Facebook is an ever-growing digital cemetery

Imagine a situation: a person lives, and suddenly his beloved aunt dies. The day after her death, he finds an inscription on the flyleaf of the book she gave him: "I know how important words are for you, so here's my gift to you. With love, Aunt Jackie. "

Dead or alive on Facebook?

Naturally, it touched the person to the depths of his soul, and he opened his laptop to find his aunt's page in the social network Facebook. After all, if you read that she wrote, that they wrote to her, what records were kept on her wall, it would be useful for him. This could have a calming effect. The last post on the wall was a video from a nephew, in which two elephants play in the water (Aunt was very fond of elephants). Below you can find farewell messages from her former students, as well as an obituary posted by her half-sister. Looking above, the man found the following: Aunt Jackie studied English at Frostburg State University, was head of the English department at Baltimore schools, and also lives in Baltimore, Maryland. "Lives?" Thought the man. She no longer lives, she died. But if you were on her Facebook page and not scrolled to her obituary, you do not know about it. She will be in some ways alive, she will be here on Facebook.

Death of the body and life in the social network

Naturally, this makes one remember the very day when the whole family is standing around an aunt connected by wires to cars and looks like she is dying ... And it's very strange to be a witness of this phenomenon - in a moment the person you love is next to You, you speak with him, hold his hand, thank him for being close. And the next moment it's gone ... One device showed a heart rate - and it turned off as a result. The same thing happened with another device - an incredible "computer" that kept all thoughts, memories, connections. And while a person is not able to continue living with the help of high technologies after the death of a body, high technologies allow him to live as memories in the network. But how does the presence of dead people's accounts on social networks change how people die? And what does this matter for those people who remain after their loved ones die?

Digital Cemetery

The number of dead people on "Facebook" is growing very quickly. By 2012, that is, only eight years after the launch of the platform, 30 million users of the social network were already dead. And this indicator has grown significantly to the present moment. Some sources claim that about eight thousand Facebook users die daily. There will come a time when there will be more dead people in this social network than the living ones. "Facebook" is a constantly growing digital cemetery.

Ability to read posts of the departed

Many profiles on Facebook are marked by close people of the deceased, getting the status of memoralised, - on the profile appears a record that this person is remembered, loved and mourned for him, and he ceases to appear in various types of search. For example, you will not be offered it as a profile of "a person you can know," and you will not receive a reminder of his birthday. However, not all users of the social network who died have received the status of memoralised.

Digital Identity

The person in question in this article recently died a former classmate, Kerry. He committed suicide several years ago, but his wife and friends periodically write messages from his profile, place posts and so on. Neither Kerry's profile nor Jackie's aunt's profile got the status of memoralised. Thus, the deaths of these people have no significance for the social network, as for those users who accidentally find themselves on their pages. Their "digital personality" continues to exist.

Autobiography then and now

The media showed people "the power of the moment" - they allowed to monitor awards, television shows, football matches and other similar situations live, here and now. But now it's time to think about what will happen after all this - about the legacy. Previously, outstanding people left behind a legacy, since after them remained written evidence of their deeds, or later figures themselves investigated what their predecessors did. However, high technologies change the rules of the game. Now, many people spend about 12 hours a week, according to recent research, writing their autobiography on the social network.

Heritage

Your great-grandchildren will be able to learn about you by studying your page on the social network. Assuming that social networks do not disappear and remain in such a format, the descendants will be able not only to learn about the biggest events in your life, as happens in these autobiographies. They will also be able to learn the small, very insignificant details of your daily life - pictures that made you laugh, posts that you shared with your friends, restaurants in which you liked to dine, jokes that cheered you up. And, of course, they will have a huge number of your photos. By studying this information, your great-grandchildren will be able to learn more about you than you know about your ancestors.