At Aspiration, we’ve been trying to smooth some of the rough edges that we have with regard to ensuring that we have our data secure. This both means having a reliable and trusted service into which we put that data but also being responsible for backing it up ourselves, because it takes one server meltdown to take a “reliable” service to a “you lost all of my data and are now on my blacklist for life” service. In honor of these thoughts of terrifying data apocalypse, (as well as a great resource tweet from @pearlbear) here are a few resources for getting a more secure hold on your data:

• Backing Up Your Google Universe
  The people behind The Data Liberation Front say that they “intend for this site to be a central location for information on how to move your data in and out of Google products” and they definitely hit the nail on the head. Every Google product from Gmail to Docs to Orkut is covered with ways in which to export your data out.
• Exporting Your Tweets
  Twitter, with all of its popularity and good intentions, still goes down ALL the time (as evidenced by this Fail Whale Fan Club). Needless to say, backing up Twitter should be something of a priority if you care about what you tweet or who is following you. Tweetake is a simple, easy, web-based tool that spits out a .csv file of your followers, their websites, their names, their screen names, their descriptions, their last tweet, ALL of your tweets (get ready), direct messages, etc. It’s all in the simplicity. Tweetake does what it says it will do and gives you that magical standard of data export, the csv file. PS, did you know that Twitter only archives your tweets up to 3,200?
• Smuggling Your Data Out of Facebook
  When looking to back up Facebook, there are a couple options that have popped up to help you out. SocialSafe is an Adobe Air application that allows you to download data from your Facebook account, however, at present, it costs $2.99. Kind of lame. Another option is the Firefox Addon called ArchiveFacebook. This extension to the Firefox web browser downloads a user’s Facebook data as well. This add-on is still experimental but its development into a fully fledged add-on will be a welcome addition because while Twitter backup tools abound, Facebook options are sorely lacking.

These are only a few of the tools that are out there for getting the data from your social media presence back in your hands.

What tools are missing from the list?