Matters of life and death (like, OMG!)
As if anyone needed another reason to stay far from MySpace and its driveling kin, now its members can apparently be subject to tacky virtual memorials if they die sudden and so-called untimely deaths and their profiles live on.
Some are suggesting this could foreshadow the future of mourning in a wired world, giving grieving families and friends a space in which to connect and keep the dear departed's memory alive–in some rather creepy ways:
It will be interesting to see what sorts of privacy issues come out of matters like these, and how they're resolved. For instance, what should an Internet company do when family members of someone who died want access to the deceased's private e-mail account? Why do people even think they have a right to access things after a person's death that they would never dream of asking for in life, or want things they know will probably only upset them and make them feel misled?
I know I once made a half glib, half solemn pact with my mother that, whichever of us dies first, the other will destroy her computer and have her e-mail accounts deleted without nosing around in either, lest any well-wishing meddlers get a chance to use our private communications and creations against our wishes or memories.
(Also, if I ever die in some dramatic fashion or in some freak accident that gets covered on the local news, I want someone who knows me to walk up to the reporter and, when he or she asks what I was like and how I'm going to be missed and whatnot, just say you're glad I'm gone because I was really kind of a bitch. Just FYI.)
But I suppose, at least Facebooking from beyond the grave isn't making anyone any money.
In all this uproar over the Harvard student who allegedly plagiarized parts of her "chick-lit" novel, I've been left wondering two things: How is it right that people get $500,000 contracts to write such crap in the first place, and how do you even spot and prove plagiarism within the genre? I mean, how many original ways can there possibly be to describe slobbering after loser emo boys and manufacturing existential angst to liven up a materially perfect, princess life?
The great thing about the Internet is that bad and inconsequential writing doesn't take up physical space or get legitimated by tangible, third-party publishing and compensation.
The horrifying thing about the Internet is that all that bad and inconsequential writing is going to be what makes up this era's primary-source history, and guide how we as digital denizens end up being remembered.
Some are suggesting this could foreshadow the future of mourning in a wired world, giving grieving families and friends a space in which to connect and keep the dear departed's memory alive–in some rather creepy ways:
The Walkers correctly guessed the password to their daughter's page, and used it to alert her friends to details of her memorial service. They also used it to access photographs and stories about their daughter they had missed out on.Yeah, way to get to know your child better–because what parent wouldn't feel cheated not seeing that, in online life, their precious angel was a drunken whore with woefully poor English skills and bad taste in just about everything? But of course, whoever has the most "friends," even after they're dead, is still just a little bit better than everyone else.
"It's a little weird to say as a parent, but the site has been a source for us to get to know her better," Mr. Walker said. "We didn't understand the breadth and scope of the network she had built as an individual, and we got to see that through MySpace. It helped us to understand the impact she's had on other people."
It will be interesting to see what sorts of privacy issues come out of matters like these, and how they're resolved. For instance, what should an Internet company do when family members of someone who died want access to the deceased's private e-mail account? Why do people even think they have a right to access things after a person's death that they would never dream of asking for in life, or want things they know will probably only upset them and make them feel misled?
I know I once made a half glib, half solemn pact with my mother that, whichever of us dies first, the other will destroy her computer and have her e-mail accounts deleted without nosing around in either, lest any well-wishing meddlers get a chance to use our private communications and creations against our wishes or memories.
(Also, if I ever die in some dramatic fashion or in some freak accident that gets covered on the local news, I want someone who knows me to walk up to the reporter and, when he or she asks what I was like and how I'm going to be missed and whatnot, just say you're glad I'm gone because I was really kind of a bitch. Just FYI.)
But I suppose, at least Facebooking from beyond the grave isn't making anyone any money.
In all this uproar over the Harvard student who allegedly plagiarized parts of her "chick-lit" novel, I've been left wondering two things: How is it right that people get $500,000 contracts to write such crap in the first place, and how do you even spot and prove plagiarism within the genre? I mean, how many original ways can there possibly be to describe slobbering after loser emo boys and manufacturing existential angst to liven up a materially perfect, princess life?
The great thing about the Internet is that bad and inconsequential writing doesn't take up physical space or get legitimated by tangible, third-party publishing and compensation.
The horrifying thing about the Internet is that all that bad and inconsequential writing is going to be what makes up this era's primary-source history, and guide how we as digital denizens end up being remembered.
posted by Holly at 10:51 PM
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