Welcome to the Story of Us

 

Hello, and welcome to “The Story of Us”, a bespoke social networking application designed to unite people in their grief. Society’s approach to grieving is not immune from the impact of technology, and digital culture has progressively influenced the ways in which people mourn and memorialise the death of a loved one. As a result of this expansion, the Web can no longer be considered a supplementary space for rituals that were once manifested solely offline. In addition to the Web, the advent of social media and rise in platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, have shown that there are alternative outlets for people to display their grief and for individuals’ virtual presence to live on, even when they cease to exist in the physical realm.

The emerging and interwoven nature of technology, in relation to an ever-expanding memorial culture, is beginning to challenge the conventional societal constraints that once encompassed the nature of mourning. Equally, social media has transformed the connection individuals can have with those who are facing death as, before the Web, communication with the dying was restricted by geography, time, and familial connections. However, as society embeds itself within the digital realm, the traditional hierarchies that once encompassed the grieving process are beginning to disintegrate, thus enabling a new level of intimacy for those who want to remember a loved one.

As the virtual world reveals itself as a haven for online support groups, memorials and celebrations of death, more individuals are finding it easier to express their loss and grief through these forums. Thus, our proposal is to build a social networking application that will be both mobile and Web based, designed to bond those who are grieving, whilst enabling them to continue the story of their loved one within a specifically tailored community. This application will be designed not only to coincide with advances in technology, but also to correlate with the progression of society’s relationship with grief, helping people to cope with loss day by day and find comfort by expressing themselves in a virtual community.

Written by Ashton Kingdon

Economic Context

  The Story of Us is a charity- based application, which would be free of charge for its members. The initial business plan is to contact local funeral homes to fund our idea in exchange of free advertisement on the app. The plan is to expand to regional funeral homes after the app has taken …

Read more

Anonymity

  Our social network application provides four main features: Contacting a local counsellor Information on mental health topics Instant messaging Forum chats The Story of Us is an application that supports its users’ during the bereavement process. Therefore, it is crucial to have a robust system that protects the anonymity of its users at all …

Read more

Use of Technologies

After market research has been conducted the implementation of The Story Of Us application will start. In the following post we will discuss the technologies and tools that will be implemented on the app.  The Story of Us make use of Web- and mobile-based technologies for an enriched experience. The use of technologies may vary …

Read more

UML Diagram

The class diagram of The Story of Us social network illustrates the basic structure of this application. The main class User contains all the users of the app. Users have the option of selecting their location. If users choose to do so users can link up to other users in the same area. Users struggling …

Read more