's need of an autopsy/investigation.
3. Make the donor card legally binding, so a person's choice can override their relatives'.
All correct, except if you live in Wales (soon, anyway) as the Welsh Assembly is working on a Bill which will institute a presumed consent to organ donation, unless you explicitly opt out.
If you don't opt out it is by no means clear that your relatives will get a look-in.
If it comes to it I will opt out and let my next of kin know my actual wishes.
"If it comes to it I will opt out and let my next of kin know my actual wishes."
So one of your final acts on earth will be to deny somebody the use of something which is now completely useless to you?
Sounds like your next of kin will be heaving a big sigh of relief to be rid of that selfish bastard.
And if it's because of some vague "ooo, it's all a bit big brother" argument, unfortunately assumed consent is necessary because people tend to be too lazy to go to the little effort it takes to opt-in even if they don't care much either way. Those who do care enough about it for religious or squeamish reasons will be the ones willing to put in the effort to opt-out.
If you think the only objections are religious or 'squeamish' ones, you're not thinking very far. And also mis-reading what I said (my fault, maybe).
Quite simply, the choice would currently be in the hands of my Wife and children and I want it to remain that way, since they are the ones who would, in such an event, be seriously affected by the situation. If I have to opt-out in order to ensure that they are in control, that's what I'll do.
It doesn't mean I've said no at all, so 'selfish bastard' doesn't fit.
Just before you die, set up a web site with links to tv program torrent files (or probably just submit a comment about such a web site on twitter). The US will then very kindly extradite your organs free of charge to the US. For clarity, make sure that the web site (twitter post) specifically lays the blame for the heinous act at the door of the relevant organ. e.g. "I didn't want to post this but my kidneys made me do it...evil bastards that they are.." which could help the US to only extradite specific organs.
NOTE: This does NOT work in reverse. Claiming that you owned a web site with torrent links but 'my heart wasn't really in it..' is NOT a good idea. :-)
Whenever life gets you down, Mrs. Brown,
And things seem hard or tough,
And people are stupid, obnoxious, or daft,
And you feel that you've had quite enough...
(You know the rest!)
(Come on - you can't mention organ donation and livers without Eric's Guide to Astrophysics!)
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