According to the Seattlepi via Pasta and Vinegar, Microsoft aims at patenting a ‘project that would let information be stored indefinitely and accessed by future generations, or perhaps civilizations’. As MS named it, it’s a sort-of long-term ‘immortal computing’.

One scenario the researchers envision: People could store messages to descendants, information about their lives or interactive holograms of themselves for access by visitors at their tombstones or urns.

And here’s where the notion of immortality really kicks in: The researchers say the artifacts could be symbolic representations of people, reflecting elements of their personalities. The systems might be set up to take action — e-mailing birthday greetings to people identified as grandchildren, for example.