How To Send Email When You're Dead

The Narrative Fallacy writes "'The Last Messages Club' is a new service that sends personal emails written prior to one's death to loved ones in the future. The messages can range from a final love letter, guidance for someone left behind, a list of instructions, details on life insurance and other financial information. 'No one likes to think about their impending "demise," but it is much better to be fully-prepared, so that there is less stress on your loved ones after you pass away,' says founder Geoff Reiss. The system works by giving each member a secure and private vault where they are able to create messages to be sent specifically to their chosen recipient. A secure process ensures that messages are only sent after at least two people appointed by the user have confirmed that you have died and other safety criteria are met. 'I thought at first that maybe it was a bit ghoulish but on consideration I think it's a great idea as it would be nice for loved ones to receive messages from me when I'm no longer here,' says a technical adviser to the company. 'It's strange really as it makes you confront your own mortality in a sense.'"

Comments

Re-inventing the wheel

[coffeechica]

The idea of a will has existed for quite a while now. And your loved ones will, in all likeliness, find it a lot more useful if you leave them a dead-tree folder with all the collected information on insurances, people to notify, financial information etc. Much less creepy than postmortem emails, and less likely to end up in the spam filter. Not to mention that such a folder is useful in other situations too, such as if you have an accident and end up incapable of taking care of your affairs.

Re:Creepy...

[ParticleGirl]

A friend of mine's mother passed away a few years ago, and before she died she told her daughter that she had left a very important letter for her. She said that her daughter would find it after she passed away. Well, my friend spent months tearing apart her mother's house and belongings, and never found the letter. Did her mother change her mind at the last minute? Did she hide it too well? Had she never gotten around to writing it? One thing that an email service has going for it is that the message is delivered. There is no finding involved. My friend will agonize about that letter for the rest of her life.