The Black Mirror TV series explored dystopian futures, and one of its recurring themes was the idea of a digital life after death. This was the theme of no less than three episodes: Be Right Back (2013), San Junipero (2016) and Eulogy (2025). As often with science fiction, life is not far behind, and there is now a digital afterlife software industry based on artificial intelligence. Products such as Storyfile, Project December and HereafterAI allow someone to construct a digital rendering of a deceased person based on data about their life. This may include emails, text messages, social media, photos, voice files and video. Large language models (LLMs) then create original, unscripted conversations based on the data, rather than merely repeating pre-recorded phrases. The tool DeadSocial (now branded as MyWishes) allows users to capture personal messages that can be viewed by relatives and friends after death, such as at funerals. They can even be instructed to post social media messages on platforms like Facebook after someone has died.
Some of these tools are text-based, but others produce an avatar with a voice or a speaking video. Somnium Space, created by Artur Sychov after his father died, constructs an avatar that is based on conversations and mannerisms, recorded via virtual reality headsets and haptic suits, created while a user is still alive. An avatar is built based on this information that can interact with friends and family. There are products that can produce a full-body hologram, and some research projects even involve a neural interface to gather data from the brain. The idea of uploading an entire human consciousness has long been a speculative area of science fiction, such as in Neal Stephenson’s novel “Fall; or, Dodge In Hell“ (2019), and the “Dixie Flatline” in William Gibson’s seminal and multiple award-winning novel Neuromancer (1984).
This emerging industry is not just an obscure sideline. Although estimates vary wildly depending on exactly what is included and excluded, it may be worth as much as $31 billion in 2025. Higher estimates may include products such as digital wills and asset inventories, but a significant segment is the creation of digital memorials of people. Needless to say, this area, which is essentially unregulated, raises a host of ethical issues. Who actually owns a digital self after death? What if someone hooks up a digital avatar to an AI agent and allows it to take actions on behalf of the avatar? How do such digital reminders affect the grieving experience of loved ones? Have the deceased persons always consented to these creations?
How secure is the data, and if it were hacked, could it be used for highly targeted misuse of various kinds? This is quite apart from any spiritual or philosophical issues about “the soul”.
While it may seem ghoulish, some people claim to have found some comfort in such “grieftech” products, but there are clearly many risks and issues. As with many other areas of emerging technology, AI has been used in ways that its inventors probably did not anticipate, though the science fiction world most certainly anticipated it. The core LLM technology is not only used for customer service chatbots and for summarising documents, but is now creeping into unexpected areas of our lives. We are now building digital ghosts that can outlive us. It is no longer a question of whether we can build such things, but rather whether we should.
