Identity, Memory, Death and the InternetURL: http://www.jentropy.com/archives/400Bob Cormier reflects on the digital legacy of a colleague and friend, Lee Baber.He also reflects on the nature of identity:“Identity is, for me, things being identical over time. When I think of my own identity I look for those things that are the same in two different incarnations or timestamps and calls those things identical. … To look at someone’s identity is to look for those things that are the same over the period you are looking at. We are creating this identity in little bits all the time. We leave little trails of ourselves in different places only for them to crystallize when we stop feeding the beast.”I think what Bob is referring to is the essential self. The everyday concerns and circumstances change over time, as do our relationships, careers, hopes, fears, and challenges, but there still exists our core selves that transcend time. We are encountering others not be looking at another’s identity, but observing the footprints of others through a lens made up of a unique set of circumstances, needs, and experiences. Bob describes his memories of his brother, 20 years after his death, and shares a photo.Hethen observed that, thanks to the Internet, future generations will have a collection of legacies left behind for them from previous generations. “…Our grandkids will, barring a worldwide meltdown, KNOW their parents and grandparents in a way that we never did.”I am inspired by the following declaration:“There is a longer, more human thing at work here that I’m reaching for. There is a sense in which we are storing the memories of ourselves, of our friends, of the ways that we are all connected to each other. Of our love.”He then follows up with a comment that reminds me of the Elder role I described in my edublogging typology.“I am seriously starting to wonder about the stewardship of digital identity. Who cultivates our digital graves when we leave?”Bob, this is a powerful question, a question that will shift the perspective of how we prepare ourselves to build up, celebrate, learn from, and then pass on our personal legacies to our families and friends, so they can engage in the cycle of sharing, celebrating, learning and witnessing.