Out there: Remembering the dead
March 9, 2003
by Peggy O'Crowley
The Star-Ledger
The price of immortality? How's 10 bucks sound?
That's how much it costs to create an
online memorial to yourself that family and friends can visit when you've
left this mortal coil.
A new online service, www.PartingWishes.com, will create
cyberhomes for your will, funeral wishes, messages to loved ones or a
memorial for yourself or a loved one.
Subscribers can leave these written instructions in encrypted messages, to be
read posthumously by anyone they select.
"A lot of people express what they want in their funeral, but
they don't write it down, or they put a piece of paper in a bedside table, and
it might not be discovered for weeks or months later. Then you find out, 'Oh,
wow, he wanted to be cremated,'" CEO and president Tim Hewson says. "Or it's
kind of awkward to discuss your funeral. Or you want to let someone know
you've got a stash of bank notes in your closet, but not until you're gone."
The Ottawa-based company came about after Hewson and a
partner attended the funeral of a colleague at a large telecommunications
company. Everyone seemed to agree that the funeral was too somber and morbid for
a twentysomething young man (who died in a car accident), he said. It also got
him to thinking about a will, another task many people find too unpleasant to
deal with. Subscribers can create an online will that is tailored to all 50
states and the different provinces of Canada.
Prices vary for different services. The Silver I package
includes files for funeral services, messages to loved ones (or enemies) and a will
for $35 a year, $60 for 10 years. And that $10
will keep your Web page, complete with pictures and testimonials, going for one
year after your death; it costs more to extend it for 5 or 10 years later. Of
course, you can provide for the upkeep in your will.
Either way, says Hewson, "that's a bargain."
-- Peggy O'Crowley
(From The Star-Ledger newspaper, Sunday, March 9, 2003)
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