Since some of us got baptized into the social media frenzy, one thing that has been an undeniable feature of the various platforms we get glued to is the status update and photos. Social media is a place where most people hide themselves from the realities of life; we post funny, serious, awkward, silly, insightful messages and also show our smiles mostly to the world but what will happen to all the post and photos when we eventually die?
Some few years back I became an acquaintance to a lovely woman on Facebook, the friendship grew organically and we even planned on meeting each other at point. She told me about her health condition and that she was going to seek medication in the U.S but it saddened me that I never heard from her until I saw her birthday notification on my phone so as usual I sent her a birthday wish only for me to be informed that my friend is dead the next day and that she had actually been dead three months ago.
I believe I am not the only one faced with this shock of a news but that really got me thinking about my digital life. We all now have two major lives; the physically realistic one’ in which we try to find purpose for life and the other one (the digital life) where we choose to blow our horns, network and sometimes show off. Can you imagine the thousands of photos and posts by the dead lurking on social media and oh... the shocks some family and friends will face when they inherit our digital life?
Thinking out loud, relatives would no longer only consider what to do with our books, shirts, vases and jewelries, but they would have to think about our online social remnants such as digital photos, videos, status updates and emails.
They will also have to think about how they will mourn us on social media too. Ghost reminders online are enabling new types of mourning practices too; they are consequently presenting a number of challenges to the traditional role of custodianship as these remnants of digital life cannot be placed within rooms or on shelves in quite the same way as a piece of jewelry.
Today’s Facebook age, a new form of mourning has emerged in which people are turning to the web to post their sympathy messages, store their memories or express grief, the line between life and death has become a much more public event, with the last status updates and final tweets of victims showcased by friends and family.
The changing responses to death and the digital legacy we leave behind will pose all sorts of new questions and challenges. So what social life legacy are you leaving behind and have you thought about who will inherit them when death comes knocking?
