Author Archives: Alexandra Carmichael

Richard Ryan: Notes From a Year of Biohacking

Posted on April 14, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

Richard Ryan was inspired by the first QS conference to spend a year hacking his life. He most wanted to solve his problems with insomnia, obesity, Ambien dependence, hypertension, and drinking alcohol – what he calls “classic New Yorker problems.” In the video below, Richard talks about the changes he made to his lifestyle, rules of thumb he discovered, and the amazing progress he has made. (Filmed by the New York QS Show&Tell meetup group.)

Richard Ryan – Notes Toward a Biohacking Handbook from Steven Dean on Vimeo.

Posted in Videos | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Jakob Larsen: My Experience with a Smartphone Brainscanner

Posted on April 13, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

 Jakob Larsen and his team at the Mobile Informatics Lab at the Technical University of Denmark have developed a way to build a real-time 3-D model of your brain using a smartphone and the Emotiv EPOC game controller headset. In the Ignite talk below, Jakob describes how the fourteen sensors in this mobile EEG device rival a traditional lab EEG setup, and where he sees this inspiring project going. (Filmed at the QS Europe conference in Amsterdam.)

My experience with a smartphone brainscanner by Jakob Eg Larsen from Quantified Self Amsterdam on Vimeo.

Posted in Videos | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Simon Frid on Wearable Awareness

Posted on April 9, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

Simon Frid moved to California last year because his data told him he was smarter here than in New York. Well, not really. But this funny story begins his journey of figuring out how to track one of the simplest things that we don’t generally know about ourselves: our own posture. Simon designed a wearable sensor shirt with ten built-in accelerometers, and was able to improve his posture significantly from December to January. In the video below, he shares how he trained the shirt to recognize good posture, why he didn’t want immediate feedback, and what question he most wants to ask people. (Filmed by the Bay Area QS Show&Tell meetup group.)

Simon Frid – Wearable Awareness from Gary Wolf on Vimeo.

Posted in Videos | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Nicholas Manolakos on Twenty Years of Self-Experiments

Posted on April 8, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

Nicholas Manolakos is a programmer and avid reader who has been self-tracking for twenty years. He’s recently been improving his left-right body balance, and can write proficiently with both hands now. In the video below, he talks about many of his experiments, including optimizing cognitive performance, managing anxiety, introducing complexity, dietary experiments and fasting – interestingly, one of the things he discovered is that fasting and giving blood improved his cognitive performance. (Filmed by the Toronto QS Show&Tell meetup group.)

Nicholas Manolakos – Cognitive Performance from Gary Wolf on Vimeo.

Posted in Videos | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Announcing Ten New Sessions for the QS Conference

Posted on April 7, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

We’re excited to announce another new batch of talks and sessions at the upcoming QS conference. Thanks to everyone who is stepping up to speak! Check out these awesome topics:

Show&Tell Talks

Genes and Other Strangers (Esther Dyson)
Tracking Breathing with Wearables (Danielle Roberts)
Chronicling chronic lower back pain, posture, and happiness (Andrew Chang)
The Quantified Us: Self-knowledge through group connection (David Fetherstonhaugh)
A Group Mood Experiment by QS Boston (Michael Nagle)

Breakout Conversations

EEG for Self-Experimentation (Martin Sona)
Infographics 101: The Power of Visual Storytelling (Jason Lankow)
Personal Speech Analytics (Bill Jarrold)
Practice and Quantify Mindful Communication (George Lawton)
Open Ways to Connect Devices, Apps, and Humans (Rafi Haladjian)

All sessions are defined by attendees in advance of the conference, like a curated unconference. There will be breakout sessions, show&tell talks, and posters. We will keep posting them here as the date approaches.

The first 350 tickets are already gone, so if you’d like to come, please make sure to register here. And if you have a personal self-tracking story to share or would like to lead a breakout discussion, please let us know!

Posted in News and Pointers | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Mark Drangsholt on Tracking a Heart Rhythm Disorder

Posted on April 2, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

Dr. Mark Drangsholt is a long-time self-tracker who also teaches evidence-based medicine at the University of Washington. He has tracked blood pressure and exercise, atrial fibrillation and what triggers it, deep sleep and sex, diet and body fat. In the video below, Mark shares what he learned about his arrhythmia triggers, and how his self-tracking data helped sway his cardiologist to do a less invasive procedure. He also makes a great case that Quantified Self experiments can be more scientifically valid than many of his colleagues would like to admit. (Filmed by the Seattle QS Show&Tell meetup group.)

Mark Dangsholt – QS Tracking; an example using a heart rhythm disorder from David Reeves on Vimeo.

Posted in Videos | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

James Norris on Firsts and Maximizing Life

Posted on March 31, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

James Norris asks the Singapore QS audience, “Do you remember your first kiss?” In the 16 years since his first kiss at age 13, James calculated that he has had 1,500 “firsts.”  For the past three years, he has been tracking his goals, according to how happy, fulfilled, and productive he feels every day. In the video below, he shares what he learned about his goals, how his personal advisory board works, and tips for maximizing different areas of life. (Filmed by the Singapore QS Show&Tell meetup group.)

James Norris – Singapore QS – Life by the numbers from Ciaran Lyons on Vimeo.

Posted in Videos | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Bill Schuller on Quantifying With Kids

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

Bill Schuller started tracking his exercise and weight in 2010, and got into the habit of talking about his numbers each night at the dinner table. Before long, his kids got interested in tracking too. In the video below, Bill talks about what he learned and tells some fun stories, including one about a tracking game he made up with his five-year-old son to clean up the house while his wife was away for the weekend. (Filmed by the San Diego QS Show&Tell meetup group.)

QS San Diego: Bill Schuller – Quantifying with my Kids from Ernesto Ramirez on Vimeo.

Posted in Videos | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Randy Sargent on Tomatoes and Irritability

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

Randy Sargent has an hypothesis that eating certain foods, like tomatoes, makes him irritable and anxious. He asked himself, “How can I structure an experiment on myself so that I don’t know whether I’m eating tomatoes or not?” and “How would I go about quantifying my irritability?” In the video below, he explores ways to go about designing the experiment, with some fun input from the audience. (Filmed by the Pittsburgh QS Show&Tell meetup group.)

Randy Sargent – Discussing experimental design from Quantified Self Pittsburgh on Vimeo.

Posted in Videos | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Recap of First Beirut QS Meetup

Posted on March 26, 2012 by Alexandra Carmichael

Last Thursday, twenty people gathered in Beirut, Lebanon for the first QS meetup there. It was organized by the wonderful Hind Hobeika, and had presentations by a biomedical engineer studying human motion and a competitive outdoor sports enthusiast, as well as talks about a data analysis project on cortisone and tracking blood coagulation rate. Some pictures from the event are included below, and here’s a write-up of the event. Exciting!

Posted in Meeting Recaps | Tagged , | Leave a comment