Funeral Technology: Mourning in a Digital Age
Technology has left no industry unscathed. It’s warped and transformed how we live our lives and do our jobs. It comes as no surprise that technology has slowly begun to reform the funeral services industry, and has even had an affect on how people confront death. Check out how these technologies are paving the way for our digital afterlife.
RosettaStone
“A RosettaStone is a small stone artifact (Disk or tablet) that leverages advanced mobile device technologies for the purpose of long-term preservation of historical and genealogical information associated with outdoor monuments, statuary and landmarks. When added to new or existing monuments, the result is a technologically enhanced memorial that can allow current and future site visitors to read the associated story from a mobile device. Each story is authored on-line by the buyer or the family.”
History Pin
History Pin (working in collaboration with Google) is one of our favorite websites that allows people to upload older personal photos to History Pin’s library. These photos can be viewed in Google’s street view exactly where the photo was taken. The website makes it easy to view the old and the new!
Billion Graves
Billion Gaves, a phone application, is now available on the iPhone and Android. It allows people to upload photos of gravestones and transcribe their etchings. It’s a way to preserve history with just a snap of a photo!
Funeral Advice
“Funeral Advice is a free application, written by experienced funeral providers. Whether at the funeral home or with your family, Funeral Advice answers questions not often asked about funerals, cemeteries, burial, cremation and losing a loved one.”
E-TOMB
Similar to Rosetta Stone, the E-TOMB can store links to blogs, social networking sites, etc. When visitors come to the burial site, they can visit these sites via Bluetooth. E-TOMB is designed for the information age. Accessing photos, writings, and videos of a loved one can “provide a more emotional form of tomb.”