Experiences in Designing Technologies for Honoring Deceased Loved Ones

Abstract

This article describes and reflects on the processes of designing two devices, Timecard and Fenestra, that both aim to propose new ideas for creating technologies that support rituals of honoring deceased loved ones. The discussion provides insight into how their respective designs were crafted to provide a range of interactions and to interweave with domestic practices, artifacts, and spaces; the article also describes the projects' similar strategies to supporting relationships with the deceased. Reflections then are offered about the design of future technologies aimed at supporting the processes both of adapting to the loss of loved ones and of honoring their continued evolving place in the lives of the living after they are gone.

Designing Anekdota: Investigating Personal Metadata for Legacy

“…Participants referred to data as something that exists in an omni-present, all-encompassing form, as foating in the air, as something that spreads, or is quickly evolving. While this imagery is consistent with data gathering taking place during the COVID-19 pandemic, it underscores how metadata is seen as placeless, spaceless and formless [37]. These qualities lead to confusion: placelessness makes us unsure of data's location, making them feel out of our control; spacelessness makes it hard to grasp size and scale, making them feel impossible to interact with and curate; formlessness denies the sense of history gained through material qualities like patina, and make them feel less real.…”

“…Odom, Zimmerman & Forlizzi describe virtual possessions' experi ential qualities in order to understand why they complicate phe nomena such as legacy [37]. They separate virtual possessions into three distinct categories: Material possessions such as photographs or documents that have become virtual; Immaterial possessions that include virtual messages, social media profles, game avatars; and metadata, which are described as logs that capture people's actions To them, the general problem with virtual possessions is that they cannot be encompassed by theories of material possession attach ment [2,31].…”

Information science and the inevitable: A literature review at the intersection of death and information management: An Annual Review of Information Science and Technology (ARIST) paper

“…In addition to developing design concepts and studying users, many works acknowledge and explore the complexity of the intersection of death and technology, such as the relevance and influence of different ages and cultural backgrounds (Bos, 1995; Foong, 2008; Odom et al, 2018; Uriu et al, 2006; Uriu & Okude, 2010; van den Hoven et al, 2008), the entanglement of interactive technology and spiritual death practices (Uriu et al, 2018, 2019), and the curatorial aspect of such artifacts (Wallace et al, 2020). Works have also touched upon broad legal, ethical, technical, and professional issues that affect information systems (Boscarioli et al, 2017; Maciel & Pereira, 2015), such as the social influence of technologically mediated relationships with the dead (van Ryn et al, 2017) or the adoption of death‐related technologies for digital archeology (Graham et al, 2013).…”

“…As examples of thanatosensitive design in practice, several works develop digital artifacts to support the honoring and mourning processes. Some digital artifacts serve communication between mourners (van den Hoven et al, 2008) while others provide pictorial representation to digital memorials (Bos, 1995; Chaudhari et al, 2016; Odom et al, 2018; Uriu & Odom, 2016; Uriu & Okude, 2010; Wallace et al, 2020) or a combined representation of physical and digital remains of someone deceased (Uriu et al, 2018). The artifacts differ in their various focuses (e.g.…”

“…The artifacts differ in their various focuses (e.g. the digital representation of loved ones, sometimes enriched with additional information) but also in their physical design (Odom et al, 2018; Uriu et al, 2006), which may allude to existing death practices (e.g. tombstones, Häkkilä et al, 2019) or not.…”