I see dead people – in a video on my smartphone, having scanned the QR codes on their gravestones.
That’s what you could be saying if you lived in Tonbridge, Kent, where Hyphenalia now offers to add the ‘bar codes’ to gravestones which, once scanned, can give smartphone users access to a web link containing a wealth of information about the deceased.
Videos are just the tip of the iceberg here. Photos, music and family tree info are just a few other things that can be added to the site.
This could have been of real benefit to my family over the years, especially as my dad is very much into researching our family tree.
I remember one cold, rainy day in particular, as my dad and I traipsed around a graveyard up in the Highlands while my sister sat in the car, tears rolling down her cheeks. It was her birthday and this was not how she’d imagined spending her special day.
Anyway, it’s not easy reading some of these gravestones. Time and weather wears the letters away so much that a lot of them become completely unreadable, so the QR codes could be very useful.
Would you want this kind of digital info to be available on your gravestone once you have passed into the netherworld?
Personally, I’m not really sure what I would want to happen once I have departed. I have a donor card, but I’ve not signed it because I want someone else to get use of it once I’m dead.
My dad’s always telling me to get stuffed, but maybe I’ll get myself frozen. I suppose if there’s one time when you can afford to be a little bit indecisive it’s when you’re dead.
