Beyond the Silent Frame: Solving the “Story Decay” of Our Family Legacies Part 1
Jan 27, 2026
3 min read
Introduction
We’ve all seen them. Boxes of faded Polaroids in the attic or thousands of unnamed JPEGs buried in a “Misc_2014” cloud folder. We tell ourselves we’ll organize them one day, but the truth is more haunting: Photos aren’t just disappearing. Stories are..
Imagine sitting with your grandfather, Arthur, looking at a photo from 1958. He tells you a hilarious story about a crab pinching his toe right before the shutter clicked. You laugh, you connect, and the history feels alive.
Now, imagine that same photo fifty years from now. Arthur is gone. The laughter is gone. All your grandchildren see is a silent, grainy image of a man they don’t recognize. Without the story, the photo becomes an object rather than a memory. This is Context Decay, the primary antagonist of my thesis project.




