Post-digital Species
New forms in the age of digital immortality | Concept worldbuildingFuture concept worldbuilding / 3D environment design
NO.3 Post-digital Species
New forms in the age of digital immortality | Concept worldbuilding
Digital inheritance, resource conversion, and biological cultivation form the path from death to a speculative third kind of life.
- My contribution
- Concept worldbuilding, 3D environments, and visual design
- Project stage
- Concept design, 3D models, and environment films
A World of Digital Immortality
When death cannot erase a person’s data, can life continue in another form?
The project explores digital immortality: when a digital identity becomes as significant as a physical one, does death still mark the end of life? In this imagined future, memories, emotions, behaviour, and relationships are continuously stored online. The body disappears, while its data and memories remain.
Digital immortality comes at a cost. As digital legacies accumulate, the systems maintaining them consume increasing amounts of energy and resources. Preserving the past begins to change the future, creating a conflict between digital civilisation and the physical ecosystem.
The resulting concept, NO.3 Post-digital Species, combines digital inheritance, resource circulation, and biotechnology. Neither a conventional human nor a purely digital intelligence, this speculative third form of life emerges where digital memories, biological information, and ecological resources meet.
Physical life creates digital life; digital life consumes physical resources; those resources give rise to a new life form. Death becomes a stage within a civilisational cycle. The project builds a post-digital life system to reconsider the boundaries of life, memory, and existence.
In this future setting, physical and virtual worlds merge. A person’s body and digital avatar together form a complete identity, carrying equal weight in social and emotional relationships.
Research & Concept
The research connects three questions: what happens to personal information after death, what resources sustain a digital world, and whether emissions could become a biological resource. Preserving digital legacies links life extension with the material cost of data storage.
Three Forms of Life
Physical and digital life depend on each other. A third node—the post-digital species—connects memory, biological information, and resource circulation in a cycle of death, conversion, and rebirth.
From Life Cycle to Spatial Model
A growing tree organises the three stages: digital inheritance at its roots, resource conversion in its trunk, and new species as its fruit. This structure turns the life cycle into a spatial model.
Death | Digital Funeral
Digital inheritance system: after physical death, a person’s memory data is preserved and enters the post-digital life cycle.
Digital Funeral Service Flow
- 01
Death announcement
An official institution confirms the death and submits the certificate to the system.
- 02
Personal data frozen
The virtual account is frozen, preventing further changes to digital assets.
- 03
Service access enabled
The digital funeral service is activated and takes over the next steps.
- 04
Digital identity assembled
Fragmented information is assembled into a virtual body and identity.
- 05
Online memorial opened
An online memorial opens on designated dates for friends and family.
- 06
Digital coffin sealed
The data is sealed in a digital coffin, awaiting archival storage.
- 07
Memorial avatar generated
A memorial avatar is generated from lifetime data, continuing the digital image.
- 08
Information inherited
Personal data enters the data cemetery as a preserved information legacy.
- 09
Energy system sustained
Maintaining the cemetery consumes energy, creating the ecological tension of the next stage.
Virtual avatar
Memories, behaviours, and social data are reconstructed into an enduring digital persona.
Digital coffin
The organised digital legacy is archived as an information carrier after death.
Digital memorial space
Family and friends can visit memories in a virtual space, maintaining emotional connections.
Digital wreath
The traditional memorial wreath is reinterpreted as a ritual for preserving memories and emotions.
Convert | Resource Cycle
Resource conversion system: as digital legacies grow, maintaining the data cemetery requires more energy. In this speculative system, carbon emissions and methane become resources that biotechnology returns to the life cycle.
01 — Energy use & emissions
The digital legacy system runs continuously, generating emissions and energy by-products.
02 — Carbon resource collection
Carbon dioxide and methane associated with the data system are collected for conversion.
03 — Biological resource conversion
Within the concept, methane-oxidising bacteria transform the feedstock into biological protein.
Reborn | Cultivation Laboratory
Post-digital cultivation: digital inheritance, biological resources, and life information recombine into a species between physical and digital life. NO.3 represents the third life form of this imagined civilisation.
NO.3 Post-digital Species
A new species between physical and digital life, born from memories, biological information, and ecological resources.
Biological information synthesis
The fictional synthesis system combines biological protein with human DNA to establish the new organism’s structure and inherited characteristics.
Methane-oxidising bacteria
Bacterial communities mediate resource conversion and supply the nutrients required for growth.
New Species & Archives
Cultivation Specimens
A facility dedicated to cultivating NO.3. Researchers control biological resources, genetic information, and growth conditions while observing new life from emergence to maturity.
Infant-00001
Cultivation specimen- Name
- Dolly
- Gender
- Gender-neutral
- Birthday
- 2095.01.01
Infant-00002
Cultivation specimen- Name
- Dolly
- Gender
- Gender-neutral
- Birthday
- 2095.01.01
Species Records Archive
Each NO.3 individual has an independent record of its growth stages, biological characteristics, genetic origins, and resource conversion history, forming a database of new life.
World Extension
The emergence of NO.3 moves life beyond the physical–digital boundary. As their numbers grow, these species develop ecosystems and civilisational structures of their own. Conflicts around digital inheritance, cultivation, and resource allocation reshape the social order.
The world could extend into a game where players become cultivators, researchers, or archivists. Managing digital inheritance, species growth, and ecosystems advances the civilisation. Different information sources yield distinct individuals, supporting collection, cultivation, and a species catalogue that reveals hidden records and new branches.
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