Digital Immortality or Deathbot?

Would you want your persona to live forever in the metaverse after your physical body shuffles off this mortal coil? That is what the metaverse platform Somnium Space plans to offer its users, starting in the next year or so, with its Live Forever service.

- By Ronald Bailey

By applying an unspecified artificial intelligence (A.I.), Live Forever would instantiate a digital avatar of the user based on vast amounts of information collected as he or she interacts in Somnium Space through virtual reality headsets, controllers, and, eventually, full-body haptic suits with motion capture and biometric monitoring. Data on facial expressions, body language, gait, voice, conversations, and character traits would allow the avatar to walk, talk, and react just like the deceased user. Descendants and friends could interact with the avatar in a perpetually accessible digital seance years and decades later.