The question soon came up: What do we do about his Facebook profile? We had never really thought about this before in such a personal way. Obviously, we wanted to be able to model people's relationships on Facebook, but how do you deal with an interaction with someone who is no longer able to log on? When someone leaves us, they don't leave our memories or our social network. To reflect that reality, we created the idea of "memorialized" profiles as a place where people can save and share their memories of those who've passed.We understand how difficult it can be for people to be reminded of those who are no longer with them, which is why it's important when someone passes away that their friends or family contact Facebook to request that a profile be memorialized. For instance, just last week, we introduced new types of Suggestions that appear on the right-hand side of the home page and remind people to take actions with friends who need help on Facebook. By memorializing the account of someone who has passed away, people will no longer see that person appear in their Suggestions.
Mikenna Pierotti on 28 Apr 12Interesting yet slightly morbid. Does immortalizing the dead on a social media platform that by definition requires interaction among the living to fulfill its purpose reveal yet another narcissistic impulse? For whom are we writing? Obviously not the dead (unless you can make some sort of argument that they check their feeds from the afterlife). For ourselves? If that were the case, we could just as easily sit at home and mourn a photograph. It seems more like this type of mourning is much more performative and public than that...
