Stephen Wolfram on Personal Analytics
technologyreview.com
technologyreview.com
A lot of people will find this type of technology a solution in search of a problem. This type of analysis may even distract from peoples lives.
Would the knowing that you do a certain thing a certain percent of the time almost become self fulfilling?
This is the type of technology that can make you into a productive cold robot, the thing is many people are not interested in becoming like this.
Maybe I'm wrong and we all now need personal analysis to squeeze the most out of life.
I know that I have to struggle to avoid analysing everything I do and think. It renders me paralysed and miserable. I guess steve would say that if I injected more real data I would be able to make more confident decisions rather than just worrying. Somehow I doubt that though. We here are all too aware of the pitfalls of naive analytics.
I was not very impressed with Stephen's blog post about the amount of data he had collected on himself. Ok I lie, it seemed impressive at first and then I asked myself "Whats the point?" and came up empty. If the data collected does NOT get in the way of life and can serve some purpose then it could be a good idea.
But Stephen's phone calls, email times and keystrokes seemed a bit pointless. Stephen seems to really enjoy collecting this data about himself and probably wants other people to collect similar amounts of data so he can compare them.
I'm not surprised that he might have the most data on himself, its not exactly a hobby that one can walk away from for a few weeks. If you break the timeline you ruin the consistency of the data. So its a hobby that needs lifelong dedication.
Good on Steven for finding a hobby that interests him, I just don't think its the future or if it is, it will be in a different form; useful data, medical information, things that can actually help you in a truly meaningful way. Some data is actually just useless or even counterproductive.
In general, I don't see the point of doing all that analysis. Or, at least he doesn't provide many good reasons (in my opinion) for doing it. This is the only one I could see:
> Very early on, back in the 1990s, when I first analyzed my e-mail archive, I learned that a lot of e-mail threads at my company would, by a certain time of day, just resolve themselves. That was a useful thing to know, because if I jumped in too early I was just wasting my time.
Now, this seems like a genuinely useful insight. But, in my mind, this isn't personal analytics. This is email analytics. See mailstrom - http://mailstrom.co/
It comes down to time invested in analyzing and useful data out.
I'm on the fence about it. If truly useful information can be obtained without having to set up anything then that's a good thing. However a lot of personal analysis would happen away from the computer too. How to record real life away from PC data?
Maybe Google glass could automatically detect what your eating?
Its all about time. Do you want to spend x amount of time time analyzing/setting up instruments/inputting real life data into a computer/iPhone, to potentially save y time? and risk saving no y time and losing x time?
I think some more people doing this and showing a clear positiveness would be a good thing.
Also another aspect is some people will enjoy collecting data and others won't. Some people take a thousand photos on holiday, others 10. I think this type of personal data aggregation will appeal to some and just seem daft to others. Which is the beauty of humanity I guess.
Good (and thought-provoking) point. This approach implicitly encourages a tech/gadget-heavy focus in one's life - which makes me queasy. And what would be the end-result of this analysis? More-efficient, but deeper-ingrained use of technology? If the result of the analysis were people putting down their smartphones and, instead, have face-to-face conversations with other people - or people no longer playing Candy Crush Saga and, instead, putting that time toward a cause that improves the world, I'd be all for it. But, I don't see that happening.
I have no need for the the notion that my act of living constitutes an object ("my life")... that would be burning down the village in order to "improve" it.
I just try to enjoy life. So I don't feel the need to worry about data or memories.
It goes some way to augment memory and is fast & easy to use.