On keeping a journal: 1091 days of life data collection

http://stevecorona.com/on-keeping-a-journal/

by stevencorona • 14 years ago

26 17 14 years ago

c0balt279• 14 years ago

A (moleskine) notebook is great for this. And so is a folder on google docs (or an encrypted true-crypt vault if you're paranoid).

keithpeter• 14 years ago

I get a cheap page a day diary (A4/Letter) off the market each year. Lets keep this thing low tech. Backups via phone camera and dropbox. The volume stays at home.

ajlburke3• 14 years ago

+ 1 on journal-keeping.

I've been keeping a diary for the last 8 years or so. The act of writing about and reflecting on each day is useful - but it's also very helpful to be able to look back on what your daily life was like in the past. It's easy to forget what you were really thinking about several years ago, and a diary is a great way to give yourself some realistic perspective.

Brief pitch: A big problem I had in getting started with diary keeping was that I'd get busy and not write anything for several days, and then I'd have trouble remembering what I did, say, last Tuesday. Sometimes, to be honest, I forget what I did this morning. I gather this is a common reason for losing the diary-keeping habit.

A few years ago I scratched my own itch on this and built "Remembary": an iPad diary app that collects photos, tweets, Facebook updates, and RSS feeds and organizes them by day, giving you some context to help you remember what you did each day. It's a bit like the iPhone app Momento, but iPad-native and focused more on writing rather than just collecting feeds.

If you're just getting into diary writing or have tried before but have had similar problems getting traction, you might want to check it out. I'm wrapping up a major version 2.0 update that should (hopefully!) be out in a few weeks. You can find out more at http://remembary.com (I'm about to revamp the site too).

It's cheaper than a Moleskine (if you already have an iPad anyhow), is easily searched, and can be backed up to DropBox or email, too.

/pitch

stevencorona2• 14 years ago

Very impressive app. Love the "It's cheaper than a Moleskin" tagline, haha. Once I get another iPad, I'll check it out. I use Evernote (which has a terrible UI), but I have so much data it's next to impossible to import it into any other system.

ajlburke3• 14 years ago

Thanks! By the way, the upcoming version will also work on iPhone/iPod Touch.

I'm currently in that crazy-making pixel-perfect OCD design polish phase that takes so long in iOS apps. If the design gods and the testing gods smile on me, it should be out before the end of the month.

ddw2• 14 years ago

I've been meaning to start a journal (will start now), but I've been using Daytum obsessively for the last year and a half.

At this point I have over 24K+ data points about my life including what I've done, consumed, people I've seen and the good and bad things that have happened to me. It can be a pain to keep up sometimes, but I have a hunch that the data becomes more valuable as time goes on.

aw3c22• 14 years ago

It creeps me out to no end that people would log such kind of data to a remote, online service they have zero control over. I hope at least you keep backups for you. But my concerns are the privacy.

will_lam3• 14 years ago

You can keep the data private and there is no built in "social" with Daytum. It doesn't look like the founders will be working on it anytime soon since they were "acq-hired" by Facebook. I've been using it for the last 2 years to measure and visualize my personal data.

But to each their own, I suppose.

ddw2• 14 years ago

What will_lam said. I constantly download data dumps in case the website completely goes down and all of my data is private.

will_lam3• 14 years ago

I've been keeping a journal since 2007, however, my entries were not as frequent as Steve. Lately, I've been obsessive with personal data collection a la Daytum.com, iDoneThis.com, Fitocracy, MemoLane.com, RescueTime.com, and Timehop.com that passively record things about my past, which is fascinating, empowering or downright depressing when I see what I've done in the past.

It's interesting to use these services or manually (Moleskine and pen) to be more cognizant and aware of where we're going in our lives, to be more appreciative of what we've done or how we've spent our time in the most "ideal" way we construct for ourselves.

schneby2• 14 years ago

I find it funny that his earlier posts say he is "giving up social media" when he tweeted about this blog post. I question the validity of the 1091 days.

stevencorona2• 14 years ago

:-)

It's true I have been tweeting my blog posts and posting them on facebook, as well as replying to comments about my posts on Hacker News. I feel that this falls within the guidelines I set for myself- which was to stop collecting information and produce value in my life. I don't read my Twitter or Facebook stream, and use it solely as tool for (seldomly) publishing my things I've created.

You'll notice I have only tweeted about 6 times over the past 20 days, when I was tweeting well over 50+ times a day previously.

schneby2• 14 years ago

Fair point. And I'm going to try the same thing on my 30th Birthday in 6 days. And I may run naked.

willidiots• 14 years ago

Flagrant self-promotion: if you're interested in this sort of thing, check out myscribr.com. We're all about preserving your life for future days.

We start by importing the information you're already posting to Facebook, Twitter etc. We'll send you a nightly email asking how your day went - simply reply and we'll save your response as a private entry. View your past on any day of the year, or browse through an aggregate timeline. When it suits you, you can click a few buttons and order your past in printed book form, suitable for shelving.

ajlburke3• 14 years ago

That looks very cool. The daily reminder email is a great touch.

These are very interesting times for diary-keeping - we're leaving so many more traces of our lives around these days.

The book output option is nice. I'm thinking of this as an option for future versions of Remembary, too. Aren't these books quite big and expensive though? Or is that the point?

On keeping a journal: 1091 days of life data collection

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