I haven’t lost files, but I’ve lost portions of papers I was writing, et cetera.
Horror story from a friend: In high school, we had an english paper due that was the biggest chunk of our grade by far. It was a “decade project”, where we had to research some facet of a specific decade and write roughly fifteen pages on it. MLA formatting and citations, tons of sources, bibliography/works cited, etc.
Naturally, the friend and I were up hacking away at the damned thing the night before it was due. Suddenly… something happens on his end. He spilled water, or his sister crashed into it, or something. The computer fizzes out, unresponsive.
Panic time. He’s good with computers, but has no luck. The drive is essentially fried. He calls in his father, asking him to help in the restoration effort.
The paper was gone, along with everything else. Except for one thing – his rather extensive porn collection. Which his father then found.