Jan 21

I came across a new site, http://1000memories.com, it's for sharing memories of loved ones. It's skewed towards becoming a new type of obituary, but it can be used by the living too. It's interesting and well designed. But it started me thinking...is there a digital afterlife?

 

I've been fortunate, I haven't lost many people in my life. But when it has happened the things they've left behind have been physical and tangible. A box of letters, old diaries, photos forgotten in a shoe box. Usually these things are discovered while cleaning out their dwelling or when looking for something specific. And inevitably your mind wanders and you're flooded with memories. When I've been with others it usually leads to a chat session where you discover all sorts of things you didn't know about the dearly departed.

 

But what about our digital afterlife?

However today, with photos online, and our lives pseudo shared with Friends and Followers on Facebook and Twitter - not to mention the myriad of other digital corners we hang out on...what will happen when we're gone? Sure, by sending off a death certificate you can usually gain access to bank accounts and other online profiles - but what about all those memories that will simply vanish when Flicker accounts are canceled or your Facebook account is deleted?  How will anyone stumble upon the little undiscovered gems of your life?

 

It's quite a different thing to have our lives bound up in bits and bytes. It's convenient for us today, but when we're gone, we'll be leaving even less behind than prior generations. I'm guilty of this...I take tons of photos and videos with my iPhone and save them to my computer...and back them up...and copy them to MobileMe and to Facebook. But I don't print out physical copies. Hard drives fail. Online services shut down or are closed after you die...and so your memories will be lost too?

 

It's an odd thing...and something I've never really considered before landing on 1000memories.com. And perhaps I'm a bit maudlin now that I have a daughter and I'm not getting any younger....there's a certain realization that, well, I'm over 40, so the first half of my life is behind me. Not that I'm going anywhere...or that I'm ill, but as I explored 1000memories.com I started to wonder what others would say about me...and what they'd find when I'm gone. Nothing incriminating I'm sure, but since my life recently is so much about being online and storing things digitally, there may be less of me to discover as time moves on after I've passed.

 

Sure, initially the great digital dump will offer up tons of memories...but in the next 40 years...the sheer amount of data I'll collect and create will be enormous....it'll be impractical to store (eternally) or to sift through it. It'll just fade away or fail or be deleted. Perhaps I'll have to start printing out more "archival quality" photos and stashing them away in boxes and drawers...so they'll be discovered little by little.