It’s an age old topic; one that has been debated time and time again through the centuries. Wars have been fought over it, lives lost because of it, and today is absolutely no different. You got it folks, I’m talking about death and what happens after it. Don’t worry, don’t worry, I’m not about to preach my personal beliefs on the afterlife, but I am calling your attention to a cyber take on the topic: What happens to your cyber presence after you die? I’m glad you asked.
There are countless sites like Great Goodbye and Legacy Locker that allow you to financially protect yourself and your family and bid a final farewell electronically. In the unfortunate event of a premature death, this feature might be the closure family members need but this TED talks video I came across takes life after death to another level.
The speaker, Adam Ostrow, discusses a well known blogger publishing a final blog post after his death thereby transforming his blog from an active site into an archive. I think that’s a pretty cool concept and has the potential to tie up a lot of loose ends for a lot of people. He then goes on though, to an entirely different level I hadn’t even fathomed. From tweets and pics, to blog posts and Facebook updates, we create a ridiculous amount of content daily. In existence now are services that get to know us by way of the content we create. They get to know us so well in fact, that they can actually predict future posts, update etc we might create. Imagine the possibilities. Ostrow goes on to reference a moment during the 2008 presidential election where CNN beamed a live hologram of Will Iam into the studio and mentions also MIT’s robot research where scientists are forever improving a robot’s ability to act like a human. Think about this for a moment: what if technology allowed us to create a hologram of a loved one complete with a personality and voice based upon the content he or she created throughout his or lifetime. In theory, we could recreate a loved one after his or her death and essentially ‘live’ with that recreation.
The technology to support this strange, intriguing and morbid concept is indeed a ways off but I’m not gonna lie, my mind is blown by the concept. Let us know what you think on our Facebook Page.