Comments on: Respectance: Social Networking With A Deadly Twist

By: terry george

terry george — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 09:31:25 +0000

i set this up in 3 years ago and finance it myself. tell me what you think please?

Terry
x

By: janet arnett

janet arnett — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 13:57:33 +0000

A site to add to the discussion of memorial sites: http://www.PartingWishes.com This one is very upfront about the cost per length of time posted. It is a very well constructed site, operated by professionals who demonstrate appropriate respect for their customers

By: Counselling & Psychology | Mallorca

Counselling & Psychology | Mallorca — Sun, 25 May 2008 21:17:53 +0000

Counselling & Psychology | Mallorca…

Living in Mallorca can be both exciting and challenging at times, but when you find yourself a bit overwhelmed by life the British Counselling Service are there…

By: Wise Elephant: Design and Influence » Blog Archive » On-line Social Networks - The Unusual

Wed, 19 Dec 2007 19:35:24 +0000

[...] another niche social networking site has launched, this time for those who’ve passed on, according to [...]

By: Raman

Raman — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 15:50:13 +0000

I guess I didnt do wrong when I came up with the idea of creating networks for professionals. I expect to have good user based. Your comments are solicited.

By: jon

jon — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 10:21:54 +0000

I’ve just been told about the debate going on above and have had a look at the new site Respectance. There is no doubt that memorial sites have massively improved in the last few years. I founded http://www.muchloved.com after my brother died in 95 and I tried to find a memorial site but they were all expensive and awfully styled – think angels at heaven’s gate, flowery fonts and depressing sounding organ music.
For newly bereaved people there are now some really nice choices but I must say that my heart and head told me that this area is one for counselling and support which should be charitable, rather than by making money. Bereaved people are very vulnerable people and this must always be remembered. In teh UK as well as http://www.muchloved.com there is another charity http://www.missyou.org.uk and we are looking to provide the right ethos as well as the right style. Therw will always be room for commercial organisations, but only those that ‘really get it right’ and respectance may or may not have got it. It will no doubbt be an interesting subject to come back to in the future to see developments.

By: Denise Carson

Denise Carson — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 19:15:57 +0000

I’ve spent some time over the last week at Respectance. It’s a great place to collectively share memories rather than reminiscing in solitude. I also think the site gives us an opportunity to transmute our dead from anonymity. This is important to those of us who have loved and lost. We are no longer geographically bound to a physical memorial site to spend time (at a cemetery or mausoleum) in reflection of a loved one. I visited the other sites that people have mentioned in the comments and I think each offers the user a different experience. Some of them feel like a virtual cemetery, funeral home or memorial wall. The attraction to these different sites depends on where you are on you grief journey. Respectance has a light, heavenly atmosphere. I liken my tribute pages to Myspace or Facebook profiles for the dead. Instead of visiting the site to post a comment, you write a memory upon inspiration.

By: Lucy White

Lucy White — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 14:07:53 +0000

Hi yes agree with previous posts – its been done before and a bit better elsewhere I think – although the look and feel is a bit more like linkedin etc than some existing sites – though not sure how appropriate this is anyway. I also think the fact that it is a commercial venture (obviously looking to recoup its money) makes it a lot less appealing than somewhere like http://www.muchloved.com which is a registered not for profit charity who have sponsorship and don’t aim or need to make a profit. Apart from creating much more special & beautiful tributes, they also have their tributes guaranteed by thedatatrust for ten years or in perpetuity which I think is really important for a memorial site – you don’t want your memorial disappearing when a commercial site deosn’t hit its profit margins in the first year! I think this is not the arena for a commercial venture and companies that set out to make money from people’s grief are never going to have an ethos that’s as sympathetic to the needs of the bereaved as a charity.

By: Sahar Sarid

Sahar Sarid — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 18:16:43 +0000

“Your competition is the one you are yet to know about”

This was told to me only a week ago by a close friend of mine who sold his co. for high eight figures, highly successful individual. In the case of respectance, he is so right.

Cheers

Sahar

By: Martha Mihaly

Martha Mihaly — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 08:24:30 +0000

Respectance has far more to offer than a venue allowing people to create tributes. It is a site to hold memories and tell life stories. Our tag line is “share your memories”, and it is exactly what we hope for. In the social networking context we allow strangers and friends to share visceral emotions whether happy or sad.

It is my hope that as our community grows our members will be able to provide the support for one another that they find difficult to find elsewhere.

Many of the websites listed as competition really aren’t because they are simply online obituaries. We offer the first human face in this niche, and we will work hard to continue that trend.

By: Respectance.com » Crunched!

Respectance.com » Crunched! — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 02:15:31 +0000

[...] this is even better than Richard’s video interview in French! Respectance got reviewed by TechCrunch late Tuesday night. TechCrunch is a pretty much the leading site about Web 2.0 products & [...]

By: Lana and Jason

Lana and Jason — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 18:35:11 +0000

Memorial sites are considered something of a trend right now, but Memory-Of.com has been around for over three years, providing the community with a way to celebrate life, as well as grieve loss. Our 50,000+ members have been reaching out to each other and forming real friendships since 2004. New members join everyday, and enjoy the free trial memorial pages, and free candles that we offer. The truth is that not all memorial sites are created equal. Memory-Of.com is not about sadness, but celebration and making the good times last forever.

Stephen Forsyth, our Chairman and Founding Trustee, had the death of his brother in mind when he started Memory-Of.com. He realized that there were things he never knew about his brother, that there were things that he was starting to forget, and how valuable a record of his brother’s life would be. So in 2004, at the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum, he launched his company.

We are currently updating our social networking technology, and will have a big re-launch very soon. In the meantime, we continue to offer support and education, by giving access to articles and advice, as well as a network of people to share with. We are a community that’s constantly striving to give comfort to the grieving, and celebrating the lives of those we love.

By: dave mcclure

dave mcclure — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 16:22:19 +0000

i think we already saw this company envisioned at Half-Baked @ E-tech… it was called CorpseTwitter.com.

By: beyondwww

beyondwww — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 16:01:13 +0000

God!!!!!!!!!! aren't people tiered of Social Communities?????????????? Beyondwww

By: Concrete Stain

Concrete Stain — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 14:33:50 +0000

One problem;

– we thought myspace had bad usage- rates ; After the common dead person has been buried for more than 3 months / most people will never revisit the site.

– Although this is a good idea – for families / …

By: Chuck

Chuck — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 01:19:54 +0000

I see the next logical extension of this as memorial to those who were killed because they deserved it, rather than dying of disease or natural causes.

Comeuppance.com, anyone?

By: jose

jose — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 00:35:05 +0000

It´s a good idea, and they make it well to avoid controversy. As for the ads, it´s ok what they have done. The ads will be on other pages of the web, and it´s a way of increasing their users.

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 22:53:42 +0000

Tim, sure, you are free to disagree all you want. No clear leaders that I’ve seen, and I’ll bet I know why – has to do with the general behavior of people. Life goes on. Nothing wrong with it, just the human nature.

Sure they can succeed. Maybe they will and best of luck to them. But I still doubt it. Due to the same human nature behavior.

And “in perpetuity” is a long, long time to remain committed from one host (who may or may not stay in business or honor the contract) to host stories forever with a small investment that generates interest without setting up a back-up.

I guess I”m just surprised that people are thinking of this as “new”. Many of these memorial sites tribute places have been around for a bit now.

By: Tim

Tim — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 21:40:02 +0000

Mike, I respectfully disagree with your conclusions.

While there are other sites doing this concept, are there any clear leaders?

It almost sounds like you think that if there are already competitors, there is no opportunity for success and profit. Don’t forget Google was not close to the first search engine, they were just the first to get it right.

Perhaps you don’t see anything breakthrough in this site, but if they execute correctly it could turn into the market leader and become a very profitable business.

Most likely this funded beta is just the start. Once they grow the concept there are a lot of directions they could go. I see a lot of potential here, for the simple reason that a lot of people have never heard of sites like this. While there may be competitors, the market is far from saturated.

There is plenty of room for a strong new website to promote this concept and make it become a more accepted venue for bereavement.

By: Tim

Tim — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 21:35:15 +0000

In respect to the comments on this service being closed down, I think it should be pretty easy and cheap to leave the websites running perpetually. With a small enough investment, and the ever decreasing costs of hosting, it should be pretty easy to make an investment where the interest pays for the hosting charges. This is basically a perpetuity.

It would be interesting to see if any of the companies are doing this.

Plus there is the issue that if you have so much traffic that it costs a lot of money, then certain advertising models could be pursued to pay for the bandwidth. Of course with this company’s commitment ot never user advertising…

By: David Mackey

David Mackey — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 20:49:53 +0000

Seems like a pretty solid (though niche) model to me.

By: The Social Net » Social Networking July 4, 2007 1:46 pm

The Social Net » Social Networking July 4, 2007 1:46 pm — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 18:18:31 +0000

[...] Comment on Respectance: Social Networking With A Deadly Twist by Tim One idea was talked about by is to use AI to let the dead people talk to each other, making it a real social networking site for the dead. That could be interesting. =^). Here is a blog post where someone discusses this option. … [...]

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 17:55:15 +0000

@Sputnick – that’s a great point too. I noticed that several of these memorial sites say that they keep the memorials forever, but how? When the owners are long dead and gone, how can they possibly assure that. There is no provision in place to do so. One site says they’ll give you your money back. How nice, but er – I’m dead….. once the hosting fees are no longer paid, all the memorials go into the literal dead pool.

By: sputnick

sputnick — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 17:46:19 +0000

In the Philippines, unscrupulous vendors sell what is known as “double-dead” chicken. The chicken dies of some disease, possibly avian flu, but is made to look as if it has been slaughtered, and sold anyway to unsuspecting consumers.

Now we have another prospective definition of “double-dead”, namely when this startup runs out of money and/or momentum, pulls the plug on all the servers, and all the pages disappear from view forever.

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 17:41:59 +0000

As I said, this idea has already been done to death, even with social networking elements.

@TIm – those other sites already have all that stuff. I am sorry but this is really nothing new. At all. Sorry Respectance….. all memorial sites are for the living. I don’t want to sound disrepsectful but I don’t think you guys did your homework if you really feel you’re the first 2.0 site that’s cashing in on people’s grief and need to connect, leave tributes, discuss, euglogize etc.

Did you look at memory-of, and some of the tribute sites? you have a nice design but there is honestly nothing new in your site that I see. You’ve run into a big ocean of existing competition. There are even already several pet memorial sites where people can leave tributes, light candles, share memories etc.

Todd, you’re right, those sharing sites should be when the person is living, thus all the social networking sites (MyFamily, Celebration-of, and all their clones, heck even the pure social networkin gsites ) already do all that.

Sorry, my opinion is there is no there there.