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Online Memorials Bring Strangers and Friends Together in Community of Grief
Executives at major memorial Web site companies say users often develop a close relationship with their Web page, visiting it as often as three or four times a day for years after the person's death. Traffic is heaviest usually in the morning and evening, as people start and end each day thinking about their loved ones.
The founders of Memory-of.com originally envisioned an online photo gallery for the deceased, but it now hosts forums for grieving people to talk to one another or to seek support.
  Michael Bloomer visits his wife's gravesite at Quantico cemetary on the 2nd anniversary of her death. He keeps up an online memorial website in part because his wife's job took her all over the county and "she had friends all over the place." (Lois Raimondo - Twp) |
"It's become a lifeline for a lot of families," said Henry Chamberlain, chief executive of Memory-of.com. In its early days, when the Web site went dark for a few hours, panicked users would e-mail and call, feeling as if they were reliving the loss of their loved one, he said.
The Internet's constant availability makes it possible for people to grieve in their own time.
"You can't tell someone when they should process their loss," said Scott Mindrum, president, chief executive and founder of Making Everlasting Memories LLC, which runs Mem.com. The company started in 1995 as an archive site. "What we didn't know was the bereavement value" of allowing people to create their own site, he said. "People face into their grief," to the point where family members sometimes hug the monitor when a video is played.
The death business can be a touchy one, especially when it comes to marketing, said Legacy.com's Ferguson. In early days of the Internet, some casket makers and funeral homes tried to advertise online -- which struck some users as tactless. Instead, most major sites may have a small ad for a florist on the home page but no advertisements on the guestbooks, she said.
Legacy.com wasn't sure how to react after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and when the war in Iraq began, Ferguson said. "We quite frankly didn't know how to respond. We didn't want to take advantage of the situation," but within days, people started asking for online services for those people, she said.
Dawn Cepero said she grieves mostly through the memorial Web sites she set up after her 4-year-old daughter, Caylee, died of leukemia last March.
For Cepero, the sites fulfill many functions. She uses them to claim that toxins in the well water serving her old home in Thonotosassa, Fla., caused her daughter's sudden, acute illness. She warns other parents to get their children blood-tested for the disease. She uploads every photo and video of her daughter for safekeeping. She helps raise funds for other children with leukemia. And while she continues to seek solace in all those activities, she also reads daily condolences she receives from other parents who leave her notes on various Web sites.
"I get probably 25 a day," said Cepero, who said those contacts helped her compile an e-mail list of people to help her with fundraising. "You feel like no one's forgotten, and no one's going to forget," said Cepero, who said that in her everyday life she seldom encounters people who have lost a child and can relate to her. "I probably would have lost my mind if I hadn't done something."
