A year ago today, former South African president Nelson Mandela, probably the most-loved person of the modern age, passed away at the age of 95.
A web application, In Tribute to Mandela, which allows people to post messages to the great man, was launched yesterday. About 43 000 tributes – received by the Nelson Mandela Foundation in the period shortly after his death – have already been posted on the app, which was developed by Flow Communications for the foundation. These messages have come from personalities such as Barack Obama and the Dalai Lama.
All tributes can be viewed on an impressive 4.2 gigapixel super-mosaic. The mosaic is made up of about 65 000 blocks, which means that more than 20 000 are still empty – waiting for anyone who would still like to pay tribute to Madiba to type in his or her message.
"The concept of the digital activation is that it encourages active participation in building the image of legacy, as defined by Madiba himself," says Danielle Melville, head of Communications and Outreach at the Nelson Mandela Foundation.
Flow Cape Town manager Kate Rau, who worked on the project, says: "The Nelson Mandela tribute site is a superb digital iteration of something everybody understands – the notion of individuals coming together in support of one vision. Today, as we remember the impact Nelson Mandela had on each of our lives individually, together we celebrate his legacy. At Flow we are honoured to have worked with the Nelson Mandela Foundation in driving Madiba's legacy online."
Flow MD Tiffany Turkington-Palmer adds: "The new In Tribute to Mandela app on nelsonmandela.org is innovative, interactive and in itself pays tribute to the great man. In the spirit of collaboration and community, the Nelson Mandela Foundation has chosen to share the tens of thousands of tributes, which were collected at the time of Madiba's passing last year, in a format that encourages people to post a tribute now, in commemorating the anniversary of his death."
Users land on a screen with a photo of Nelson Mandela, and by zooming in on Madiba's face they can see the tributes that have been loaded by people from around the world.
