State of Ohio: Ohio Launches New Data Dashboards to Report Overdose, Substance-Use Measures. “Ohio Governor Mike DeWine today announced that the state has launched new data dashboards to better track and report data on overdose deaths and other substance-use related measures for all 88 Ohio counties.”
KSTP: Minnesota Department of Health introduces new tool to track violent death. “The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) introduced the Minnesota Violent Death Reporting System (MNVDRS) dashboard on Wednesday, a comprehensive tool used to observe trends in violent death county by county. The dashboard uses information about violent deaths including suicide, homicide, unintentional firearms, law enforcement intervention or other violent deaths between 2015 and 2020.”
UCLA Law: UCLA Law Releases New Database To Monitor Deaths In U.S. Prisons With Funding From Arnold Ventures . “…the UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project is releasing a comprehensive public resource documenting prison deaths nationwide. Relying on each state’s public records law and publicly available reports, our team requested and gathered information on each death in U.S. prisons covering at least 2019-2020; for a few states, like Louisiana and Texas, we have relied on exceptional colleagues who had already collected the data in their states.”
WIRED: What Web3 Can Learn From Archive of Our Own . “[Fannish Next-of-Kin] arrangements allow users of the popular fan-fiction website Archive of Our Own to designate another fan to take control of their works—things like fan fiction, fan art, essays, and videos—after they die. Carpenter had heard of the policy before, but it was XT’s death—and the suggestion from a fellow server member that they all consider naming a FNOK—that spurred her into action.”
New-to-me: A worldwide map of memorial benches. Over 26,000 of them. From the About Page: “There are blue plaques to commemorate the famous and influential figures of the past. For everyone else, there are memorial benches. A quiet reminder of the people gone but not forgotten. A spot to rest your weary legs and give silent thanks to ‘Alice – who loved this park’.” This site also mentions a similar site for memorial plaques.
TechCrunch: Empathy’s new tool uses AI to generate obituaries, and it’s not half bad. “Writing an obituary isn’t an easy task. That’s an understatement — it’s incredibly painful, usually expensive too. But someone has to do it. Or perhaps not. Consider leaving it to AI. That’s the pitch Empathy, a platform that provides support for families who’ve recently suffered a loss, is making with the launch of its new tool that uses AI to create obituary drafts. Called Finding Words, the tool generates obits from basic info provided by family members.”
Undark: Wanted (by Scientists): Dead Birds and Bats, Felled by Renewables. “[Todd] Katzner, [Mark] Davis, and other biologists are working with the renewable energy industry to create a nationwide repository of dead birds and bats killed at wind and solar facilities. The bodies hold clues about how the animals lived and died, and could help scientists and project operators understand how to reduce the environmental impact of clean energy installations, Davis said.”
University of Rochester: The ethics of dark tourism. “[Julia Granato] offers a history of the collection and treatment of human remains in the West, and a discussion of the recent phenomenon of ‘dark tourism’—the visiting of sites that commemorate or offer reminders of tragedy or death…As part of her research, Granato has created a virtual component—an interactive map of dark tourism sites in the western world.”
ERR (Estonia): New database helps Setos find graves of relatives on Russian side of border. “Taking care of relatives’ graves is an extremely important part of Seto culture. However, in recent years, many Setos living in Estonia have been unable to get to their ancestors’ burial sites on the Russian side of the border to ensure their upkeep. Now, a new database has been established to help keep track of the Seto and Estonian graves in neighboring Petserimaa.”
MIT Technology Review: Inside the metaverse meetups that let people share on death, grief, and pain. “Death Q&A is a weekly hour-long session built around grappling with mortality, where attendees often open up about experiences and feelings they’ve shared with no one else. Bright, cartoon-like avatars represent the dozen or so people who attend each meetup, freed by VR’s combination of anonymity and togetherness to engage strangers with an earnestness we typically reserve for rare moments, if we reveal it at all.”
Mid-Day: Why people are keeping their deceased ones alive through social media accounts. “The last post on Bollywood singer KK’s Instagram account was in October 2022, roughly five months after his sudden death in Kolkata last May. ‘After he passed, I spoke to Nakul [his son], about what we should do with his account,’ says Shubham Bhatt, KK’s manager, ‘and we decided to not deactivate it as it was a way to reach out to all his fans….’ … The singer’s posthumous Instagram account is now of the many belonging to renowned artistes across the globe, who have an active account after their death.
Esquire: How to Unfriend Your Dead Brother. “As months passed, I attempted to accept Andrew’s death, but his digital self refused to. By all accounts—literally—he lived on. When did technology become the guy who casually brings up traumatic events without noticing he’s crippling you?”
Bloomberg: TikTok’s Viral Challenges Keep Luring Young Kids to Their Deaths. “The blackout challenge has been linked to the deaths of at least 15 kids age 12 or younger in the past 18 months, according to data Businessweek compiled from news reports, court records and interviews with family members. At least five children age 13 and 14 also died in that time. Headlines in the wake of the deaths frequently singled out TikTok, but police departments denied Freedom of Information Act requests to see incident reports that might help prove which platform was involved, if any.”
Slate: Russian Oligarchs Keep Dying in Suspicious Ways. Wikipedia Is Keeping a List.. “On July 9, an anonymous Wikipedia editor with the username ‘cgbuff’ started Wikipedia’s 2022 Russian mystery deaths article, which chronicles ‘unusual deaths of Russian-connected businessmen [that] occurred under what some sources suggest were suspicious circumstances.’ When the article was first published, it listed just nine Russian oligarchs.Today, it chronicles 17 deaths, and it’s been viewed more than 400,000 times.”
University of Bristol: Good Grief announces first mini-festival about ‘Grief + Memory’. “The hugely popular Grief Channel, a spin-off from the original Festival, now has its own YouTube channel, with all its content free to access and share…. In another development, later this year the team will launch a new website, the Grief Hub, providing curated resources and signposting to a host of organisations and content from charities and groups across the UK.”
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