Will You Webcast Your Funeral?

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That question was phrased poorly.

You won’t be doing much of anything at your funeral. But would you want your funeral to be webcast for those who can’t attend? The practice is growing in popularity, according to a recent USA Today article.

The benefits, of course, are that those who live too far away, have no drivers license, can’t stand the smell of formaldehyde, are agoraphobic, or any combination of the aforementioned challenges can virtually attend a given funeral without actually being there in person.

The potential downsides are that you’re not, you know, actually there. And the article makes no mention as to how much of an additional cost webcasting a funeral adds to the total bill either.

Whatever the case, streaming live video of funerals is apparently catching on. John Reed, an owner of two funeral homes in West Virginia said, “In the past three years we’ve gone from absolute zero to the point where we now do 50% of our funerals on the Web,” according to the article.

And even for funeral homes that don’t offer streaming services, the ability for even mildly savvy funeral attendees to stream video from most smartphones is limited only to a decent web connection and an app from the likes of Qik, Ustream, Justin.tv or similar services.

For the record, I’d like my funeral to be webcast and I’d like it to be webcast by one of the attendees—if only for the sheer irony of being the one and only person in my entire family, extended family and network of friends that’s even remotely interested in technology.

More on TIME.com:

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Radio Toaster: Ultimate Convergence Device?

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