Interorbital Systems has this cool TubeSat Personal Satellite Kit for only $8000, which includes launching it into low earth orbit. Briefly, what you get is “the satellite’s structural components, safety hardware, solar panels, batteries, power management hardware and software, transceiver, antennas, microcomputer, and the required programming tools.” Or, you can mix and match your own replacements. You then toss in the components of your experiment.

Along with the list of typical tech/geek type of experiments you’d expect, they mention “space burials”.

That would be an interesting bit of legal research. For a “burial”, what are you allowed to send up? Microbes? Insects? Pets? Relatives? Would the country over which the tiny “coffin” burned up have any say in who or what could be cremated over their territory? (I’m assuming you don’t have much choice regarding where the orbit finally decays and the satellite burns up.) What if it failed to burn up completely — would you be distressed if a smouldering housecat from space suddenly impacted the hood of your car?

image: TubeSat Photo 77 Edit 2 S 1.jpg, Interorbital Systems