Two of the articles we read, “Inadvertent Algorithmic Cruelty” and “Enter the Grief Police” got me thinking about what we expect from technology as it relates to grief insofar as we can keep technology separate from the human people who use it. Eric’s chief complaint is that he was not consulted about his “Year in Review,” which Facebook’s algorithm selected an image of his deceased daughter to represent. He writes that those who have had years full of crisis “might not want to look at this past year.” However, I’d argue that some would–what about those who would share their year in review, even if it was a devastating one, as a form of mourning? The Garber piece in The Atlantic also touches on this territory–no one can establish what is and isn’t an appropriate reaction to grief (with the exception of the trolls Whitney Phillips elaborates on). As Garber phrases it, “The notion that there is but one way to grieve, and that the deviation from that way is wrong” has no place on the internet. Perhaps for every person who wouldn’t want to share their year in review, there’s one who does — one who doesn’t find Facebook grief to be “utterly insincere,” as Camilla Long’s tweets describe.
The kind of content we expect from the internet is changing. Eric writes that “The design [of Facebook’s year in review] is for the ideal user, the happy, upbeat, good-life user. It doesn’t take other cases into account.” I would argue that this vision of the internet’s / social media’s purpose is incomplete. Eric’s judgement brings to mind that the characteristics he describes are what we used to expect from content (importantly, self-advertised content) on the internet. But now, the internet is becoming an acceptable place to mourn. As Garber puts it, #RIPDavidBowie wasn’t just a trending topic–it was a digital funeral.