When Sunshine Henle's mother, Linda, died unexpectedly at the age of 72, Henle, a 42-year-old Floridian, was left with what she describes as a "gaping hole of silence" in her life. Even though Linda had lived in New York, where she worked as a Sunday school teacher, the pair had kept in constant contact through phone calls and texting. "I always knew she was there, no matter what – if I was upset, or if I just needed to talk. She would always respond," says Henle. In November, Linda collapsed in her home and was unable to move. Henle's brother Sam and her sister-in-law Julie took her to urgent care.

A computer scientist is urging the world to record their elderly parents and loved ones as he predicts consciousness could be uploaded onto a computer this year. Dr Pratik Desai, who has founded multiple Silicon Valley AI startups, said that if people have enough video and voice recorders of their loved ones, there is a '100 percent chance' of relatives'living with you forever.' Desai, who has created his own ChatGPT-like system, wrote on Twitter: 'This should be even possible by end of the year.' Many scientists believe the rapid advancements in AI, which ChatGPT is spearheading, are poised to usher in a new golden era for technology. However, the world's greatest minds are split on the technology - Elon Musk and more than 1,000 tech leaders are calling for a pause, warning it could destroy humanity. On the other side are other experts, like Bill Gates, who believe AI will improve our lives - and it seems other experts are on board with the idea it will help us live on forever.

Photography can no longer represent our identity. Our identity can no longer be represented by the two-dimensional flat surface of a photographic image alone. Photography has had its day. The photograph as a referent of our identity will be replaced by an AI Hologram. In the 21st-century digital world, our identity is represented by multiple forms of technology.

Interactive internet-based technologies are transforming the way in which we understand death, grieving, and coping with loss. Online communication together with changes in social and religious attitudes in western society has created a space where the individual is part of the collective. The transition from analog to digital combines the private with the public and the real with the virtual. Feeding the digital afterlife zeitgeist are tech giants who are eager to build a synthetic heaven where big egos go to die. The idea of a synthetic heaven is offensive to many with long-standing religious beliefs even though those same beliefs are as synthetic as digital data. GLIU AI and Visual Arts is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. We are living in an AI-powered Matrix future and the richest man in the world agrees.

Somnium Space is a metaverse platform and live forever service. Its Live Forever mode creates a digital avatar of users based on information collected when interacting in the Somnium Space through VR headsets, controllers, and soon, full-bodied haptic suits with motion capture and biometric monitoring. Data on facial expression, body language, conversations, voice, character traits, and gait, allows the avatar to walk, talk and react with descendants and friends who can interact with the avatar of their deceased loved one. Initially, death bots and private chatbots were based on data supported by dead individuals but Somnium Space goes one step further with a moving full-body avatar. Somnium CEO Artur Sychov created the project after his father died from an aggressive form of cancer.

Were you unable to attend Transform 2022? Check out all of the summit sessions in our on-demand library now! I have been thinking about death lately. Possibly because I recently had a month-long bout of Covid-19. And, I read a recent story about the passing of the actor Ed Asner, famous for his role as Lou Grant in "The Mary Tyler Moore Show."

For decades science fiction film, television, and literature have addressed our human desire for connection with our dead loved ones. With the creation of artificial intelligence, our imagination for machine learning holograms and robots has turned into reality. More recent film and documentary programs have addressed this new technology and I will be examining numerous mediated stories throughout my research studies.

As we gather with family and friends in video spaces, with our virtual backgrounds and touched-up faces, our actual bodies are safely secreted away in our modern bunkers, waiting for the day we might return to the living. In this context, there is something uneasy in streaming the new Amazon Prime series Upload. Like other shows that have explored the intersections between technology and society, Upload questions what it means to be truly human--and, in particular, about the potential of some part of our selves living on in digital form. The plot follows some standard tropes, including a whodunit, a romance, and a character who does a lot of growing up after he has died. But beneath this, we are presented with set pieces that make strange the possibilities of our digital selves living rich lives after death, and that question what it means to live full lives in the meantime.

In 2033, the Gordita Crunch is sold virtually by fast food goliath Nokia Taco Bell. Mega-airline corporation Frontier Spirit United offers 30-minute flights from New York to Los Angeles with the option of Economy Minus. The most popular reality show is Baby Botox--which is exactly what it sounds like. Vape lung is a chronic disease. Far East Movement's 2010 chart-topper "Like a G6" is considered classical dance coursework in schools.

Take Black Mirror's dystopian tech commentary, The Good Place's philosophical exploration of the after-life, and the workplace antics of The Office, mash them together, and you have Amazon's Upload. It takes place in a world that could easily be 10 years from now -- self driving cars are commonplace, the Earth is polluted and over-crowded, and, oh yeah, you can also achieve digital immortality by uploading your consciousness to the cloud. Upload, which premieres today, is an entirely new territory for Greg Daniels, the genius writer behind The Office, and Parks and Rec (not to mention a long run on The Simpsons). But it's a world that's clearly been percolating in his mind for years. It's bold and raunchy in a way a network sitcom never could be, and it defies being classified into a single genre.