Early in my career, I worked as a tech writer. I knew the importance of making copies of my work, so I would faithfully make a backup each Friday as I wrapped up the workweek. One Friday was particularly hectic and in a rush to begin my weekend, I postponed making my backup, planning to do it first thing Monday morning. That was my first mistake.
My second error is that I left my computer running. Over the weekend, a power spike corrupted the files. As a result, I lost over 40 hours of carefully crafted writing; I needed to revert to my backup that was now over a week old.
Although dismayed at my shortsightedness, I immediately begin reconstructing the lost work. Fortunately, the second pass went much quicker than the first iteration; I was able to recompose everything by midday Wednesday. As a bonus, I think the second version was superior to the first.
Having experienced firsthand the importance of frequently backing up my work, I became fastidious in doing so; it is a practice that continues to this day. Not only do I make backups on a network drive, but I also use an automatic off-site backup service. And for writers who feel they can’t afford the $40 or so annual fee for such a service, they should at least sign up for a free Gmail account and email themselves a copy of their writing each time they finish working.
Some people still aren’t following this advice. Periodically, I hear of aspiring writers who lose their entire book when their hard drive crashes.
Please make sure I never hear your name mentioned in such a devastating story.
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Peter Lyle DeHaan is an author, blogger, and publisher with over 30 years of writing and publishing experience. Check out his book Successful Author FAQs for insider tips and insights.
