While I really like the principle, I don’t really see how that’s an alternative to cremation - sure, the “loved one”'s ashes are put in something cooler that an urn on the chimney… but it’s still cremation, innit ?
You ask me, if you want a really, really cool alternative to burial ? Organ donation. Living again in someone else ! How eternaler can you be ?! 
I wouldn’t say it’s cheap, but, that’s kinda what cryonic preservation always really seemed like to me.
You can do it, too (in some states). I’d love to do this, but it’s wicked expensive…maybe after I get rich!
Why worry about preservation? The more rotted your corpse is, the better a zombie you will be!
Sadly, it actually *costs *money to “donate” your remains to a medical school, although it is cheaper than any other method of (legal) disposal…I think about $150 the last I checked. And this definitely needs to be arranged prior to death.
Dress me up in stone age skins an dump me in the Antarctic. That oughtta screw up the archaeologists in 40,000 years.
How is this any different than just cremating someone and scattering the ashes in the ocean, though?
Reef balls. Hmm.
“Mommy, what happened to Daddy?”
“Your daddy sleeps with the fishes, dear.”
Simply scattering means the cremains become silt on the bottom, as my dad is. The reef balls become protective habitat. The smaller fish that can get through the holes can hide from bigger predators.
Soylent Orange is … oh, never mind.
And now reef balls are making the news!
How cool is that?! Thanks for sharing that article.