Objecs, which specializes in the exchange of digital information between people and objects, has announced that it developed a new group of technology enhanced memorial products expected to help cemetery visitors access texts and photos by touching a cell phone against a new or existing cemetery headstone.

According to company officials, the products will be sold under the brand name RosettaStone and will be available as a palm-sized stone tablet or as a coin-sized stick-on polymer tag (News - Alert) called a Data Tag - which can adhere directly to a headstone.

The test and photo of each Data Tag will be uploaded and managed by the buyer to an online Data Archive site which is available along with the purchase.

The products incorporate a microchip which leverages multiple cell phone technologies and allows anyone with an Internet enabled cell phone to access a tag’s related information.

Near Field Communications-Radio Frequency Identification or “NFC-RFID,” is a global communications standard that will be available in the U.S. soon.

“The NFC technology is impressive to see in action, but the benefit of having a Data Tag on a headstone goes beyond the technology,” said John Bottorff, Objecs founder and principal member. “Each tag has a unique ID number that serves the same purpose as a database primary key.”

Bottorff also said that the existence of this ID number on a grave marker is good for the industry as a whole and can be freely used by anyone including Web-based genealogy and memorial sites. He pointed out that this unique ID number creates a common reference between the physical world and the digital world in ways that cannot be achieved by first and last names.

Christopher Hill, Founder and CEO of FuneralResources.com explained that his company’s aim was to make sure that both families and Funeral Directors are constantly kept updated and aware of the many new and cutting-edge technologies being introduced into the funeral industry.  He added that the RosettaStone product group will be very useful to those who are interested in long-term record archive and historical reference.