Mourning in the digital age: New trend for putting QR codes on gravestones to commemorate the dead with online multimedia content
PUBLISHED: 00:52 EST, 1 October 2012 | UPDATED: 01:28 EST, 1 October 2012
It’s modern technology that has secured its roots in the past.
Just when you thought smartphones had taken over all aspects of life, they are now taking control of death too as they enable messages to come from beyond the grave in the form of digital bar codes.
Digital Legacys, a Philadelphia business, is developing brass QR codes that grieving families can attach to the after-life memorials of their loved ones.
Leaping into the 21st century, the tags will allow smartphone users to upload personal details about the deceased, accessible by way of an online tribute to those who scan the code.
Lorie Miller, who has launched the new business with her husband Rick, said she is confident the concept will take off.
‘It’s just a great technology,’ she said, adding that other similar companies have already demonstrated success in the sale of such codes.
Mrs Miller’s inspiration came after the death of her grandparents, whose grave was the first to have one of her brass squares stuck to it.
Her mother, Mariyn Elias, told npr.org that she hopes her daughter’s endeavor will help keep families’ memories alive.
‘When you come out to the cemetery and you’re just standing and looking at a headstone it’s just looking at printing or writing and you usually walk away feeling teary-eyed or depressed,’ she said.
‘Now I feel that I come out, and I put my smartphone on, and I can look at my mom and say, “Mom, what were you thinking when you wore that hairdo years ago? I remember when we bought that dress.”
‘I think you can better feel, and walk away feeling better – maybe even laughing, sometimes.’
Mrs Elias added that she hopes the new technology will help make cemeteries ‘come alive’.
