A company from the USA offers its customers to call a voicemail and leave a message for a deceased relative. The message is transmitted into space via radio waves, and should echo there forever
You can forget about emails, cell phone calls, greeting cards or newspaper ads. It turns out that there is another way to send personal messages to the whole world - and maybe even to the next world - for less than 25 dollars. By sending radio waves into outer space, a company in Pennsylvania, USA, allows the sender to give a final farewell to dead loved ones, words of comfort to lost pets or a birthday greeting to a family member. The company "Endless Echoes", which started operating this month, offers its customers the possibility to dial a phone number and record a one-minute voice message. Then, through a relay station located in Germantown, Maryland, the company broadcasts the message into space. Theoretically, the message should continue its journey through space at the speed of light forever.
The founder of the company, Paul Forte, a former beeper technician, said that he got the idea 14 years ago when his grandfather died in Italy and he didn't have a chance to say goodbye to him properly. One day, when he was working on a tower at a radio relay station, the thought occurred to him of sending messages to the universe using radio waves. "It was just as if my grandfather patted my head and said: 'Don't forget that night in 1989,'" said Forte. In March 2002, he decided to risk everything for the realization of the idea: he quit his job and moved from the suburbs of Philadelphia to the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania, to start realizing his vision there. Although at first he was mocked by the "Federal Communications Council", he now pays a monthly fee and uses the radio waves of the satellite Internet company "Skycasters LLC" to operate the service.
Forte tested his invention on several test cases earlier this year. One of the first was Rosie Potbaum, 44, of Philadelphia, who sent messages to her father Arthur Zermoski, who died of a cancerous brain tumor at the age of 44 in 1972, and to her brother Arthur Jr., who died the same year at the age of 21 in an accident. "This idea allowed me to say goodbye," Putbaum said. With the help of the company's services, a couple from Colorado announced their daughter's birthday; A girl from Florida told her lost dog she missed him, and a guy from New York declared his love for his fiancee on Valentine's Day.
According to Forte, since he opened the business on June 1, he has had over 20 customers. Judging by the thousands of customers of the "International Registration of Stars" company, which allows its customers to register stars in their name - the number of its customers may increase considerably.
Ray Fairman was moved to tears after finally being able to say goodbye to an old family friend who passed away a few months ago. After calling the company on his cell phone and sending his message, he felt peace of mind. "It made me feel really good. It's a great way to convey a message or bring things to an end and put them behind you," said Fairman.
