Writer Seth Fiegerman mused that Facebook keeps the window to our past opened, by keeping us linked with relationships and people from long gone experiences and identities.
Still connected to that random guy you met once in a hostel in 2004? High school friends you haven’t spoken to, face to face, in years? This, he contends, creates a generation that never really loses touch, or ever really lets go. And he seems correct; beyond “keeping in touch” with people from our past, users also stay connected virtually with those who have passed. As of now, Facebook users can comment on a deceased loved ones page or revisit old memories, and like we discussed in our previous article Death in the Age of Social Media, many do so. But the next step to keeping in touch with the deceased seems to have arrived--with the deceased answering back. The soon to be released site Eterni.me creates an avatar of a loved one who has passed by using algorithms and personal data to create a virtual version of the deceased, one that knows what they knew, responds how they would have responded, and mimics their personality. The site promises the ability to ask deceased loved ones for information, reminisce about personal stories, and even dispense advice. Eterni.me hopes it will be like a "Skype chat from the past."
It sounds strange, and maybe a little gimmicky, but it does shine a light on how our cultural desire to always be connected and to not let go is translating not just to how we experience life, but also how we interact and experience death and a digital afterlife. With sites like Eterni.me, AfterLife, AfterNote, DeadMansSwitch and more, we are looking to not only come to terms with our own mortality, but to build a lasting digital legacy and presence after death by creating a virtual surrogate. Through this we become something of immortal, leaving our identity behind in a way more lasting than the stories and remembrances of those we leave behind. It makes us wonder, however, if seeking a digital surrogate after our passing is not too much different from using a digital surrogate to live our lives now. We often hear that social and digital interactions are replacing real, meaningful ones; in some ways, we are letting the digital persona of ourselves, our posturing, poking and posting, take the place of genuine human interaction.* The fact we can replace those we have lost with profiles and algorithms seems strangely validating that perhaps we are less people and more profile in the digital age. And if you’re a fan of Her, perhaps also calls into question the quality and type of the relationships that will be made between the digital self we leave, and the living friends and family we leave with them. All sorts of fun, hypothetical, ethical and science fiction thoughts out of this very real trend; death with social media does not mean disappearance, but an increasingly complex digital afterlife.
*And if our legacy is made from our social media life, there's a good chance it will be our idealized self.
ARTICLE: Mashable & PSFK
SITES:
http://www.psfk.com/2014/02/eterni-me-virtual-afterlife-avatar.html#!upYl3
http://mashable.com/2014/02/02/facebook-growing-up/
